How to Prove a Constitutional Violation of the Establishment Clause
- 1). Collect the published statute or ordinance adopted by the governing body that violated the establishment clause, or the minutes of a body that sanctioned the action of a public employee. For instance, there have been occasional attempts to challenge references to God on U.S. currency and in a phrase added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954. Challenges regarding the pledge often focus on authority figures such as public-school teachers requiring children to recite the pledge, including the phrase "under God."
- 2). Document the harm you yourself, or an incompetent person or child for whom you act as the legal guardian, suffered through the action of the governing body. One of the Pledge of Allegiance suits went as far as the U.S. Supreme Court, in 2004, before being denied because the parent who had brought the suit did not have custody of the child on whose behalf he had filed. He filed a new suit on behalf of other parents, but the Court of Appeals found in 2010 that the wording of the pledge was constitutional.
- 3). Research previous rulings on similar issues. Prepare yourself to show how your suit should be considered differently than the others, or how it is the same as precedents from other jurisdictions. Focus on the issues of the establishment clause - government favoring one religion over another or providing the powers of government to religious institutions.
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