I was recently at a corporate function of a publicly traded company to celebrate a recent aquisition, and they had an opening prayer (that happened to be overtly evangelical in nature), which lasted for about 3-4 minutes. I’m pretty sure more people than myself in the room were not self-proclaimed christians, but even if that were the case, is this legal in the United States?
This particular meeting was in the Carolinas.
There’s nothing the Constitution that mandates the separtion of Church and Business.
Unless you work for the government, the Constitution is largely suspended when you’re at work.
Absolutely – publicly traded or not.
However, it would be illegal for the brass of this company to somehow coerce employees to participate in the prayer … or to deny reasonably expected promotions/perks to those who don’t participate.
Of course it is. A private Corporation is not regulated by the Constitution, which allows for the restriction of Government promotion of Religion only. The First Amendment does not prohibit Government participation in religion, only establishment of a religion. This is probably one of the most mis-understood and over-rhetoricized subjects in America. Doubtless, someone will cite the Supreme Court’s decision on “Seperation of Church and State,” a decision almost as faulty as Dred Scot, as a legal doctrine…
CPL
Not true, BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA et al. v. DALE, clearly stated that the right of association allows organizations to decide without Government interference their standards of conduct and who they wish to allow to participate in an activity. In other words, the Boy Scouts are allowed, according to the Supreme Court to deny admittance to homosexuals and athiests.
Denial of participation is not the same thing as coerced participation.
BSA v Dale (or as I call it, the BS decision) does not suspend the right to be free of religious discrimination in employment. BSA can get away with discriminating because it claims it’s a religious organization. Some random business denying an employee a promotion because she didn’t want to participate in morning prayer would not likely get the same deference.
Just 'cuz you say it, it doesn’t make it true. Your post is also pretty irrelevant to the topic at hand, which is the legitimacy of prayer at a private business meeting.
–Cliffy
Wrong cite. That wouldn’t apply to businesses. What if that business decided it wouldn’t promote Blacks to management positions, for instance? Even the Boy Scouts would get in trouble if they had a policy banning black scoutmasters.
It’s all in the Civil Rights Act:
Religion is specifically protected. bordelond is correct: under the Civil Rights Act, you cannot refuse to promote or hire an employee because of his religious preferences.
You are, however, allowed to open a meeting with prayer. If an employee objects, he is not require to take part, and cannot be punished for refusing.
I am not familiar with that case but I looked at a summary of it and the ruling (IANAL). It looks like it’s about freedom of association, unrelated to employment. That is, you can have a club and don’t have to take anyone as a member whom you don’t want, and the government can’t make you.
But employment is different, and religion (or lack of it) can’t be used as a condition of employment. Further, “harassment” on the basis of religion is illegal. I do not know what the precedents are for what is considered harassment, but I suppose that if a non-Christian employee were required to be present for this prayer as a condition of employment there could be an issue.
The conduct of the prayer per se, however, was legal.
This is interesting, because I am aware that one form of Sexual Harassment in the workplace is called “hostile environment”, where, say, while comments and actions are not directed at the complainant, they are surrounded by offensive pictures and or within earshot of offensive comments. Could this opening prayer be considered hostile environment in the same way? Does anyone know of precident for this?
If that’s the case, you’d be causing a hostile environment by raising the question in front of someone that supports it. And I’d have just cause to complain about all the “UAW Yes” posters our less intelligent engineers have plastered about the place, since my blood boils every time I see one. But in your case, why should it even be a problem? If it’s not your belief, just privately laugh at the poor fools who are wasting their time and not hurting anyone at all. These prayers happen all over the place, and unless you’re in the church during service, they’re not talking to you.
I am just questioning the legality of it, Im not questioning the harm or morality. Those issues would be in great debates or the bbq pit, I believe.
So can a corporation in the United States own slaves? If the Constitution does not apply to corporations, the 13th amendment would not apply and they would be able to own slaves.
The 13th Amendment applies to governments. They are forbidden to pass any laws that permit one human being to own another. Absent such laws, a corporation cannot have property in a human being.
You are reading that sentence way too literally. The amendment in question is specifically aimed at the government. The Civil Rights Act talks about what is legal regarding religion in the workplace. The Act does not disallow prayer in the workplace, however.
Yes, it’s perfectly legal.
Plus, hostile work environment sexual harassment as it is, must actually be related to “sexual” harassment and isn’t just any form of hostile environment you wish it to be.
This website explains what, in general, needs to be there in order for you to prove your claim of hostile work environment sexual harassment in court.
To summarize the website’s explanation you need so show that:
- You suffered intentional discrimination because of your sex.
- The discrimination was pervasive and regular.
- The discrimination detrimentally affected you.
- The discrimination would detrimentally affect a reasonable person of the same sex.
- Management knew about the harassment, or should have known, and did nothing to stop it.
From the article I read on that link, I don’t know that “hostile work environment” based on religion is something covered by current harassment law.
My husband does work for thew government-- he’s deputy warden at a state prison. Many meetings and conferences he attends open with prayer-- sometimes with Jesus specifically mentioned. He declines to participate, and though he feels it to be a constitutional violation, he’s not dumb enough to file suit.
Cite, please?
I know parents would leave in droves and meeting places would become more scarce if the Scouts banned black scoutmasters, but I can’t think of a current law that could be used to initiate civil or criminal pursuit of them for this.
It’s certainly legal for a private business corporation to open meetings with a prayer.
It’s certainly illegal for that corporation to require all employees to participate, or to fire or refuse to promote employees who don’t participate, etc.
Just the fact that they are doing this in the first place would probably count against them if any employee ever brings a discrimination charge against them. Try to convince a judge/jury that ‘my religion is so important to me that I require every business meeting to start with a prayer, but I don’t retaliate against employees that refuse to participate in this prayer’. Would certainly raise some suspicions.