{
  "id": "96-846",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "96-846",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 100610,
      "date": "1998-12-01",
      "retrieved": "2016-05-24T20:48:35.951941",
      "title": "School Prayer: The Congressional Response, 1962 - 1998",
      "summary": "For at least a century and a half the issue of school prayer has periodically convulsed the body\npolitic. But only in recent times -- since 1962 when the Supreme Court in  Engel v. Vitale\n held\ngovernment sponsorship of devotional activities in the public schools to be unconstitutional -- has\nCongress become persistently involved.\n  Since that decision Congress has considered a variety of measures to promote or permit\ndevotional activities in the public schools: (1)  Constitutional amendments  --\nNumerous proposals\nhave been introduced in every Congress since  Engel  to overturn or limit the Court's\ndecisions by\namending the Constitution, and numerous hearings have been held. The House has voted on a\nconstitutional amendment twice (in 1971 and 1998), the Senate four times (in 1966, 1970, and twice\nin 1984). But only in the Senate vote in 1970 did such a proposal garner the two-thirds majority\nnecessary for adoption, and that vote was perceived less as a vote on school prayer than as a vote to\nkill the measure to which the school prayer proposal was attached -- the Equal Rights Amendment. \n(2)  Limitations on federal court jurisdiction  -- Proposals were introduced in every\nCongress from\nthe 93d through the 103d to strip the federal courts of jurisdiction over the school prayer issue. The\nSenate voted in favor of such a measure the first time it came up for a vote in 1979; but in 1982,\n1985, and 1988 it rejected the proposal by increasingly wide margins. (3)  Equal access\nproposals \n-- Following the Supreme Court's 1981 decision in  Widmar v. Vincent  holding student-\ninitiated\nreligious groups to be entitled to meet on the same basis as other student-initiated groups at public\ncolleges and universities, Congress in 1984 enacted the \"Equal Access Act\" extending the principle\nto student-initiated religious groups at the public secondary school level. (4)\n Appropriations riders \n-- Since fiscal 1981 Congress has added a prophylactic rider (the Walker amendment) to the annual\nappropriations bills for the Department of Education barring funds from being used \"to prevent the\nimplementation of programs of voluntary prayer and meditation in the public schools.\" (5)\n Cutoff\nof funds  -- Since 1984 both the House and the Senate have voted on various amendments\nto cut off\nfederal education funds from state and local educational agencies that prevent individuals from\nparticipating in voluntary prayer. In 1994 Congress enacted the Kassebaum amendment and\nconverted several school prayer amendments to the \"Goals 2000: Educate America Act\" into a\nmandate to state and local educational agencies similar to the Walker amendment. (6)\n Sense-of-the-Congress resolutions  -- Measures to express Congress' views on\nwhat devotional activities remain\npermissible in the public schools under the Court's rulings have frequently been offered as\nalternatives to constitutional amendments. The Senate has rejected two such proposals (in 1966) and\napproved one (in 1994), but none have become law.\n  This report provides a Congress-by-Congress review of legislative action on the school prayer\nissue from 1962 through 1998.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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          "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/96-846",
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      ],
      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "American Law",
    "Appropriations",
    "Constitutional Questions"
  ]
}