The Five Freedoms Project

You Be The Judge

Test your knowledge of the Five Freedoms and see how you match up to the courts...and fellow citizens.

August 16-31, 2008

Free Exercise vs. Compulsory Education

Several members of the Old Order Amish religion and the Conservative Amish Mennonite Church were convicted of violating Wisconsin's compulsory school-attendance law (which requires children to attend until age 16) by refusing to send their children to school beyond the eighth grade. (The Amish provide continuing informal vocational education to their children to prepare them for life in the rural Amish community.) The families believed that high school attendance was contrary to the Amish religion and way of life, and that they would endanger their own salvation and that of their children by complying with the law.

Do state attendance laws override the religious wishes of parents?

Vote Now!

  • 33%
    A. NO
    Requiring Amish and Mennonite children to attend school past the 8th grade would substantially burden their religious freedom. The religious groups in question provide a support structure for members of their community that does not require education past the 8th grade.
  • 38%
    B. YES
    As adherents of a fringe religion, Amish and Mennonite families are not entitled to First Amendment protection. The state’s need to ensure that all young people receive an education is the most compelling interest in the case and must be satisfied.
  • 29%
    C. YES
    First Amendment rights are not absolute, and must always be balanced between the rights of the individual and the needs of the state. In this case, the need for compulsory education outweighs a family’s need to withdraw their children from school.

  • Correct!

    In Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), the Court ruled that Wisconsin’s interest in universal education, “however highly we rank it, is not totally free from a balancing process when it impinges on fundamental rights and interests, such as those protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, and the traditional interest of parents with respect to the religious upbringing of their children so long as they ‘prepare [them] for additional obligations.’”

  • Incorrect

    The First Amendment’s Free Exercise clause protects the religious liberty of all Americans — regardless of how many adherents a religion has.

  • Incorrect

    Although it’s true that First Amendment rights are not absolute, and must always be balanced between the rights of the individual and the needs of the state, in this case, the religious-liberty rights of the families outweigh the state’s compulsory education law.

Remember — US Supreme Court decisions outline "the law of the land." Lower court decisions do not. Sometimes, this means different lower courts will issue contradicting opinions.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE COURT'S DECISION?

3 responses to Free Exercise vs. Compulsory Education

Add your own response.

laura says:

August 15th, 2008 at 5:14pm
This debate should not be about religion....it should be about a parents right to judge whether or not the public school system will adequately prepare the young for the future.....!!! But whose idea of the future are we to follow ? Perhaps the Amish know something that most capitalistic, consumer minded Americans don't know or want to know........the Amish know that a simple life is a sustainable and healthly life ! What are consumerism and industrialization doing for our planet ? NOTHING, but killing it for the future of our children !

laura says:

August 15th, 2008 at 5:09pm
Right ON ! Our public school system is inadequate for students who DO NOT wish to go to college...perhaps we should learn from the Amish and institute more vocational programs at an earlier age so that we in fact can reduce our dropout rate for the poor and minority students !

Gerlma A. S. Johnson says:

August 15th, 2008 at 12:42pm
The educational methods used by the Amish and Mennonite people are no different philosophically that those who place their children in Catholic schools. Even though Catholic education is considered more "mainstream", it allows for parental choice the same as other religions.