Religion and Politics Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Religion and Politics - Research Paper Example Challenge to separate church from State arise due to immediate and long term causes which includes social, political and religious changes respectively. Americans are trying to divide the neighboring countries in terms of religion and politics. The division or separation of religion and politics rests on the cornerstone that, religious affairs cannot be compared and equated to politics. In this chapter, I will discuss how the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance has brought forth conflicts between religion and politics among American citizens. I will base my argument on the Supreme Court case of Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow. The Pew Research Center’s Religion and Public Life Project has done studies on how religious issues cross over to political debates in the United States. The studies also include the examination of how politics spills over to religion. The above named project has also identified different ways in which religion has molded the American citizens’ behaviors and attitudes. These issues and attitudes are targets issues pertaining politics and whether religious institutions should be involved in the same. Ideally, the commitment of the public to religion in the United States has prompted the progression of the debate on whether religion and politics should be separated (Noll & Harlow, 2007). ... Elk Grove Unified School District in California, U.S.A, has a pledge case to defend against in the Supreme Court. Michael Newdow’s daughter attended classes in this school. Newdow argued that the mentioning of the phrase by students during recitation of the pledge violated the establishment clause of America. The case endured different levels before reaching the Supreme Court. First, Newdow sued the school to a federal district court in the city California. However, Newdow was not the first man to raise concerns over the recitation of the pledge by students in public school. The seventh circuit of 1992 supported a law in Illinois that allowed public school students to recite the Pledge. However, in 2003, Ninth Circuit of Appeal ruled that the addition of the phrase â€Å"Under God† in the pledge and the demand by the School District Policy for the recitation of the pledge by students was unconstitutional, and it also violated the establishment clause of the first amendm ent (Andonian, 2003). The Supreme Court dismissed the case in 2004, for lack of provident standing. On the contrary, the court concentrated on the interests of both Newdow and his daughter. Justice Stevens argued that probably, Newdow’s daughter was not willing to affirm the constitutional challenge. On the concurring opinions, the majority ware accused by Justice Rehnquist for avoiding to consider the advantages of the constitutional challenge addressed by Newdow (Goelzhauser, 2011). Justice O’ Connor also argued that, Newdow had grounds to challenge the Elk Grove school policy. He later found out that the school policy opposed difficulties in the establishment clause. However, the dismissal of the case by