The American Constitution and Religion

9. Regulation of Religious Organizations and Personnel

220 9 REGULATION OF RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS AND PERSONNEL c The First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of religion. There is no doubt that the free exercise clause absolutely protects freedom of religious belief and the freedom to adhere to any religious organization an individual may choose, but the freedom to act in accord with one’s religious beliefs is not absolutely guaranteed . Important secular public interests may run counter to religiously motivated activities. Organizations’ religious practices in soliciting funds, liability for taxes, conditions of employment, and methods of recruiting and retaining members are the main areas where religious practice may trigger government regulation. Solicitation of Funds In soliciting funds, individuals and groups may falsely represent themselves to the public. Governments not only prosecute fraud when it occurs, but also try to prevent it from happening in the first place. In Cantwell v. Connecticut,1 three Jehovah’s Wit1 . Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296 (1940). 221 Regulation of Religious Organizations nesses were convicted of violating a Connecticut statute that required solicitors of money for religious causes be certified by a local welfare official. The Supreme Court in 1940 unanimously overturned the convictions, holding the statute an unconstitutional abridgment of the defendants’ rights to religious exercise. Specifically, the Court held that the statute was a prior and prohibited restraint upon the exercise of religion because the statute empowered a public official to decide whether a solicitor’s cause was religious. The Court noted, however, that the state might subsequently punish any fraudulent solicitation of funds under religious pretenses. Four years later, in 1944, the Court reviewed another case involving a conflict between individuals claiming a right to freedom of religious exercise and the public’s interest in preventing fraud (U.S. v. Ballard).2 Donald and Edna Ballard were convicted of using the mails to solicit funds by false and fraudulent representations of their religious beliefs. The defendants were accused of falsely representing that they had been selected as divine messengers , that they had the power to heal and cure diseases the medical profession considered incurable, and that they had in fact cured hundreds of afflicted persons. The indictment charged that the defendants knew these claims to be false, and that the defendants made these claims with the intention of cheating and defrauding the public. The defendants sought at the trial to establish the truth of their religious beliefs as a defense, but the trial judge restricted the Ballards’ defense to their good faith in the matter of the beliefs . When the case went to the jury, the judges instructed the jury not to consider the truth or falsity of the defendant’s claims of supernatural powers, but only whether the defendants believed their claims to be true. The jury found the defendants guilty of 2. U.S. v. Ballard, 322 U.S. 78 (1944). 222 Regulation of Religious Organizations fraud. The Ballards appealed, and the Court of Appeals reversed the convictions and ordered a new trial, holding that they were entitled to submit to the consideration of the jury a defense based on the asserted truth of their religious beliefs. The Supreme Court divided three ways. Justice Douglas, speaking for five justices, held that the trial court correctly excluded the question of the truth or falsity of the defendants’ religious beliefs, but remanded the case to the court of appeals to review other issues. According to Douglas, “heresy trials are foreign to our Constitution,” and human beings “may not be put to the proof of their religious doctrines or beliefs.”3 Thus religious beliefs may not be submitted to a jury charged with determining their truth or falsity. Chief Justice Stone, joined by two justices, dissented. Stone argued that some counts in the indictment had charged the Ballards with fraudulent procurement of money by knowingly making false statements about their religious experiences, and that these counts were susceptible of negative proof. If one asserted that one had had a religious experience in San Francisco on a certain day, Stone thought that it should be open to the government to submit to the jury proof that such a one had never been there. Or if one asserted that one had in fact cured hundreds of persons by the use of spiritual powers, the government should be able to submit evidence that no such cures had ever taken place. But Stone’s main argument was that the case went...