Editing Lemon v. Kurtzman (section)

==''Lemon'' test<!--'Lemon test' redirects here-->==
The Court applied a three-prong test, which became known as the '''''Lemon'' test''' (named after the lead plaintiff [[Alton Lemon]]),<!--boldface per WP:R#PLA--> to decide whether the state statutes violated the Establishment Clause.<ref name=PewResearch>{{cite web |title=The Lemon Test |date=May 14, 2009 |url=https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2009/05/14/shifting-boundaries6/ |publisher=Pew Research Center}}</ref><ref name="20100910FirstAmendmentCenterEClause">{{cite web |title=Religious liberty in public life: Establishment Clause overview |url=http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/rel_liberty/establishment/index.aspx |publisher=First Amendment Center |access-date=May 28, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100905120418/http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/rel_liberty/establishment/index.aspx |archive-date=September 5, 2010}}</ref><ref name="NYTObitAL">{{cite news |last=Liptak |first=Adam |date=2013-05-26 |title=Alton T. Lemon, civil rights activist, dies at 84 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/us/alton-t-lemon-civil-rights-activist-dies-at-84.html?smid=pl-share |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=2014-08-15}}</ref>  

The Court held that the Establishment Clause required that a statute satisfy all parts of a three-prong test:<ref name=PewResearch/>

* The "Purpose Prong": The statute must have a secular legislative purpose.
* The "Effect Prong": The principal or primary effect of the statute must neither advance nor inhibit religion.
* The "Entanglement Prong": The statute must not result in an "excessive government entanglement" with religion.

In the 1985 case ''[[Wallace v. Jaffree]]'', the Supreme Court stated that the effect prong and the entanglement prong need not be examined if the law in question had no obvious secular purpose.<ref name="20201105WVJEncyclopædiaBritannica">{{cite web |author1=Malila N. Robinson |title=Wallace v. Jaffree |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Wallace-v-Jaffree |publisher=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]] |access-date=November 5, 2020 |ref=November 5, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201105175148/https://www.britannica.com/event/Wallace-v-Jaffree|archive-date=November 5, 2020}}</ref> In ''[[Corporation of Presiding Bishop of Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints v. Amos]]'' (1987) the Supreme Court wrote that the purpose prong's requirement of a secular legislative purpose did not mean that a law's purpose must be unrelated to religion, because this would amount to a requirement, in the words of ''[[Zorach v. Clauson]]'', 343 U. S. 306 (1952), at 314, "that the government show a callous indifference to religious groups." Instead, "''Lemon''<nowiki/>'s 'purpose' requirement aims at preventing the relevant governmental decisionmaker—in this case, Congress—from abandoning neutrality and acting with the intent of promoting a particular point of view in religious matters."<ref>{{cite web |title=Corp. of Presiding Bishop v. Amos, 483 U.S. 327 (1987), at 335 |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/483/327/ |publisher=Justia US Supreme Court Center |access-date=November 8, 2020 |date=June 24, 1987}}</ref> The Supreme Court further explained in ''[[McCreary County v. American Civil Liberties Union]]'' (2005) that" "When the government acts with the ostensible and predominant purpose of advancing religion, it violates that central Establishment Clause value of official religious neutrality, there being no neutrality when the government’s ostensible object is to take sides."<ref>{{cite web |title=McCreary County v. American Civil Liberties Union of Ky., 545 U.S. 844 (2005), at Part II A |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/545/844/ |publisher=Justia US Supreme Court Center |access-date=November 8, 2020 |date=June 27, 2005}}</ref>

The act at issue in ''Lemon'' stipulated that "eligible teachers must teach only courses offered in the public schools, using only materials used in the public schools, and must agree not to teach courses in religion." Still, a three-judge panel found 25% of the State's elementary students attended private schools, about 95% of those attended Roman Catholic schools, and the sole beneficiaries under the act were 250 teachers at Roman Catholic schools.

The Court found that the parochial school system was "an integral part of the religious mission of the Catholic Church", and held that the Act fostered "excessive entanglement" between government and religion, thus violating the Establishment Clause.<ref name=lemon/>

{{blockquote|Held: Both statutes are unconstitutional under the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment, as the cumulative impact of the entire relationship arising under the statutes involves excessive entanglement between government and religion.<ref name=lemon/>}}

===''Agostini v. Felton'' modification===

The ''Lemon'' test was modified,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.lincoln.edu/criminaljustice/hr/Religion.htm|title=Freedom of Religion|website=www.lincoln.edu|publisher=[[Lincoln University (Pennsylvania)]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200524013011/http://www.lincoln.edu/criminaljustice/hr/Religion.htm|archive-date=May 24, 2020|access-date=May 28, 2020}}</ref> according to the [[First Amendment Center]], in the 1997 case ''[[Agostini v. Felton]]'' in which the U.S. Supreme Court combined the effect prong and the entanglement prong. This resulted in an unchanged purpose prong and a modified effect prong.<ref name="20100910FirstAmendmentCenterEClause" /> As the First Amendment Center notes, "The Court in ''Agostini'' identified three primary criteria for determining whether a government action has a primary effect of advancing religion: 1) government indoctrination, 2) defining the recipients of government benefits based on religion, and 3) excessive entanglement between government and religion."<ref name="20100910FirstAmendmentCenterEClause" />