How far might the pendulum swing?
The pendulum is definitely swinging back toward a greater tolerance of the expression of faith in the public forum, including in the schoolroom. You see its expression in battles such as this one in Cupertino—a case that I don’t think would have even been filed a decade or two ago. And you see it in the so-called “Decalogue” cases, those disputes over the placement of the Ten Commandments in public spaces. And a significant element on the Rehnquist Court openly espouses state encouragement of religious belief. How is this kind of case similar to—and different from—the controversy over the Ten Commandments? The Cupertino case is like the Ten Commandments cases in the sense that they all turn on the inherent tensions in the First Amendment. It’s a great passage, when you think about it. It guarantees free speech and freedom of religion, but it also forbids the establishment of religion. It’s the interpretation of that “establishment” clause that is at issue in all these cases, and that i
