Facts of the Case
In 1935, Lillian and William Gobitis were expelled from Pennsylvania public schools for refusing to salute the flag as part of a daily school exercise. The Gobitis children were Jehovah's Witnesses and believed that saluting the flag was forbidden by the Bible. They argued the expulsions violated their First Amendment rights.
Questions
Did the mandatory flag salute infringe upon liberties protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments?
Conclusions
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In an 8-to-1 decision, the Court upheld the mandatory flag salute. Writing for the majority, Justice Felix Frankfurter he relied primarily on the "secular regulation" rule, which weighs the secular purpose of a nonreligious government regulation against the religious practice it makes illegal or otherwise burdens the exercise of religion. The Court held that the state's interest in "national cohesion" was "inferior to none in the hierarchy of legal values," and that national unity was "the basis of national security." Frankfurter wrote that the school district's interest in creating national unity was enough to allow them to require students to salute the flag.
The Court declined to make itself “the school board for the country.”
Justice Harlan Stone dissented, writing that the “very essence of the liberty” guaranteed by the Constitution “is the freedom of the individual from compulsion as to what he shall think and what he shall say.” Stone’s position soon became the majority; the decision was reversed in 1943 in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette
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