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Join the ALA Intellectual Freedom Round Table (IFRT) and the Freedom to Read Foundation (FTRF) along with banned author David Levithan, library professionals, authors, and friends for this 2022 Freedom to Read Celebration, Merritt Fund fundraiser, and reception. The organizations will honor the recipients of the FTRF Roll of Honor Award, John Phillip Immroth Memorial Award, Gerald Hodges Intellectual Freedom Chapter Relations Award, and Eli M. Oboler Memorial Award.

Were excited to have author David Levithan launch the evening by sharing his remarks, and experience, with intellectual freedom and censorship. David is a childrens book editor and the author of several books for young adults, including Lambda Literary Award winner Two Boys Kissing; Nick & Norahs Infinite Playlist, Naomi and Elys No Kiss List, and Dash & Lilys Book of Dares (co-authored with Rachel Cohn); Will Grayson, Will Grayson (co-authored with John Green); and Every You, Every Me (with photographs from Jonathan Farmer). David was named the recipient of the Margaret A. Edwards Award for his contribution to YA literature. His newest book, Answers in the Pages, was released through Penguin Random House in May. This title has a timely topic as it addresses speaking up and coming out as parents lobby to ban a beloved book from the school curriculum.

The following 2022 intellectual freedom award recipients will be honored at the event.

Add the celebration to your Conference Scheduler.RSVP to attendEvent Date: Friday, June 24th at 7pm - 8:30pm ET.Location: Marriott Marquis, Univ of DC & Catholic UnivCost: Suggested Donation: $20.00 (checks and cash preferred) to benefit the Leroy C. Merritt Humanitarian Fund (one free drink ticket included)

FTRF and IFRT wish to thank Penguin Random House for their generous sponsorship of the Freedom to Read Celebration.

About the Freedom to Read FoundationThe Freedom to Read Foundation has been working on behalf of librarians and others to protect the First Amendment for over 50 years. Because FTRF is a non-profit, the staff and trustees may also litigate on behalf of First Amendment issues, as well as educate and advocate. The FTRF board of trustees includes representatives from each of ALAs roundtables. This ensures that librarians representing all forms of library work can bring their voices and concerns to FTRF and carry back valuable information.

About the Intellectual Freedom Round TableThe Intellectual Freedom Round Table of the American Library Association provides a forum for the discussion of activities, programs and problems in intellectual freedom of libraries and librarians; serves as a channel of communications on intellectual freedom matters; promotes a greater opportunity for involvement among the members of the ALA in defense of intellectual freedom; and promotes a greater feeling of responsibility in the implementation of ALA policies on intellectual freedom.

About the Office for Intellectual FreedomEstablished December 1, 1967, the Office for Intellectual Freedom is charged with implementing ALA policies concerning the concept of intellectual freedom as embodied in the Library Bill of Rights, the Associations basic policy on free access to libraries and library materials. The goal of the office is to educate librarians and the general public about the nature and importance of intellectual freedom in libraries.

About the Merritt FundThe LeRoy C. Merritt Humanitarian Fund was established in 1970 as a special trust in memory of Dr. LeRoy C. Merritt. It is devoted to the support, maintenance, medical care, and welfare of librarians who, in the Trustees opinion, are: Denied employment rights or discriminated against on the basis of gender, sexual orientation, race, color, creed, religion, age, disability, or place of national origin; or Denied employment rights because of defense of intellectual freedom; that is, threatened with loss of employment or discharged because of their stand for the cause of intellectual freedom, including promotion of freedom of the press, freedom of speech, the freedom of librarians to select items for their collections from all the worlds written and recorded information, and defense of privacy rights.

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Freedom to Read Celebration, Supporting the Merritt Fund, and Featuring Banned Author David Levithan - ala.org

Sarasota Herald-Tribune Editorial Board| Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Marsy's Law, intended for crime victims, now used to shield law enforcement

The Marsy's Law amendment, as approved by Florida voters, was intended to protect victims of crime. But it's being used to shield law enforcement.

