[quote] § 1. Clergy; eligibility to serve in legislature
Whereas Ministers of the Gospel are by their profession, dedicated to God and the care of souls, and ought not to be diverted from the great duties of their functions; therefore, no Minister of the Gospel, or priest of any denomination whatever, shall be eligible to a seat in either House of the Legislature.
§ 2. Atheists holding office
No person who denies the being of God, or a future state of rewards and punishments, shall hold any office in the civil department of this State.
§ 3. Duelists holding office
Any person who shall, after the adoption of this Constitution, fight a duel, or knowingly be the bearer of a challenge to fight a duel, or send or accept a challenge for that purpose, or be an aider or abettor in fighting a duel, shall be deprived of the right to hold any office of honor or profit in this State, and shall be punished otherwise, in such manner as the Legislature may prescribe.
[quote]
So in Tennasse if your an athiest you cant be elected? huh?
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That scares the crap out of me. The fact that you can't even hold office if you don't believe in an afterlife is a gross violation of separation of church and state. I hope someone challenges this in court.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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Why does that scare you? Have you ever been given any indication that promotion of atheism will ever be restricted?
Posts: 1286 | Registered: Dec 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: Why does that scare you? Have you ever been given any indication that promotion of atheism will ever be restricted?
What do you consider 'promotion of atheism'?
If there is a Ten Commandments monument on the lawn of a court house, is every piece of grass that doesn't have the monument on it 'promoting atheism'?
Posts: 3852 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
It's interesting that only the atheism aspect raised your religious freedom hackles, Blayne. The Supreme Court has explicitly struck down section 1.
Therefore, the Tennessee provision is unlikely to ever be challenged in court, because it is unlikely to ever be enforced. Moreover, being a well-established right, the official who enforced it would be subject to a section 1983 suit for damages.
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Just file this one with the other absurd vestigial "laws" that get emailed around every so often.
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I suppose I should be used to lawmakers putting forth "message bills" that put personal biases before the actual good of a populace. It scares me that there were enough people who thought it was a good idea to pass something that is clearly discriminatory. It's a religious test, something our nation's founders wanted desperately to avoid.
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quote:Originally posted by Epictetus: I suppose I should be used to lawmakers putting forth "message bills" that put personal biases before the actual good of a populace. It scares me that there were enough people who thought it was a good idea to pass something that is clearly discriminatory. It's a religious test, something our nation's founders wanted desperately to avoid.
To be fair, the law also includes references to 'dueling', so it's not exactly a piece of recent legislation.
Posts: 3852 | Registered: Feb 2002
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What really has me worked up is section 3. So I ran with a bit of a rough crowd when I was younger and did my fair share of dueling. Now I can't hold public office in Tennessee? This is ridiculous.
I first read the title of the section as "dualists holding office" and was shocked that they actually had a statute specifically for dualists!
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I noticed that after posting, so my outrage over this has diminished. In principle though, it still kind of irks me.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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Yes, it's an old law. It made its rounds on the social news sites a few months ago. I guess its returned.
Posts: 1327 | Registered: Aug 2007
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What's annoying is that a modicum of research would indicate that the issue was taken care of more than 40 years ago.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:What's annoying is that a modicum of research would indicate that the issue was taken care of more than 40 years ago.
It's still a scary thing to see encoded in a law, even if the law "will never be enforced".
If the law stated that Catholics couldn't hold office in Tennessee, I'd bet the outrage would be extreme, and that they'd pass a law to repeal it post haste.
I'd imagine that a lawmaker proposing to take it (the atheist version) off the books would get a very strong negative reaction. This is a just a feeling of mine, and not based on any facts, however.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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quote:It's still a scary thing to see encoded in a law, even if the law "will never be enforced".
There are lots of laws still on the books that are unconstitutional to enforce - especially in state constitutions, because they can't be undone with just legislative action.
Most laws that are struck down as unconstitutional are only repealed if there is a way to alter them to make them unconstitutional. It's a mark of how utterly this law was rejected that it's still on the books. Otherwise, it would have been replaced with a narrower version that attempted to skirt the lines drawn by the Supreme Court.
quote:If the law stated that Catholics couldn't hold office in Tennessee, I'd bet the outrage would be extreme, and that they'd pass a law to repeal it post haste.
The law against ministers holding office is still on the books, and there hasn't been extreme outrage about it. And that's an issue that came up with Huckabee's run.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I'd like to see someone from my home state sponsor a bill that basically reverses every obviously unconstitutional and unenforceable state law currently extant. The "cleanup" bill.
