# The Religion Clauses: The Case for Separating Church and State - Hardcover

by **Erwin Chemerinsky** (Author), **Howard Gillman** (Author)

Throughout American history, views on the proper relationship between the state and religion have been deeply divided. And, with recent changes in the composition of the Supreme Court, First Amendment law concerning religion is likely to change dramatically in the years ahead.

In _The Religion Clauses_, Erwin Chemerinsky and Howard Gillman, two of America's leading constitutional scholars, begin by explaining how freedom of religion is enshrined in the First Amendment through two provisions. They defend a robust view of both clauses and work from the premise that that the establishment clause is best understood, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, as creating a wall separating church and state. After examining all the major approaches to the meaning of the Constitution's religion clauses, they contend that the best approaches are for the government to be strictly secular and for there to be no special exemptions for religious people from neutral and general laws that others must obey. In an America that is only becoming more diverse with respect to religion, this is not only the fairest approach, but the one most in tune with what the First Amendment actually prescribes.  
Both a pithy primer on the meaning of the religion clauses and a broad-ranging indictment of the Court's misinterpretation of them in recent years, _The Religion Clauses_ shows how a separationist approach is most consistent with the concerns of the founders who drafted the Constitution and with the needs of a religiously pluralistic society in the 21st century.  

### Author Biography

  
**Erwin Chemerinsky** is Dean and Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. His most recent books are _We the People: A Progressive Reading of the Constitution for the Twenty-First Century_ (2018), and two books published in 2017, _Closing the Courthouse Doors: How Your Constitutional Rights Became Unenforceable_ and _Free Speech on Campus_ (with Howard Gillman). He also is the author of more than 200 law review articles. He writes a regular column for _The Sacramento Bee_, monthly columns for _The ABA Journal_ and _The Daily Journal_, and frequent op-eds in newspapers across the country. He also frequently argues appellate cases, including in the United States Supreme Court.

**Howard Gillman** is chancellor of the University of California, Irvine and holds faculty appointments in the School of Law and the Departments of Political Science, History, and Criminology, Law and Society. He is the author of _Free Speech on Campus_ (with Erwin Chemerinsky) and _The Votes that Counted: How the Court Decided the 2000 Presidential Election_ (2001).  

**Number of Pages:** 240

**Dimensions:** 1 x 8.3 x 5.3 IN

**Publication Date:** September 01, 2020

## Details

- **Price:** 29.99 USD
- **Vendor:** Books by splitShops
- **Type:** Books
- **Tags:** Books by splitShops, Shopify Collective

## Variants

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- The Religion Clauses: The Case for Separating Church and State - Hardcover

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