C. A. Bridges, Tallahassee Democrat

In return for the immense amounts of unspoken trust and expansive authority that our society willingly gives to law enforcement and judicial agencies, those who wield such powershave a clear obligation to hold themselves to higher standards of transparency and accountability.

Unfortunately, the Sarasota County Sheriffs Office and the 12th Judicial Circuit State Attorneys Office are both failing to meet those standards in their joint effort to bar the Sarasota Herald-Tribune from publishing the names of two deputies involved in a fatal Aprilshooting in Sarasota.

And, equally unfortunate, both parties are beingempowered to shirktheir responsibilitiesby an emergency injunction, granted last Friday by Chief Circuit Judge Charles E. Roberts, that upheld their request to block the Herald-Tribune from identifying two deputies involved in the shooting of Jeremiah Evans, 58, while carrying out a court-ordered eviction at the Palm Place Condominium in Sarasota.

Related: Sarasota County deputy fatally shoots armed man during eviction, Sheriff says

It's ironic that the names of the two deputies along with a third who was presentwhen Evans was shot had previously been provided to the Herald-Tribune by the State Attorneys Office in response to a routine public records request for a letter in which prosecutors had ruled the shooting was justified.

But when the Herald-Tribune sought additional information regarding the case, the Sheriff's Officeabruptly moved to pursue the emergency injunction in tandem with the State Attorney's Office.

With these facts established,the following conclusionsare beyond debate:

The ruling, which granted the injunction with no notice to the Herald-Tribune, is an unconstitutional prior restraint of the press that is prohibited by the First Amendment in both the U.S. Constitution and Florida Constitution.

This fact was driven homein the emergency motion filed June 13 byCarol Jean LoCicero and James B. Lake, from the firm of Thomas & LoCicero in Tampa, on the Herald-Tribunes behalf to overturn the emergency injunction.

Freedom of speech means that its up to the Herald-Tribune to decide whether to report information in its possession, especially facts about such a significant matter as a fatal shooting by law enforcement, Lake told the Herald-Tribune.We fully expect that, once our arguments are heard, the injunction will be set aside.

The Sheriffs Office and the State Attorneys Office have poorly servedthis community by: a) citing Marsys Law, which is designed to prevent the disclosure of potentially sensitive details about victims of crime, to justify asking for the emergency injunction, and b) working in hurried, secretive and underhanded fashion to secure a court order to restrain the press from publishing the deputies names even though the press had lawfully obtained that information and isnt bound by Marsys Law.

In effect, then, the Sheriffs Office and State Attorneys Office are not only behaving as though the First Amendment, which clearly applies to the press, does not exist they are also using a state law that doesnt apply to the press as a weapon to muzzle a news organization and blatantly obstruct its ability to provide information that the public has aright to know.

This is inexcusable. And this is just plain wrong.

Its time forthe Sheriffs Office and State Attorneys Office to adhere to the elevatedstandards of transparency and accountability that they must meet. Its time for the emergency injunction to be dissolved, and for both agencies to show the proper respect for the publics right to be fully informed.

This editorial was written by Opinions Editor Roger Brown for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune Editorial Board.

Link:
Citizens have a right to know about Sarasota shooting case - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

First Amendment Resources | Statements & Core Documents | Publications & Guidelines

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution passed by Congress September 25, 1789. Ratified December 15, 1791.

One of the ten amendments of the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment gives everyone residing in the United States the right to hear all sides of every issue and to make their own judgments about those issues without government interference or limitations. The First Amendment allows individuals to speak, publish, read and view what they wish, worship (or not worship) as they wish, associate with whomever they choose, and gather together to ask the government to make changes in the law or to correct the wrongs in society.