I understand it'd be a bit harder to go about cleaning up the mistakes in our state constitution though. (Particularly recent ones like Utah's amendment 3 )
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: I'd hate to see that, because it would be a huge waste of resources.
That's right! The state legislatures are far too busy coming up with new unconstitutional and unenforceable laws.
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: I'd hate to see that, because it would be a huge waste of resources.
I guess my assumption would be that it would be a quick process. I suppose I was wrong. Still, it'd be really cool to have a "clean" set of laws.
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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I like Dan Carlin's idea: every time state legislature wants to add a new law, they first have to go through all the old, outdated ones and get rid of one. Sure, it might be a "waste of resources". I'm just wondering if it's really okay to just ignore our mistakes forever and ever. Probably should've started clean up a longggggg time ago.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
ild prefer the concept from the getgo of renewable, if its not renewed its stricken from the books. after say a 20 year period.
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quote:Sure, it might be a "waste of resources". I'm just wondering if it's really okay to just ignore our mistakes forever and ever.
It's not ignoring our mistakes. The mistake was squarely addressed; the mistake corrected. That disqualification has no force. Repealing it has zero effect.
quote:ild prefer the concept from the getgo of renewable, if its not renewed its stricken from the books. after say a 20 year period.
That's not even a feasible fix for this problem. If this law just expired, the entire government of Tennessee would be abolished - remember, the law in question defines the structure of that government.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I really hate these old laws...they are dangerous and can creep up into things when you least expect them.
Such as an ancient law that banned inter-racial marriage that was used to ban gay marriage. If only the movement to clean up these old laws had moved a little faster...if brought up before the glut of anti-gay amendments that helped get Bush back into office it would have been struck down in a second as a racist law and could never have been used to such evil purposes.
Posts: 4953 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Robert Heinlein once proposed that the measure of a govenment should be the laws it repealed...
Dagonee: what is the (generic)process to repeal a law? Who has to be consulted - or is just a thing that could be handled by an appropriate commitee?
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quote:Sure, it might be a "waste of resources". I'm just wondering if it's really okay to just ignore our mistakes forever and ever.
It's not ignoring our mistakes. The mistake was squarely addressed; the mistake corrected. That disqualification has no force. Repealing it has zero effect.
Not "zero" effect, but I think people are getting what you're saying. I understand that this law, because it has not been changed, is as good as nothing in the eyes of a court. But in the eyes of public opinion, it is not nothing.
As an example, extant laws concerning interracial marriage are a continuing embarrassment to the states (I don't know which ones) that still have them. People can understand that they are unenforceable, but the fact that they continue to be printed, that people can still continually point to them tells me that something aught to be done at some point.
Also, I'm not a legal expert, but it seems to me that as long as the law remains on the books, a court can make a decision which overturns the original ruling. I don't know if that's true, and I do know that eventually the matter would appear before a court that would uphold the constitution.
What I want to know is what is so bad about removing laws and parts of laws which are inapplicable, or which bear no force? Are the original laws just sitting there as placeholders to show lawmakers what happens when they ignore the constitution? If so, then why not find a way to educate the public on which laws are "the real thing" and which laws are *still on the books.*
You point out that a little research will find you your answers, but this is undoubtedly not the most complicated case that exists. Many of us don't have the legal knowledge or the knowledge of resources available to us to research any law. I'm the son of a lawyer myself, and I don't know where to look up precedents or rulings from any court. And you're addressing a question from Blayne, (who thinks communist China is a model society), and isn't a US citizen, and so hasn't even had the government classes you and I were required to attend.
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quote:Dagonee: what is the (generic)process to repeal a law? Who has to be consulted - or is just a thing that could be handled by an appropriate commitee?
The process to repeal a law is the exact same process to pass that law. In this case, it requires amending the state constitution - which probably means super-majorities in the legislature and a majority popular vote in a referendum.
quote:Also, I'm not a legal expert, but it seems to me that as long as the law remains on the books, a court can make a decision which overturns the original ruling.
Only the Supreme Court of the U.S. could. Which would require someone enforcing the ban and the case getting through to the Court. In the situation where that is happening, it would be trivial to get the law repassed. Repealing it is zero extra protection.
quote:What I want to know is what is so bad about removing laws and parts of laws which are inapplicable, or which bear no force?
It's not bad. It's simply not worth the effort.
One thing I think would be bad would be editing the constitution to remove the test entirely. I'd prefer an amendment saying "Article IX, Sections 1 and 2 are no longer in force."
