FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEWS ADVISORY
November 15, 2017
Steve Marshall
For More Information, contact:
Mike Lewis (334) 353-2199
Alabama Attorney General
Joy Patterson (334) 242-7491
Page 1 of 1
ATTORNEY GENERAL STEVE MARSHALL URGES U.S. SUPREME COURT TO
PROTECT PRAYER AT PUBLIC MEETINGS
(MONTGOMERY) – Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall joined a coalition of 22 states
Wednesday in urging the U.S. Supreme Court to protect the practice of lawmaker-led prayer at
public meetings.
“Lawmaker-led prayer is woven into the fabric of American society dating back to the founding
of our Republic,” observed Attorney General Steve Marshall. “Public prayer is both
constitutional and a common practice throughout our country. Today more than 35 states and
countless local governments permit lawmakers to offer prayer. I share Justice Scalia’s
perspective that “to deprive our society of (this) important unifying mechanismÖis as senseless
in policy as it is unsupported by law.”
The 22-state coalition filed an amicus brief Wednesday calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to
hear arguments in the case of Lund vs. Rowan County (North Carolina) and confirm the
constitutionality of public prayer led by lawmakers. Such a decision would clear up confusion
among the lower federal courts and strike down a recent ruling in the Fourth Circuit that the
Rowan County Board of Commissioners’ practice of opening its public meetings with a
commissioner-led prayer violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.
The brief notes that state legislatures, including in Alabama, have opened public sessions with
lawmaker-led prayer for much of this country’s history. “Both of Alabama’s legislative
chambers have allowed members to offer prayers for more than one hundred years. A member
of the House of Representatives, for instance, gave the invocation in the state Senate in 1873.
And during the 1875 legislative session, Mr. Nelson and Mr. Wilson, members of the House of
Representatives, opened House sessions with prayers.”
Alabama filed its brief in support of free expression of faith along with West Virginia, Arizona,
Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana,
Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and
Wisconsin, along with the Governor of Kentucky.
A copy of the brief is available here.
–30–
501 Washington Avenue * Montgomery, AL 36104 * (334) 242-7300
www.ago.alabama.gov