The right to speak and the right to publish under the First Amendment has been interpreted widely to protect individuals and society from government attempts to suppress ideas and information, and to forbid government censorship of books, magazines, and newspapers as well as art, film, music and materials on the internet. The Supreme Court and other courts have held conclusively that there is a First Amendment right to receive information as a corollary to the right to speak. Justice William Brennan elaborated on this point in 1965:

The protection of the Bill of Rights goes beyond the specific guarantees to protect from Congressional abridgment those equally fundamental personal rights necessary to make the express guarantees fully meaningful.I think the right to receive publications is such a fundamental right.The dissemination of ideas can accomplish nothing if otherwise willing addressees are not free to receive and consider them. It would be a barren marketplace of ideas that had only sellers and no buyers. Lamont v. Postmaster General, 381 U.S. 301 (1965).

The Supreme Court reaffirmed that the right to receive information is a fundamental right protected under the U.S. Constitution when it considered whether a local school board violated the Constitution by removing books from a school library. In that decision, the Supreme Court held that the right to receive ideas is a necessary predicate to the recipients meaningful exercise of his own rights of speech, press, and political freedom. Board of Education v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853 (1982)

Public schools and public libraries, as public institutions, have been the setting for legal battles about student access to books, the removal or retention of offensive material, regulation of patron behavior, and limitations on public access to the internet. Restrictions and censorship of materials in public institutions are most commonly prompted by public complaints about those materials and implemented by government officials mindful of the importance some of their constituents may place on religious values, moral sensibilities, and the desire to protect children from materials they deem to be offensive or inappropriate. Directly or indirectly, ordinary individuals are the driving force behind the challenges to the freedom to access information and ideas in the library.

The First Amendment prevents public institutions from compromising individuals' First Amendment freedoms by establishing a framework that defines critical rights and responsibilities regarding free expression and the freedom of belief. The First Amendment protects the right to exercise those freedoms, and it advocates respect for the right of others to do the same. Rather than engaging in censorship and repression to advance one's values and beliefs, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis counsels persons living in the United States to resolve their differences in values and belief by resort to "more speech, not enforced silence."

By virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment, the First Amendment's constitutional right of free speech and intellectual freedom also applies to state and local governments. Government agencies and government officials are forbidden from regulating or restricting speech or other expression based on its content or viewpoint. Criticism of the government, political dissatisfaction, and advocacy of unpopular ideas that people may find distasteful or against public policy are nearly always protected by the First Amendment. Only that expression that is shown to belong to a few narrow categories of speech is not protected by the First Amendment. The categories of unprotected speech include obscenity, child pornography, defamatory speech, false advertising, true threats, and fighting words. Deciding what is and is not protected speech is reserved to courts of law.

The First Amendment only prevents government restrictions on speech. It does not prevent restrictions on speech imposed by private individuals or businesses. Facebook and other social media can regulate or restrict speech hosted on their platforms because they are private entities.

Clauses of the First Amendment | The National Constitution Center

First Amendment FAQ | Freedom Forum

Freedom of Religion, Speech, Press, Assembly, and Petition: Common Interpretations and Matters for Debate | National Constitution Center

First Amendment - Religion and Expression | FindLaw

Censorship is the suppression of ideas and information that some individuals, groups, or government officials find objectionable or dangerous. Would-be censors try to use the power of the state to impose their view of what is truthful and appropriate, or offensive and objectionable, on everyone else. Censors pressure public institutions, like libraries, to suppress and remove information they judge inappropriate or dangerous from public access, so that no one else has the chance to read or view the material and make up their own minds about it. The censor wants to prejudge materials for everyone. It is no more complicated than someone saying, Dont let anyone read this book, or buy that magazine, or view that film, because I object to it!

Libraries should challenge censorship in the fulfillment of their responsibility to provide information and enlightenment. Article 3, Library Bill of Rights

Challenged Resources: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights (2019)A challenge is an attempt to remove or restrict materials, based upon the objections of a person or group. A banning is the removal of those materials. Challenges do not simply involve a person expressing a point of view; rather, they are an attempt to remove material from the curriculum or library, thereby restricting the access of others.ALA declares as a matter of firm principle that it is the responsibility of every library to have a clearly defined written policy for collection development that includes a procedure for review of challenged resources.

