Opinion ID: 683213
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Lemon Applied

Text: 61 Analysis under the Lemon test, reviewed in Collins, leads to a similar conclusion. Under the Lemon test, we examine whether the state action has a secular purpose, has a primary effect of advancing or inhibiting religion, or fosters excessive entanglement with religion. Collins, 644 F.2d at 762. 62 A government practice ... fails the purpose prong of Lemon if its purpose is to endorse a religious custom or viewpoint. Kreisner v. City of San Diego, 1 F.3d 775, 781 (9th Cir.1993), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 690, 126 L.Ed.2d 657 (1994). Collins held that the invocation of assemblies with prayer has no apparent secular purpose.... Collins, 644 F.2d at 762. The graduation assembly or ceremony at issue here presents no circumstances that would distinguish it from Collins. The school district suggests that the prayer is intended to solemnize the occasion. However, we find solemnization through prayer no more secular than the use of prayer in the promotion of moral values, the contradiction to the materialistic trends of our times, [and] the perpetuation of our institutions.... Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 223, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 1572, 10 L.Ed.2d 844 (1963). Prayer and reading of the Bible without comment in public schools were alleged to serve such purposes in Abington, yet these goals were insufficient to save those practices under the Establishment Clause. 374 U.S. at 223-24, 83 S.Ct. at 1572. Nor was the teaching of legal history sufficient to save the practice of displaying the Ten Commandments on the high school wall in Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. at 39-40 n. 1, 41-42, 101 S.Ct. at 192-93 n. 1, 193-94. Prayer is probably the quintessential religious practice. Jaffree v. Wallace, 705 F.2d 1526, 1534 (11th Cir.1983), aff'd, 472 U.S. 38, 105 S.Ct. 2479, 86 L.Ed.2d 29 (1985). We conclude that solemnization is insufficient in this case to secularize what is objectively and inherently religious. 63 Even if the prayers did have a secular purpose, the primary effect of such prayer appears to advance religion.... Collins, 644 F.2d at 762. The prayers said in this case are indistinguishable from those that might be said in a church service. If said there, no one would dispute that their intent and primary effect was to advance religion. We do not think the character of the prayers changes when said at graduation. For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that application of the Lemon test demonstrates an Establishment Clause violation in this case.