This is similar to the way the 14th amendment overrode the 3/5 clause. The clause is still in the Constitution, but it has no effect because of a later amendment. We see one aspect of our national sin and the first major attempt at correcting it. I think such reminders are good in constitutions.
quote:Are the original laws just sitting there as placeholders to show lawmakers what happens when they ignore the constitution? If so, then why not find a way to educate the public on which laws are "the real thing" and which laws are *still on the books.*
This is how our legal system works, and there's almost no way around it in a common law system. Even were this particular instance cleaned up, there are thousands of instances where courts have clarified the meaning or extent of laws that would take enormous effort to clean up in this way. If we were to spend legislative effort on this, I would prefer it be spent on laws still in effect.
quote:You point out that a little research will find you your answers, but this is undoubtedly not the most complicated case that exists. Many of us don't have the legal knowledge or the knowledge of resources available to us to research any law. I'm the son of a lawyer myself, and I don't know where to look up precedents or rulings from any court. And you're addressing a question from Blayne, (who thinks communist China is a model society), and isn't a US citizen, and so hasn't even had the government classes you and I were required to attend.
First, the reason Blayne brought this up was because it's cyclically posted on various sites in order to generate outrage. It worked on Blayne as it works on numerous others. There's enough outrage in this country that people ought to check it out first.
Second, a google search for "religious test atheist" (without the quotes) brings up this as the first link. It provides the information needed.
quote:Such as an ancient law that banned inter-racial marriage that was used to ban gay marriage.
That's an entirely different issue. The law in question (Mass. law stating that out of state residents could not marry in Mass. if they could not marry in their state of residence) was never declared unconstitutional. Moreover, it still had legal effect - for example, different states have different consanguinity rules, and this law still applied. If you want to argue it's a bad law that should be repealed, that's fine. But I haven't spoken against repealing bad laws. I've spoken against repealing bad laws that are no longer in effect.
***
Finally, I still find it interesting that no one seemed to have a problem with the ban on ministers holding office.
I oppose Catholic priests holding office for religious reasons, but oppose a law banning them from doing so for other reasons.
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I oppose the ban on ministers holding office, but haven't commented since the law doesn't actually mean anything today.
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For what it's worth, as I read the three laws in the order they were posted, I was first very surprised/upset with the one banning ministers. The one about duelists just made me kind of go "darnit "
Posts: 349 | Registered: Jul 2006
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quote:Originally posted by scholarette: I oppose the ban on ministers holding office, but haven't commented since the law doesn't actually mean anything today.
Indeed. I thought it was kinda silly anyways, as in "You (priests), the work you do is so 'great', we wouldn't want you to merely politicians." Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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The town where I went to High School, Kaysville UT had an old local ordnance prohibiting the selling or renting of real property to "Negros, Mexicans and Hawaiians". A few years ago a civics class at the high school had it repealed as a class project. Anyone who might be in a similar class at a University might consider a repeal action as an appropriate class project. There is nothing like hands on to understand how a machine works.
Posts: 1167 | Registered: Oct 2005
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That's not a bad idea. The project should include a draft of the legislation necessary to effect the repeal, a description of the process to be followed (for things like constitutional or referendum repeals), and an analysis of why the law no longer is in effect. In this case, it would be a simple site to the SCOTUS case.
That would create enough usefulness (civic education and participation) that I think it would be worth doing.
Edit: In fact, it's a great idea. Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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What I want to know is, when is our legal system going to get a decent and public revision control system? This isn't rocket science, people.
Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jan 1999
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Here is one problem I have with 'unenforcable' laws; what is to prevent the police from trying to enforce them?
It doesn't matter that the case will eventually be thrown out and/or ruled unconstitutional or unenforceable, the damage is already done. Your name has been dragged through the press in a scandalous way, you have incurred thousands of dollars in legal expenses.
In a sense, the police can, if they have a grudge against you, use the charge as the punishment. The concept of innocent until proven guilty might exist in the courtroom, but in the public mind and in the public press, to be charged is to be assume guilty until proven innocent, and in many many cases, to be charge and proven innocent, still means you are likely to be guilty in the public mind.
I have no doubt that people are frequently charged with enforceable crimes, not because any one thinks they are guilty, but because in most cases, to simply be charged is to be punished severely.
quote:Here is one problem I have with 'unenforcable' laws; what is to prevent the police from trying to enforce them?
First, this unenforceable law is not one subject to police enforcement.
Second, there are numerous avenues of relief available, including civil rights suits.
Third, you might as well ask what prevents the police from charging you with a crime that has been expressly repealed by the legislature. There is no substantive difference - you are postulating that the police will knowingly wrongfully arrest someone to punish them.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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