Labeling Systems: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights (2015)The American Library Association affirms the rights of individuals to form their own opinions about resources they choose to read, view, listen to, or otherwise access. Libraries do not advocate the ideas found in their collections or in resources accessible through the library. The presence of books and other resources in a library does not indicate endorsement of their contents by the library. Likewise, providing access to digital information does not indicate endorsement or approval of that information by the library. Labeling systems present distinct challenges to these intellectual freedom principles.

Rating Systems: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights (2019)Libraries, no matter their size, contain an enormous wealth of viewpoints and are responsible for making those viewpoints available to all. However, libraries do not advocate or endorse the content found in their collections or in resources made accessible through the library. Rating systems appearing in library public access catalogs or resource discovery tools present distinct challenges to these intellectual freedom principles. Q&A on Labeling and Rating Systems

Expurgation of Library Materials: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights (2014)Expurgating library materials is a violation of the Library Bill of Rights. Expurgation as defined by this interpretation includes any deletion, excision, alteration, editing, or obliteration of any part(s) of books or other library resources by the library, its agent, or its parent institution (if any).

Restricted Access to Library Materials: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights (2014)Libraries are a traditional forum for the open exchange of information. Attempts to restrict access to library materials violate the basic tenets of the Library Bill of Rights.

Complete list of Library Bill of Rights Interpretations

Library Bill of Rights (1939)Adopted by ALA Council, the Articles of the Library Bill of Rights are unambiguous statements of basic principles that should govern the service of all libraries. (printable pamphlets)

Freedom to Read Statement (1953)A collaborative statement by literary, publishing, and censorship organizations declaring the importance of our constitutionally protected right to access information and affirming the need for our professions to oppose censorship.

Libraries: An American Value (1999)Adopted by ALA Council, this brief statement pronounces the distinguished place libraries hold in our society and their core tenets of access to materials and diversity of ideas.

Guidelines for Library Policies (2019)Guidelines for librarians, governing authorities, and other library staff and library users on how constitutional principles apply to libraries in the United States.

Intellectual Freedom and Censorship Q&A (2007)

Social Media Guidelines for Public and Academic Libraries (2018)

These guidelines provide a policy and implementation framework for public and academic libraries engaging in the use of social media.

Intellectual Freedom Manual (2021)Edited by Martin Garnarand Trina Magi with ALAs Office for Intellectual FreedomThe 10th edition manual is an indispensable resource for day-to-day guidance on maintaining free and equal access to information for all people

Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy (2016 - present)Edited by Shannon Oltmann with ALA's Office for Intellectual FreedomPublished quarterly, JIFP offers articles related to intellectual freedom and privacy, both in libraries and in the wider world.

True Stories of Censorship Battles in America's Libraries (2012)By Valerie Nye and Kathy BarcoThis book is a collection of accounts from librarians who have dealt with censorship in some form. Divided into seven parts, the book covers intralibrary censorship, child-oriented protectionism, the importance of building strong policies, experiences working with sensitive materials, public debates and controversies, criminal patrons, and library displays.

Beyond Banned Books: Defending Intellectual Freedom throughout Your Library (2019)By Kristin Pekollwith ALAs Office for Intellectual FreedomA level-headed guide that uses specific case studies to offer practical guidance on safeguarding intellectual freedom related to library displays, programming, and other librarian-created content.

Lessons in Censorship: How Schools and Courts Subvert Students' First Amendment Rights (2015)By Catherine J. RossLessons in Censorship highlights the troubling and growing tendency of schools to clamp down on off-campus speech such as texting and sexting and reveals how well-intentioned measures to counter verbal bullying and hate speech may impinge on free speech. Throughout, Ross proposes ways to protect free expression without disrupting education.

