Opinion ID: 778298
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Considerations of Policy: An A.A. Privilege

Text: 102 In response to Cox's conviction, [n]umerous self-help groups ... expressed outrage. Jessica G. Weiner, Comment, And the Wisdom to Know the Difference: Confidentiality v. Privilege in the Self-Help Setting, 144 U. Pa. L.Rev. 243, 244 (1995); see also Jan Hoffman, Faith in Confidentiality of Therapy is Shaken, N.Y. Times, June 15, 1994, at A2; Jimmy Breslin, Without a Shield, AA May Not Survive, Newsday, June 14, 1994. While one witness who testified at Cox's trial reportedly remarked that AA is not above the law, Breslin, supra (quoting Ms. [sic] S), others thought that the conviction threatened the confidentiality of A.A., a sine qua non of its therapeutic efficacy as a program for recovering alcoholics, see id. A priest, also an A.A. member, commented: 103 The confidentiality at AA is almost the same as the confessional.... Good Lord, if you don't have it at an AA meeting, then we are all threatened.... [O]nce you make [A.A.] people talk about one thing, what is to stop the authorities from deciding that they can come around for anything, an income tax case. Therefore, is a double murder more important than the confidentiality of AA? There had to be a better way to solve this case. 104 Id. (quoting anonymous A.A. member and priest). 105 We repeat our observation in DeStefano that [w]e have no reason whatever to doubt what we have been told: that A.A. is a vastly worthwhile endeavor; that it has saved the lives, health or well-being of thousands of Americans, at least in part because it requires participants to engage in intensive religious self-reflection. DeStefano, 247 F.3d at 422. Cox may be a case in point. He testified that since joining A.A., he has never again consumed an alcoholic beverage. We also have no reason to doubt the importance of confidentiality of communication to the success of the A.A. program. 106 But our role is not to decide the policy issues that underlie the State of New York's legislative or judicial choice to adopt or reject such an evidentiary privilege — whether the confidentiality of A.A., and the social values it may promote, outweigh the State's interests in enforcing its criminal law and promoting the public's right to every person's evidence. Our role is strictly limited. We must decide whether the state court's refusal to shield Cox's communications with fellow A.A. members from disclosure, even though New York law protects certain kinds of disclosures between clergy and congregants, violates the Establishment Clause. We hold that it does not because, even if the Establishment Clause requires that some communications between A.A. members in some circumstances be protected by New York's cleric-congregant privilege, Cox's communications to fellow A.A. members do not qualify for such protection. We have neither the occasion nor the authority to consider the wisdom of that conclusion or the policy issues that may be relevant to New York's decision whether to protect the confidentiality of communications among members of A.A. Those considerations remain the exclusive province of New York State's legislature and governor in enacting state law, 16 and its courts in interpreting statutes and crafting common-law privileges. 17