New York, NY, October 30, 2017 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today joined a friend-of-the court brief to the U.S. Supreme Court urging rejection of a bakery’s claim that the Free Exercise Clause to the First Amendment empowered it to refuse the sale of a wedding cake to a same-sex couple based on the owner’s religious beliefs.
The brief filed by a coalition of civil rights and religious organizations asserts the Court should uphold a lower court ruling that the…
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Calls it a “Roadmap for Discrimination” New York, NY, October 10, 2017 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today expressed deep concern about guidance issued by the Department of Justice on how the Trump Administration should interpret religious liberty protections in federal law.
Jonathan A. Greenblatt, ADL CEO, issued the following statement:
This is a destructive and discriminatory policy that is using religious beliefs as an excuse to weaken anti-discrimination…
New York, NY, June 26, 2017 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today expressed disappointment with the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer, which held that Missouri’s decision to exclude houses of worship, including Trinity Lutheran, from a program that provided direct grants to pay for playground resurfacing materials was unconstitutional discrimination against religion.
ADL had joined an amicus brief, with seven other groups,…
For Educators | For Parents, Families, and Caregivers Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the High Holidays, are celebrated by Jewish people all over the world. The High Holidays fall on different days each year. For the specific dates each year, check our Calendar of Observances. These and other Jewish holidays fall on different days in our calendar because they follow the Jewish calendar, which has a different number of days than our calendar. The Jewish calendar is a Soli-lunar calendar. …
May 12, 2017
The Florida Legislature recently enacted a back door school prayer bill – Senate Bill 436, the so-called "Florida Student and School Personnel Religious Liberties Act," which the Governor is expected to sign. It is intended to do an end run around U.S. Supreme Court decisions barring school-sponsored prayer in K-12 public schools. Senate Bill 436 (“SB 436”) is unnecessary, raises serious constitutional issues, and creates a legal quagmire for Florida…
Politicizing the Pews is bad for Religion and Democracy New York, NY, May 4, 2017 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is deeply troubled by the Executive Order President Donald Trump issued today ostensibly “promoting free speech and religious liberty.” ADL expressed concern that religious organizations may believe this order empowers them to engage in more political activity, even though it does not actually change the law to permit that.
“If churches and other…
February 16, 2017 The Honorable Steve King
Chair
House Judiciary Subcommittee on the on the Constitution and Civil Justice
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515
The Honorable Steve Cohen
Ranking Member
House Judiciary Subcommittee on the on the Constitution and Civil Justice
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515
Dear Chairman King and Ranking Member Cohen:
We write to provide the views of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for…
For Educators Individuals, including parents, and groups who have no formal relationship to a school (Third Parties) may distribute religious materials, including Bibles, to students outside of school premises. They may also discuss religious matters with students.
Third-party materials or publications of a religious viewpoint may be distributed on- campus to the same extent distribution of third-party secular materials is permitted. However, courts have applied different rules to…
For Educators Release time in the public schools refers to programs in which students are released from school early to attend religious classes off school premises. Participating students must have permission from their parents. Nonparticipating students remain in school. Such programs may be constitutional if the religious classes take place off school grounds, if no public school funds are expended, and if school officials or teachers do not promote program attendance through coercion or…
For Educators Public schools may not teach religion, although teaching about religion in a secular context is permitted.1 The Bible may be taught in a school, but only for its historical, cultural or literary value and never in a devotional, celebratory or doctrinal manner, or in such a way that encourages acceptance of the Bible as a religious document.2
SPECIFIC ISSUES & QUESTIONS
What distinguishes "teaching religion" from "teaching about religion"?
Religion may be presented…
New York, NY, February 17, 2017 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is strongly cautioning against efforts to use religion as a license to discriminate. During a February 16 House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice hearings on “The State of Religious Liberty in America,” ADL highlighted the importance of church-state separation and religious accommodation in public schools, in government-funded social welfare services, in the military, and…
New York, NY January 25, 2017...The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today unambiguously condemned President Trump’s planned Executive Order on immigration and refugee entry into the United States. The draft order, if signed as written, would direct the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security to “cease refugee processing of and the admittance of nationals of Syria as refugees,” to cap the annual number of refugees at 50,000, and to halt all travel from…
For Educators | For Parents, Families, and Caregivers Most people love a celebration! Adults flutter around busily preparing for the festivities. Children are abuzz with excitement. Special foods are eaten, special heirlooms brought down from the shelf. Traditions are passed down from generation to generation. While children should have an opportunity to learn about and share information about the important holidays and celebrations in their lives, celebrating specific holidays in a school or…
Jerusalem, July 27, 2016 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today strongly condemned passage in the Knesset of the “mikvah law,” which bars the ritual immersion of converts by non-Orthodox rabbis in public mikvahs (ritual baths), saying that it is using a state-funded facilities to discriminate. Immersion in the mikvah is the final step in the process of converting to Judaism. The law, initiated by MK Moshe Gafni, strives to override the Israeli Supreme Court…
New York, NY, July 14, 2016 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today strongly condemned the decision by Israel’s Supreme Rabbinical court to reject the authority of prominent New York Orthodox Rabbi Haskel Lookstein by invalidating his conversion of an American woman to Judaism. ADL called the court’s decision a “slap in the face” to American Jewry, including those who have chosen to join the Jewish people, and said it highlights just how extreme the Israeli…
New York, NY, July 5, 2016 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today joined a friend-of-the court brief to the U.S. Supreme Court defending a Missouri constitutional provision that provides broader separation of church and state than the U.S. Constitution.
In the case titled, Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Parker, the State denied direct grants to houses of worship under this provision.
“The petitioner is seeking an unprecedented ruling from the Court that…
New York, NY, June 27, 2016 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today hailed the Supreme Court’s historic 5-3 decision in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, which struck down a Texas anti-abortion law. The law, HB2, would have effectively barred many women, particularly women in poverty and women of color, from exercising their constitutional right to an abortion. “The court’s decision appropriately recognizes the real-life impact of HB2 on access to…
Urges Quick Resolution by Lower Courts Washington, D.C., May 16, 2015 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today expressed disappointment with the U.S. Supreme Court’s sidestepping on the legality of the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive mandate opt-out provision for religiously affiliated groups.
This provision both accommodates religiously affiliated employers and ensures their female employees have access to no-cost prescription contraception insurance coverage…
Says Town’s Rejection of Mosque Construction “Troubling” and “Simply Unacceptable” New York, NY, May 11, 2016 … The Interfaith Coalition on Mosques (ICOM) today joined a friend-of-the court brief filed on behalf of a coalition of civil rights and interfaith organizations in support of The Islamic Society of Basking Ridge (ISBR). Filed with a federal court in New Jersey, the brief asserts that the Township of Bernards discriminatorily denied the congregation…
Jerusalem, March 28, 2016 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today strongly condemned Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef, for stating that “non-Jews shouldn’t live in the land of Israel.” In a recording of Yosef’s weekly Saturday night lecture, the rabbi can be heard saying, “If our hand were firm, if we had the power to rule, then non-Jews must not live in Israel. But, our hand is not firm.” He added that the only reason non…