Lemon Vs. Kurtzman Supreme Court Case

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Layla Wheeler AP/POLS 101 19 Apr 2024 Period 1.

Lemon v. Kurtzman Supreme Court Case.

The Lemon v. Kurtzman case, decided in 1971, challenged the First Amendment when funding for religious schools was being questioned for being unconstitutional. Pennsylvania and Rhode Island enacted statutes that provided financial support for religious schools so they could teach non-religious courses, get textbooks, and provide a higher salary for teachers. These statutes caused an uproar from Alton Lemon on not agreeing with this because he believed this violated the Establishment Clause in our First Amendment. When this was taken to court, the Lemon Test was then created. This test was used to determine whether or not the school districts were unconstitutional with the statutes that were created. In the first court ruling, the statutes were considered unconstitutional. Once taken to the Supreme Court, it was found that these cases were both unconstitutional under the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment. The final ruling of this Supreme Court case had an immense …show more content…
According to firstamendment.mtsu.edu written by Richard L. Pacelle Jr., “Courts used the so-called "Lemon Test" for nearly four decades to determine when laws or practices violated the First Amendment clause that prohibited government from ‘establishment of religion.’” Although this test was used for many court cases, it eventually started to faze out, especially in 2022. The Kennedy v. Bremerton case which took place in 2022 had disregarded the test. Supreme Court justice, Justice Neil Gorsuch, ruled that the Establishment clause “must be interpreted with ‘reference to historical practices and understandings.’ ” (Pacelle Jr.). Although the Lemon test has been fazed out of Supreme Court cases in this day and age, it had a massive impact on how rulings were made in many cases throughout the
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