The staff of the Office for Intellectual Freedom is available to answer questions or provide assistance to librarians, trustees, educators, and the public about the First Amendment and censorship. Areas of assistance include policy development, minors rights, and professional ethics. Inquiries can be directed via email to oif@ala.org or via phone at (312) 280-4226.

Excerpt from:
First Amendment and Censorship | Advocacy, Legislation & Issues

Dress codes are typically implemented by school districts and employers to promote learning, safety, and image.Although such regulations face First Amendment challenges by students, parents, and employees, the courts generally support the schools and employers. In this 2013 photo, Mary Beth Tinker, 61, shows an old photograph of her with her brother John Tinker to the Associated Press during an interview in Washington. InTinker. v. Des Moines Independent Community School District(1969) the Court affirmed students First Amendment rights to free speech.Although the Courts decision upheld students right to express themselves through certain items they wear, the Court has never specified whether that right bars uniforms, dress codes, or grooming requirements.(AP Photo by Manuel Balce Ceneta, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Dress codes are typically implemented by school districts and employers to promote learning, safety, and image.Although such regulations face First Amendment challenges by students, parents, and employees, the courts generally support the schools and employers.

School dress codes that merely exclude types of clothing, such as gang colors or provocative attire, tend to be enacted without controversy. When codes require uniform-like attire, however, many parents and children object.

The Supreme Court has never directly addressed school dress codes. In Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District (1969), which involved high school students wearing black armbands to protest the Vietnam War, the Court affirmed students First Amendment rights to free speech. Although the Courts decision upheld students right to express themselves through certain items they wear, the Court has never specified whether that right bars uniforms, dress codes, or grooming requirements.

Faced with increasing student-discipline problems, particularly from gang violence (involving gangs whose members often identified themselves through items of clothing) and a rise in more prurient clothing in the 1980s and 1990s, school systems in the 1990s began to introduce dress codes, school uniforms, and uniform-like dress codes.

In two State of the Union addresses, President Bill Clinton advocated public school uniforms, similar to those in parochial schools and many public schools overseas. The number of schools that adopted uniforms is not known, but in California, where they were first mandated, at least 50 schools abandoned their uniform requirements between 2000 and 2002.

Short of restricting pure political expression that does not disrupt learning, school officials have much constitutional latitude.The law in this area is far from settled, and the courts frequently side with the schools when dress requirements are challenged by students and parents.

In practice, however, the bitterness and the cost of litigation have reduced the practical maneuvers of school administrators and school boards.

If school officials attempt to punish students who exercise their expressive rights by wearing buttons, writing on fingernails, or protest messages on shirts, they could find themselves slapped with protected-speech or petition action lawsuits. In addition, in districts that have imposed incentives to increase participation in voluntary uniform and uniform-like dress codes, threats of or actual lawsuits have quickly emerged to halt this allegedly coercive practice.

Opponents of dress codes and uniforms are often fall into a few categories:

Similarly, the motives of advocates of mandatory uniforms or uniform-like dress codes vary from those who want to de-emphasize clothing and promote the egalitarianism implicit in similar clothing to those who primarily wish to avoid fights with their children over what to wear.

School administrators and teachers are divided on the issue. Some, particularly those in underperforming or less disciplined school environments, welcome uniforms and uniform-like dress codes. Supporters also argue that uniforms help identify intruders on school property.

Opponents contend, however, that uniforms also make it more difficult to identify distressed students, who may reveal symptoms of psychological disorders by wearing unusual clothing. They also point out that teachers often waste the first minutes of class trying to determine which of their students who are not in uniform have waivers and which are violating the code.

In addition, friction and discipline problems may worsen as rule breakers crowd the principals office. Over time, students may simply stop wearing the uniform or uniform-like dress, or they may mock the policy by wearing the uniform in a revealing way.

