Court Opinion

ID: 9427703
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:21:36.893547+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:09.227754
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Powell,
with whom The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Stewart, and Mr. Justice White join, dissenting.
This case presents again a dispute among church members over the control of a local church’s property. Although the Court appears to accept established principles that I have thought would resolve this case, it superimposes on these principles a new structure of rules that will make the decision of these cases by civil courts more difficult. The new analysis also is more likely to invite intrusion into church polity forbidden by the First Amendment.
I
The Court begins by stating that “[t]his case involves a dispute over the ownership of church property,” ante, at 597, suggesting that the concern is with legal or equitable ownership in the real property sense. But the ownership of the property of the Vineville church is not at issue. The deeds place title in the Vineville Presbyterian Church, or in trustees of that church, and none of the parties has questioned the validity of those deeds. The question actually presented is which of the factions within the local congregation has the right to control the actions of the titleholder, and thereby to control the use of the property, as the Court later acknowledges. Ante, at 602.
Since 1872, disputes over control of church property usually have been resolved under principles established by Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall. 679 (1872). Under the new and complex, two-stage analysis approved today, a court instead first must apply newly defined “neutral principles of law” to determine *611whether property titled to the local church is held in trust for the general church organization with which the local church is affiliated. If it is, then the court will grant control of the property to the councils of the general church. If not, then control by the local congregation will be recognized. In the latter situation, if there is a schism in the local congregation, as in this case, the second stage of the new analysis becomes applicable. Again, the Court fragments the analysis into two substeps for the purpose of determining which of the factions should control the property.
As this new approach inevitably will increase the involvement of civil courts in church controversies, and as it departs from long-established precedents, I dissent.
A
The first stage in the “neutral principles of law” approach operates as a restrictive rule of evidence. A court is required to examine the deeds to the church property, the charter of the local church (if there is one), the book of order or discipline of the general church organization, and the state statutes governing the holding of church property. The object of the inquiry, where the title to the property is in the local church, is “to determine whether there [is] any basis for a trust in favor of the general church.” Ante, at 600. The court's investigation is to be “completely secular,” “rel[ying] exclusively on objective, well-established concepts of trust and property law familiar to lawyers and judges.” Ante, at 603. Thus, where religious documents such as church constitutions or books of order must be examined “for language of trust in favor of the general church,” “a civil court must take special care to scrutinize the document in purely secular terms, and not to rely on religious precepts in determining whether the document indicates that the parties have intended to create a trust.” Ante, at 604. It follows that the civil courts using this analysis may consider the form of religious govern*612ment adopted by the church members for the resolution of intrachurch disputes only if that polity has been stated, in express relation to church property, in the language of trust and property law.1
One effect of the Court’s evidentiary rule is to deny to the courts relevant evidence as to the religious polity — that is, the form of governance — adopted by the church members. The constitutional documents of churches tend to be drawn in terms of religious precepts. Attempting to read them “in purely secular terms” is more likely to promote confusion than understanding. Moreover, whenever religious polity has not been expressed in specific statements referring to the property *613of a church, there will be no evidence of that polity cognizable under the neutral-principles rule. Lacking such evidence, presumably a court will impose some rule of church government derived from state law. In the present case, for example, the general and unqualified authority of the Presbytery over the actions of the Yineville church had not been expressed in secular terms of control of its property. As a consequence, the Georgia courts could find no acceptable evidence of this authoritative relationship, and they imposed instead a congregational form of government determined from state law.
This limiting of the evidence relative to religious government cannot be justified on the ground that it “free[s] civil courts completely from entanglement in questions of religious doctrine, polity, and practice.” Ante, at 603. For unless the body identified as authoritative under state law resolves the underlying dispute in accord with the decision of the church’s own authority, the state court effectively will have reversed the decisions of doctrine and practice made in accordance with church law. The schism in the Vineville church, for example, resulted from disagreements among the church members over questions of doctrine and practice. App. 233. Under the Book of Church Order, these questions were resolved authoritatively by the higher church courts, which then gave control of the local church to the faction loyal to that resolution. The Georgia courts, as a matter of state law, granted control to the schismatic faction, and thereby effectively reversed the doctrinal decision of the church courts. This indirect interference by the civil courts with the resolution of religious disputes within the church is no less proscribed by the First Amendment than is the direct decision of questions of doctrine and practice.2
*614When civil courts step in to resolve intrachurch disputes over control of church property, they will either support or overturn the authoritative resolution of the dispute within the church itself. The new analysis, under the attractive banner of “neutral principles,” actually invites the civil courts to do the latter. The proper rule of decision, that I thought had been settled until today, requires a court to give effect in all cases to the decisions of the church government agreed upon by the members before the dispute arose.
B
The Court’s basic neutral-principles approach, as a means of isolating decisions concerning church property from other decisions made within the church, relies on the concept of a trust of local church property in favor of the general church. Because of this central premise, the neutral-principles rule suffices to settle only disputes between the central councils of a church organization and a unanimous local congregation. Where, as here, the neutral-principles inquiry reveals no trust in favor of the general church, and the local congregation is split into factions, the basic question remains unresolved: which faction should have control of the local church?
*615The Court acknowledges that the church law of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS), of which the Yineville church is a part, provides for the authoritative resolution of this question by the Presbytery. Ante, at 608-609, and n. 7. Indeed, the Court indicates that Georgia, consistently with the First Amendment, may adopt the Watson v. Jones rule of adherence to the resolution of the dispute according to church law — a rule that would necessitate reversal of the judgment for the respondents. Ante, at 609. But instead of requiring the state courts to take this approach, the Court approves as well an alternative rule of state law: the Georgia courts are said to be free to “adop[t] a presumptive rule of majority representation, defeasible upon a showing that the identity of the local church is to be determined by some other means.” Ante, at 607. This showing may be made by proving that the church has “provid [ed], in the corporate charter or the constitution of the general church, that the identity of the local church is to be established in some other way.” Ante, at 607-608.
On its face, this rebuttable presumption also requires reversal of the state court’s judgment in favor of the schismatic faction. The polity of the PCUS commits to the Presbytery the resolution of the dispute within the local church. Having shown this structure of church government for the determination of the identity of the local congregation, the petitioners have rebutted any presumption that this question has been left to a majority vote of the local congregation.
