Creation Science Law Endorses Religion

Editor's note: On June 19, the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that states may not require public schools to teach "creation science" if they teach evolution. The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution requires the separation of church and state, wrote Justice William J. Brennan Jr. for the majority, and the Louisiana state law in question "violates the Establishment Clause … because it seeks to employ the symbolic and financial support of government to achieve a religious


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The decision in Edwards v. Aguillard ends a controversy begun in 1981, when the state legislature passed a law requiring "balanced treatment" of evolution and creation science in the state's public schools and promising state support of in-service training for teachers to prepare them to teach creation science. A group of parents, teachers, religious leaders and others immediately challenged the law as violating the First Amendment. A federal district court agreed and a court of appeals affirmed that decision. Louisiana then asked the Supreme Court to review the appeals court decision.

In August 1986, 72 U.S. Nobel laureates in science and a number of national and local science organizations joined the suit as friends of the court, attacking the claim of creation science to be scientific.

Following are excerpts from the majority opinion; dissenting were Justice Antonin Scalia and Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist.

...it is clear from the legislative ...

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