Scholars have studied the effects of uniforms and dress codes on discipline and academic performance, but their findings have been mixed: Researchers, including sociologist David L. Brunsma at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, have concluded that no relationship exists, that the uniform or dress code is much less important than most other factors, or even that uniforms lower test scores.

Employers are entitled to enact dress codes, including uniforms, if there is a rational basis for the requirement, such as fostering a particular business image, encouraging harder work, or complying with public safety and health standards. They can ban anything reasonably deemed to be distracting from work, including body art.

Employers may also offer alternative dress codes, such as minimum requirements for casual Fridays. Although employees do not have a First Amendment right to dress in any way they choose to express themselves, they do have rights under the First Amendment to contest a dress code in a civil manner without fear of employer retribution.

The courts generally defer to employer judgments and have thus upheld prohibitions of torn clothing, sweat pants, short skirts or blouses, and hats.

Provided that the dress code is written clearly, is not excessive or onerous, is applied in a consistent fashion, and does not obviously discriminate on the basis of race, sex, religion, and perhaps ethnicity, the code is constitutionaland does not violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1965.

A dress code that discriminated on the basis of gender would be struck down. However, dress codes that are consistent with social customs can be upheld. Thus, in Harper v. Blockbuster Entertainment (11th Cir., 1998), the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a rule requiring shorter haircuts for male employees.

This article was originally published in 2009. Henry F. Carey is Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgia State University.

Read this article:
Dress Codes | The First Amendment Encyclopedia

Roe v. Wade was decided per a right to privacy based on the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, but there is another, perhaps at least equally compelling, way to look at the abortion issue and that is through the lens of the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

The establishment clause first asserts freedom from state religion or theocracy. This is a consequence of our Enlightenment heritage opposition to feudal state-imposed religion. The establishment clause only secondarily asserts freedom of religion, setting it within the demarcations of constitutional rejection or denial of state religion.

But the abortion question is also an Enlightenment question of self-determination versus determination of self by other. In this case, that other, the prohibitor of abortion, would be a religious form of the state; the state having been captured, unconstitutionally, by a theocracy. Legal limitation, suppression or criminalization of abortion on religious grounds would smuggle in a theocratic state, one which adheres to one doctrine and excludes all others.

In the United States today, Roman Catholicism and Christian fundamentalism would legally institutionalize their anti-abortion doctrine, thus violating the First Amendment dictum that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. But Catholicism and Christian fundamentalists stake their anti-abortion claims on the existence of the soul at conception.

In religious contexts, ensoulment is thought to take place when the soul comes into the body.

In Catholicism the moment of ensoulment has doctrinally varied over time. About 150 years ago, the church taught that ensoulment occurred at quickening, the moment when the pregnant person could feel the fetus moving in their body. (In their first pregnancy, a person typically feels fetal movement at about 18-20 weeks.

If they have given birth at least once, they will typically feel movement around 15-17 weeks.)

The churchs contemporary view is that the soul enters at the moment of conception. This view is shared by Christian fundamentalism, which claims that personhood occurs at the moment of conception. Christian fundamentalists oppose abortion by claiming that fetuses (which they term the preborn, or unborn children) have souls. Along with the Roman Catholic church, these fundamentalists contend that the moment of conception is so singular because it is when human life, personhood and ensoulment occur.

Before the Vatican reversed course on the subject of Limbo in 2007, Catholics believed a soul may not be admitted to heaven unless its body was baptized. Some Catholics may still believe that since fetuses are not baptized, their souls may not go straight to heaven but must hang around in Limbo, which is itself a speculative concept. For some Catholics, abortion causes there to be lost and wandering souls.

Christian fundamentalists claim that aborted fetuses, which they term unborn or preborn children, go straight to heaven because they are innocent and know nothing of original sin and are too young to be saved.