The Court nevertheless declines to order reversal. Rather than decide the case here in accordance with established First Amendment principles, the Court leaves open the possibility that the state courts might adopt some restrictive eviden-tiary rule that would render the petitioners’ evidence inadequate to overcome the presumption of majority control. Ante, at 608 n. 5. But, aside from a passing reference to the use of the neutral-principles approach developed earlier in its *616opinion,3 the Court affords no guidance as to the constitutional limitations on such an evidentiary rule; the state courts, it says, are free to adopt any rule that is constitutional.
“Indeed, the state may adopt any method of overcoming the majoritarian presumption, so long as the use of that method does not impair free-exercise rights or entangle' the civil courts in matters of religious controversy.” Ante, at 608.
In essence, the Court’s instructions on remand therefore allow the state courts the choice of following the long-settled rule of Watson v. Jones or of adopting some other rule — unspecified by the Court — that the state courts view as consistent with the First Amendment. Not only questions of state law but also important issues of federal constitutional law thus are left to the state courts for their decision, and, if they depart from Watson v. Jones, they will travel a course left totally uncharted by this Court.
II
Disputes among church members over the control of church property arise almost invariably out of disagreements regarding doctrine and practice. Because of the religious nature of these disputes, civil courts should decide them according to principles that do not interfere with the free exercise of religion in accordance with church polity and doctrine. Serbian *617Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 426 U. S. 696, 709, 720 (1976); Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, 393 U. S. 440, 445-446, 449 (1969); Kedroff v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral, 344 U. S. 94, 107 (1952); id., at 121-122 (Frankfurter, J., concurring). See also Kreshik v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral, 363 U. S. 190 (1960); Maryland & Va. Eldership v. Sharpsburg Church, 254 Md. 162, 254 A. 2d 162 (1969), appeal dismissed for want of substantial federal question, 396 U. S. 367 (1970). The only course that achieves this constitutional requirement is acceptance by civil courts of the decisions reached within the polity chosen by the church members themselves. The classic statement of this view is found in Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall., at 728-729: 4
“The right to organize voluntary religious associations to assist in the expression and dissemination of any religious doctrine, and to create tribunals for the decision of controverted questions of faith within the association, and for the ecclesiastical government of all the individual members, congregations, and officers within the general association, is unquestioned. All who unite themselves to such a body do so with an implied consent to this government, and are bound to submit to it. But it would be a vain consent and would lead to the total subversion of such religious bodies, if any one aggrieved by one of their decisions could appeal to the secular courts and have them reversed. It is of the essence of these religious *618unions, and of their- right to establish tribunals for the decision of questions, arising among themselves, that those decisions should be binding in all cases of ecclesiastical cognizance, subject only to such appeals as the organism itself provides for.”
Accordingly, in each case involving an intrachurch dispute — including disputes over church property- — -the civil court must focus directly on ascertaining, and then following, the decision made within the structure of church governance. By doing so, the court avoids two equally unacceptable departures from the genuine neutrality mandated by the First Amendment. First, it refrains from direct review and revision of decisions of the church on matters of religious doctrine and practice that underlie the church’s determination of intra-church controversies, including those that relate to control of church property.5 Equally important, by recognizing the authoritative resolution reached within the religious association, the civil court avoids interfering indirectly with the religious governance of those who have formed the association and submitted themselves to its authority. See supra, at 612-614; Watson v. Jones, supra, at 728-729; Kedroff v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral, supra, at 107-110.
Ill
Until today, and under the foregoing authorities, the first question presented in a case involving an intrachurch dispute over church property was where within the religious associa*619tion the rules of polity, accepted by its members before the schism, had placed ultimate authority over the use of the church property.6 The courts, in answering this question have recognized two broad categories of church government. One is congregational, in which authority over questions of church doctrine, practice, and administration rests entirely in the local congregation or some body within it. In disputes over the control and use of the property of such a church, the civil courts enforce the authoritative resolution of the controversy within the local church itself. Watson v. Jones, supra, at 724 — 726. The second is hierarchical, in which the local church is but an integral and subordinate part of a larger church and is under the authority of the general church. Since the decisions of the local congregation are subject to review by the tribunals of the church hierarchy, this Court has held that the civil courts must give effect to the duly made decisions of the highest body within the hierarchy that has considered the dispute. As we stated in Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich:
“[T]he First and Fourteenth Amendments permit hierarchical religious organizations to establish their own rules and regulations for internal discipline and government, and to create tribunals for adjudicating disputes over these matters. When this choice is exercised and ecclesiastical tribunals are created to decide disputes over the government and direction of subordinate bodies, the Constitution requires that civil courts accept their decisions as binding upon them.” 426 U. S., at 724r-725 (emphasis added).7
A careful examination of the constitutions of the general *620and local church, as well as other relevant documents, may be necessary to ascertain the form of governance adopted by the members of the religious association. But there is no reason to restrict the courts to statements of polity related directly to church property. For the constitutionally necessary limitations are imposed not on the evidence to be considered but instead on the object of the inquiry, which is both limited and clear: the civil court must determine whether the local church remains autonomous-, so that its members have unreviewable authority to withdraw it (and its property) from the general church, or whether the local church is inseparably integrated into and subordinate to the general church.8
IV
The principles developed in prior decisions thus afford clear guidance in the case before us. The Vineville church is presbyterian, a part of the PCUS. The presbyterian form of church government, adopted by the PCUS, is “a hierarchical structure of tribunals which consists of, in ascending order, (1) the Church Session, composed of the elders of the local church; (2) the Presbytery, composed of several churches in a geographical area; (3) the Synod, generally composed of all Presbyteries within a State; and (4) the General Assembly, the highest governing body.” Presbyterian Church v. Hull *621Church, 393 U. S., at 442. The Book of Church Order subjects the Session to “review and control” by the Presbytery in all matters, even authorizing the Presbytery to replace the leadership of the local congregation, to winnow its membership, and to take control of it. No provision of the Book of Church Order gives the Session the authority to withdraw the local church from the PCUS; similarly, no section exempts such a decision by the local church from review by the Presbytery.
Thus, while many matters, including the management of the church property, are committed in the first instance to the Session and congregation of the local church, their actions are subject to review by the Presbytery. Here, the Presbytery exercised its authority over the local church, removing the dissidents from church office, asserting direct control over the government of the church, and recognizing the petitioners as the legitimate congregation and Session of the church. It is undisputed that under the established government of the Presbyterian Church — accepted by the members of the church before the schism — the use and control of the church property have been determined authoritatively to be in the petitioners. Accordingly, under the principles I have thought were settled, there is no occasion for the further examination of the law of Georgia that the Court directs. On remand, the Georgia courts should be directed to enter judgment for the petitioners.

