Roberts Court Archives - LAW AND RELIGION FORUM

I am delighted to be participating this Wednesday in a conference at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, on The Roberts Court and the Protection of Religious Freedom in the United States, organized by Center friends Olivier Roy and Pasquale Annicchino. Regretfully, my intervention will be virtual rather than in person. Here’s the description of the conference (in Italian) and the program:

Contesto

John Glover Roberts Jr. è stato nominato Chief Justice della Corte Suprema degli Stati Uniti il 22 settembre 2005, nomina confermata una settimana dopo dal Senato con 78 voti favorevoli e 22 contrari. In questi 9 anni si sono succedute numerose decisioni di assoluto rilievo del massimo organo giurisdizionale statunitense. Tra queste alcune hanno portato a definitivo compimento una nuova interpretazione ed una differente applicazione delle due clausole del primo emendamento costituzionale che si occupano di libertà religiosa: la Free Exercise Clause e la Establishment Clause. Dopo aver inquadrato nel contesto storico e politico la presidenza Roberts, questo workshop intende esaminare le principali pronunce della Corte Suprema sulla libertà religiosa.

Ogni relatore sarà chiamato a commentare una pronuncia e, mediante un approccio di “law in context” a darne una interpretazione nell’ambito del più ampio sviluppo della giurisprudenza della Corte.

L’obiettivo è quello di realizzare un volume collettivo (in italiano) che possa offrire agli studiosi nuovo materiale di riflessione e studio su un argomento che tocca gli interessi scientifici sia dei costituzionalisti che dei cultori delle materie ecclesiasticistiche.

Funded by European Research Council 7th Framework Programme

Programma

12.00-12.05 Introduzione

12.05-13.00 La Corte Roberts e la tutela della libertà religiosa

Fred Gedicks | BYU, USA

Marc De Girolami | St John’s University, USA (intervento via Skype)

13.00-14.00 Pranzo di lavoro

14.00-15.30 Discussione casi – I sessione

Valentina Fiorillo | Università di Roma “La Sapienza”, Italia

Adelaide Madera | Università di Messina, Italia

Pasquale Annicchino | EUI, Italia

Discussione generale

15.30-15.45 Pausa caffé

15.45-17.00 Discussione casi –II sessione

Marco Ventura | KU Leuven, Belgio

Susanna Mancini | Università di Bologna, Italia

Diletta Tega | Università di Bologna e Corte costituzionale italiana, Italia

Discussione generale

17.00-18.15 Discussione finale

In the first six years of the Roberts Court (OT05-OT10), the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops filed seven amicus curiae briefs. Four dealt with religious liberty (Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao de Vegetal, CLS v. Martinez, Arizona School Tuition Organization v. Winn, and Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC), two addressed abortion (Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood and Gonzales v. Carhart), and one dealt with assisted suicide (Gonzales v. Oregon). The table below compares the Justices by whether they voted for the same party supported by the Bishops’ Conference as amicus curiae.

Justice Name	Agreement with Bishops’ Conference as Percentage of Cases	Agreement with Bishops’ Conference as Fraction of Cases
Chief Justice Roberts (Catholic)	100%	7/7
Justice Scalia (Catholic)	100%	7/7
Justice Thomas (Catholic)	100%	7/7
Justice Alito (Catholic)	100%	4/4
Justice Kennedy (Catholic)	71%	5/7
Justice Stevens	50%	2/4
Justice Souter	50%	2/4
Justice O’Connor	50%	1/2
Justice Ginsburg	43%	3/7
Justice Breyer	43%	3/7
Justice Sotomayor (Catholic)	33%	1/3
Justice Kagan	33%	1/3

These statistics reveal a stark division between the Catholic and the non-Catholic Justices, a division that is likely to shape up more and more as one between the Republican appointees (all Catholic) and the Democratic appointees (one of whom is Catholic). The three cases in which the party supported by the Bishops’ Conference garnered the votes of the non-Catholic Justices were all unanimous decisions (Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC, Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao de Vegetal, and Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood). The party supported by the Bishops’ Conference did not attract the votes of a single non-Catholic Justice in any split decision.

As noted in connection with the earlier chart showing the same measure in the Rehnquist Court, the point of this measurement is not to demonstrate influence, but rather to define the universe of cases in which the Bishops have an interest in the outcome and to see how hospitable various Justices have been to the claims advanced by the parties supported by the Bishops’ Conference amicus curiae briefs.