Other religions have different takes on the ensoulment question. The Mormon churchs position is that human beings have 3 stages of life: Pre-existence as spirit children, a time of probation on earth, Eternal life with the Heavenly Father. The Mormon church allows exceptions to its abortion ban due to pregnancy resulting from rape or incest, when the parents health is medically determined to be in serious jeopardy, or when it is medically determined that the fetus is so defective as not to be able to allow the baby to survive past birth.

In Judaism there is no fully developed theory of the timing or nature of ensoulment. This could be because Judaism does not include a strict separation of soul and body. However, the Talmud does speculate on when ensoulment might occur. But it appears that the Talmud dismisses [the ensoulment] question as both unanswerable and irrelevant to the abortion question.

Islam, meanwhile, traditionally did not hold that ensoulment occurred at conception. Currently, there are three views of when ensoulment occurs in Islam: at 120 days, at 40 days or when there is voluntary movement of the fetus ranging from the 12th to the 20th week of gestation.

For Hinduism and Buddhism, the eternal soul is ever being reborn unless and until Moksha or Nirvana is attained. Per Hindu doctrine, and similar to Catholic and Christian fundamentalist views, many Hindus believe that, The soul and the matter which form the fetus are joined together from conception. Still, in Hinduism, If a foetus is aborted, the soul within it suffers a major karmic setback and is deprived of the opportunities its potential human existence would have given it to earn good karma. So, this soul is then, returned immediately to the cycle of birth, death and rebirth.

The 14th Amendment tells us that constitutional rights may only be conferred on persons born or naturalized in the United States. At this point, modern science shows us that these persons must have been in the womb for at least 24 weeks, and they must be born. We must not substitute theocratic law for constitutional law.

Given this, legislation such as Alabamas outright abortion ban, (which has been delayed by litigation), or other restrictive ordinances recently passed in Texas, Oklahoma and Mississippi enshrine in law select religious views of the question, namely Catholic doctrine and Christian fundamentalist doctrine.

It may be said that such laws would create a specific state establishment of religion, (echoing the Christian nationalist mantra that the U.S. is a Christian country) and simultaneously prohibit to birthing people and people of other faiths or no faith at all the free exercise of their beliefs. As such, abortion bans are violations of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and must be struck down. Choice in abortion matters is about: 1.) freedom from state religion; 2.) self-determination, not determination of self by other and 3.) freedom of religion.

Denial of abortion exemplifies theocratic or reactionary forces domination of the state. The same reactionary state control used to force birth could also be exercised to prohibit pregnancies among specific categories or groups of people. This has already occurred in U.S. history with respect to the sterilization of the feeble-minded, and more recently sterilization of Puerto Rican women.

White supremacist and anti-Semitic Great Replacement ideology (in a word: fascism) claims that a declining birth rate of white Americans, coupled with the increased fertility rate of people of color and increased immigration, heralds their eclipse as the majority group in our country. Actually, fertility rates for all major racial/ethnic groups in the U.S. have fallen since 1990 by different amounts. Data from 2019 showed lower total fertility rates for non-Hispanic white women and Asian women than for African American women and Latinas. Still, it is demographically predicted that the U.S. will become majority non-white somewhere between 2040-2050. In this view, abortion bans are not only a theocratic strategy; they are also a strategy for preserving the white majority.

Its a strategy weve seen used by fascists before. A memorandum to SS Officer Adolf Eichmann from Nazi-occupied Poznan, Poland, noted that all the Jewish women, from whom one could still expect children, should be sterilized so that the Jewish problem may actually be solved completely with this generation. Simultaneous with the sterilization of Jewish women, German women were awarded the Mothers Cross for having four or more children for the Third Reich.

Ultimately, what the First Amendment argument affords is not just a defense against opposition to abortion and forced sterilization, but a fresh look at adjudication of questions pertaining to religious bans on other intimate matters, such as contraception use, when viewed as attempted theocratic intrusions within our society.

More here:
The First Amendment Could Provide a Fresh Legal Approach to Defending Abortion - Truthout