WEBVTT X-TIMESTAMP-MAP=LOCAL:00:00:00.000,MPEGTS:63000 1 00:00:00.470 --> 00:00:05.440 This case dealing with a high school football coach who prayed on the 50-yard 2 00:00:05.830 --> 00:00:09.480 line is important because it's coming to the Supreme Court at a time when 3 00:00:09.481 --> 00:00:13.920 there's a lot of questions about how far people can go to exercise their 4 00:00:14.080 --> 00:00:17.160 religion and how much governments have to do to accommodate them. 5 00:00:22.650 --> 00:00:26.790 The case involves a former assistant high school football coach who 6 00:00:27.740 --> 00:00:32.110 said he felt compelled to offer his thanks to God after a game, 7 00:00:32.570 --> 00:00:37.550 win or lose. He did so on the 50-yard line of the field. Initially, 8 00:00:37.551 --> 00:00:40.190 these were prayers that were sort of quiet to himself, 9 00:00:40.250 --> 00:00:44.060 but increasingly others joined him. Players, members of the public, 10 00:00:44.350 --> 00:00:46.260 media as the controversy grew. 11 00:00:46.320 --> 00:00:49.740 And so it sort of became more of a spectacle as time went on. 12 00:00:49.880 --> 00:00:51.620 The school district basically said, "Hey, look, 13 00:00:51.621 --> 00:00:56.540 you can't do this." And what this gets to is this interplay between two 14 00:00:56.541 --> 00:00:57.540 parts of the First Amendment: 15 00:00:57.680 --> 00:01:00.900 one that says that government can't establish a religion, 16 00:01:00.900 --> 00:01:05.170 and one that says that people have to be able to have the ability to 17 00:01:05.490 --> 00:01:08.650 exercise their religion without interference from the government. 18 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:12.730 Basically the establishment clause is part of the First Amendment that says that 19 00:01:12.731 --> 00:01:14.569 government can't establish a religion, right? 20 00:01:14.569 --> 00:01:17.450 This was a very important concept to the founders, 21 00:01:17.451 --> 00:01:21.970 but what establishment means has been a, you know, 22 00:01:22.241 --> 00:01:23.720 just a question ever since. 23 00:01:23.990 --> 00:01:28.200 There's been a bunch of cases where the Supreme Court has come down on the side 24 00:01:28.201 --> 00:01:29.160 of religion. In fact, 25 00:01:29.161 --> 00:01:32.240 that seems to be this court's default position at this place. 26 00:01:32.350 --> 00:01:35.080 Some of the justices have spoken publicly about the idea. 27 00:01:35.081 --> 00:01:37.920 They feel that religion has become a disfavored right. 28 00:01:37.921 --> 00:01:41.520 And they're concerned that in the push to 29 00:01:43.770 --> 00:01:46.910 not trip over the establishment clause, that governments, 30 00:01:46.911 --> 00:01:51.470 schools and so forth have gone too far and aren't protecting 31 00:01:51.870 --> 00:01:53.310 religious exercise enough. 32 00:01:54.010 --> 00:01:58.470 The conservative majority seemed to be skeptical of the school's 33 00:01:58.830 --> 00:02:03.740 argument. They seem to be leaning with Coach Kennedy and this idea that 34 00:02:04.080 --> 00:02:07.580 the prayer was private. It was not a matter of government speech. 35 00:02:08.060 --> 00:02:12.180 I think the outcome in the case is important because it could really settle one 36 00:02:12.181 --> 00:02:16.860 of the main outstanding questions from this tension between the 37 00:02:16.930 --> 00:02:20.980 establishment and exercise clauses in the First Amendment about how far in 38 00:02:20.981 --> 00:02:25.450 particular school districts have to go to accommodate the religious beliefs of 39 00:02:25.530 --> 00:02:28.250 teachers, coaches and other employees. 40 00:02:28.950 --> 00:02:30.810 That's one of the many outstanding questions. 41 00:02:30.811 --> 00:02:35.450 One of the many major outstanding debates in this kind of long running, 42 00:02:35.600 --> 00:02:40.410 decades-long debate over how people exercise their 43 00:02:40.530 --> 00:02:41.210 religion in this country.