 Despite the Court’s assertion to the contrary, ante, at 602-603, this “neutral principles” approach was not approved by the Court in dismissing the appeal in Maryland & Va. Eldership v. Sharpsburg Church, 254 Md. 162, 254 A. 2d 162 (1969). 396 U. S. 367 (1970). The state court there examined the constitution of the general church, the charters of the local churches, the deeds to the property at issue, and the relevant state statutes. But it did not restrict its inquiry to a search for statements exnressed in the language of trust and property law; see 254 Md., at 169-176, 254 A. 2d, at 168-170. Rather, the state court canvassed all of these sources, and others, see Maryland & Va. Eldership v. Sharpsburg Church, 249 Md. 650, 665-668, 241 A. 2d 691, 700-701 (1968), for information about the basic polity of the Church of God. Having concluded that the local congregations retained final authority over their property, it awarded judgment accordingly. Contrary to the statement of the Court in the present case that such an inquiry into church polity requires analysis of “ecclesiastical . . . doctrine,” ante, at 605, “the Maryland court’s resolution of the dispute involved no inquiry into religious doctrine.” 396 U. S., at 368.
In Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, 393 U. S. 440 (1969), “neutral principles” were referred to in passing, but were never described. Id., at 449. What the Court refers to as an “approving reference” to “neutral principles” in Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 426 U. S. 696 (1976), was only an acknowledgment in a footnote that “[n]o claim is made that the ‘formal title’ doctrine by which church property disputes may be decided in civil courts is to be applied in this case.” Id., at 723 n. 15. Nor can the Court find support for its position in Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall. 679, 724-729 (1872).

