Gary S. Gilden, Coda to William Penn's Overture: Safeguarding Non-Mainstream
Religious Liberty Under the Pennsylvania Constitution, 4 U.Pa.
J.Const.L. 81 (November, 2001). Discusses the U.S. Supreme Court's
1990 decision in Employment Division v. Smith, 494 US 872,
where the court held that the laws of general applicability that had
the effect of burdening an individual's religious faith no longer needed
to be justified by a compelling governmental interest, but would pass
constitutional muster whenever there was a rational basis for the law.
Strict scrutiny would still be reserved for three narrow circumstances.
Goes on to discuss the holding in Commonwealth v. Edmunds,
where the Pennsylvania Supreme Court stated four factors that litigants
should brief whenever presenting or defending a state constitutional
claim and that Article I, Section 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution
insists that an individual must endure a burden on religion only where
government proves a compelling interest and that no alternatives less
restrictive of religion exist to achieve that interest. Also discusses
the broader religious protections under Article I, section 3 and the
history of that provision.
Marcy Smorey-Giger, The Effect of the Environmental Rights Amendment:
How Article I, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution Has Impacted
Environmental Law in Pennsylvania, 35 Juris No. 1, 35 (2001). |