School curriculum and the Free Exercise Clause

Freedom of religion in this country is protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. This Amendment specifies two ways of religious protection: the first, the Establishment Clause, protects us against establishment of religion. The second, the Free Exercise Clause, protects our right to free exercise of religion. There seems to be some question whether the free exercise rights of some Jewish students is properly protected by the public schools. Currently, some public schools incorporate parts of the New Testament into their AP English courses. Orthodox Jews, however, claim that the Jewish religion strictly forbids them from reading the New Testament. The purpose of this dissertation is to determine whether public schools, by continuing to incorporate parts of the New Testament into their AP English curriculum, are violating the free exercise rights of Jewish students.;Chapter One establishes that requiring Jewish students to read the New Testament places a heavy burden on their exercise of religion. Next, Chapter Two explains the constitutional principles pertaining to the Free Exercise Clause, the Establishment Clause, and the tension between the two clauses. Chapter Two also discusses the Supreme Court's conflicting and contradictory interpretations of the clauses, showing us that we need to select an approach to the interpretation of the clauses in order to analyze the 'New Testament' case. Chapter Three then analyzes the relevant legal precedents interpreting the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses, since any judicial decision must be based on past decisions. Then, since the religion clauses are vaguely worded and can be interpreted differently by reasonable minds, Chapter Four addresses the varying approaches to constitutional interpretation. The final chapter selects an approach to constitutional interpretation and, using the information learned in chapters One through Four, concludes that by incorporating parts of the New Testament into the AP English course, the public schools are violating the free exercise rights of Jewish students.