 The neutral-principles approach appears to assume that the requirements of the Constitution will be satisfied if civil courts are forbidden to consider certain types of evidence. The First Amendment’s Religion Clauses, however, are meant to protect churches and their members from civil law interference, not to protect the courts from having to decide *614difficult evidentiary questions. Thus, the evidentiary rules to be applied in cases involving intrachurch disputes over church property should be fashioned to avoid interference with the resolution of the dispute within the accepted church government. The neutral-principles approach consists instead of a rule of evidence that ensures that in some cases the courts will impose a form of church government and a doctrinal resolution at odds with that reached by the church’s own authority.
The neutral-principles approach creates other difficulties. It imposes on the organization of churches additional legal requirements which in some cases might inhibit their formation by forcing the organizers to confront issues that otherwise might never arise. It also could precipitate church property disputes, for existing churches may deem it necessary, in light of today’s decision, to revise their constitutional documents, charters, and deeds to include a specific statement of church polity in the language of property and trust law.

 Ante, at 607-608. Such a use would be an extension of this restrictive rule of evidence, and one likely to exacerbate further the interference with free religious exercise. See supra, at 612-614. Not only will a local congregation of a general hierarchical church be treated as an independent congregational church unless tire rules of church government have been expressed in specified documents with explicit reference to church property, in addition, all local congregations will be regarded as having a rule of majority control unless they have related their general voting rules explicitly to disputes about church property. As a consequence, the resolution of doctrinal disputes within the polity chosen by the church members often will be overturned by the civil courts, an interference with religious exercise that cannot be squared with the First Amendment.

 Watson v. Jones was decided at a time when the First Amendment was not considered to be applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, and before Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64 (1938), made state law applicable in diversity cases. But beginning with Kedroff v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral, 344 U. S., at 116, this Court has indicated repeatedly that the principles of general federal law announced in Watson v. Jones are now regarded as rooted in the First Amendment, and are applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, 393 U. S., at 447-448; Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 426 U. S., at 710-711.

 Thus, in Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, supra, the Court forbade the use of the "English approach” in the resolution of church property disputes because it requires the civil courts to determine whether authoritative decisions of doctrine and practice are consistent with the longstanding tenets of faith of a particular church. 393 U. S., at 449-450; accord, Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall., at 727-729. Similarly, in Serbian Orthodox Diocese V. MiMvojevich, supra, the control of church property turned on the resolution of questions of doctrine and practice, “which under our cases is [only] for ecclesiastical and not civil tribunals.” 426 U. S., at 709; see id., at 720.

 After answering this question, of course, the civil court must determine whether the dispute has been resolved within that structure of government and, if so, what decision has been made.

 Accord, Kedroff v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral, supra, at 113 — 114; Watson v. Jones, supra, at 727.

 See Kauper, Church Autonomy and the First Amendment: the Presbyterian Church Case, in Church and State: The Supreme Court and the First Amendment 90-92, 97-98 (P. Kurland ed. 1975). The Court suggests that the careful consideration of church constitutions and other relevant documents as a prerequisite to deciding basic questions of church polity may be impermissible if it requires ^ “searching . . . inquiry into church polity.” Ante, at 605, quoting Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 426 U. S., at 723. The issue in Serbian Orthodox Diocese, however, was quite different. There, the hierarchical polity of the church was clear. Id., at 715-717. What the Court held impermissible was the state court’s further inquiry into the faithfulness of the church hierarchy’s decisions to the detailed provisions of church law. Id., at 712-713, 718, 721-723; id., at 725 (White, J., concurring).