c. 1998 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ The House Judiciary Committee, giving religious conservatives a long-sought victory, has approved a proposal to amend the Constitution to protect”the people’s right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs, heritage, or traditions on public property.” The amendment would also, for the first time, put the word God in the Constitution.

Response to Wednesday’s (March 4) party-line vote in which 16 Republicans outvoted the 11 Democrats on the committee, fell along predictable lines.

Randy Tate, executive director of the Christian Coalition, called the vote”monumental,”while Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State called it a”disaster of titanic proportions.” Rep. Ernest Istook, R-Okla., chief sponsor of the bill, said it was the first time a House committee had acted favorably on such a proposal.

Christian conservatives have been seeking to amend the Constitution to more specifically permit organized prayer in public schools since the early 1960s, when the U.S. Supreme Court handed down rulings in 1962 and 1963 barring state-sponsored prayer and Bible reading in the public schools.

Critics, who say the amendment is unnecessary because every student already has the right to pray in schools, fear it will lead to a return to state-sponsored or state-organized prayer.

But Istook denied the charge.”It very explicitly does not permit government establishment of religion,”Istook said in a statement Thursday.”The language leaves no doubt about that.”But the proposed amendment also will force courts to stop misusing the language of the First amendment, thus ignoring Americans’ religious freedoms.” Lynn, however, said the proposal _ if adopted _”would subject schoolchildren to coercive prayer in public schools, require taxpayers to support private religious schools and ministries and permit religious majorities to run roughshod over minority faiths.” Andrea Sheldon, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition, hailed the Judiciary Committee action, saying that since the 1960s,”opponents of our religious freedoms have successfully used activist judges to vitiate this fundamental liberty.” The proposal has a long way to go before the Constitution is changed. It must still be approved by a two-thirds vote from the full House. Istook said no date has been set for that vote.

In addition, the amendment must also be approved by a two-thirds vote in the Senate, where it has not yet been introduced. If it wins both House and Senate approval, the amendment would have to be ratified by 38 state legislatures before it could be added to the Constitution.

The proposed amendment reads:”To secure the people’s right to acknowledge God according to the dictates of conscience: Neither the United States nor any state shall establish any official religion; but the people’s right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs, heritage or traditions on public property, including schools, shall not be infringed.”Neither the United States nor any state shall require any person to join in prayer or other religious activity, prescribe school prayers, discriminate against religion, or deny equal access to a benefit on account of religion.”

MJP END ANDERSON