We recently filed a friend-of-the-court brief in a case before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) to support the right of local governments to honor the religious heritage of their communities.
The case, Fitzmaurice v. City of Quincy, involves a legal challenge against the city and its mayor for planning to erect two statues of Catholic saints, Michael and Florian, on the city’s public safety building. The Archangel Michael is considered the patron saint of police officers, while Saint Florian represents firefighters. But when Quincy’s mayor proposed to install these statues as a way to honor the city’s first responders, a group of city residents brought suit, arguing that Article 3 of the Massachusetts Constitution prohibited religious displays on government property. Represented by the ACLU and the Freedom from Religion Foundation, these plaintiffs won at the Superior Court level, and the case was appealed to the SJC.
Our brief does a deep dive on the original meaning of Article 3, which states that all religious groups “shall be equally under the protection of the law; and no subordination of any one sect or denomination to another shall ever be established by law.” We argue that in its original context, this language prevented the government from forcing people to attend a specific church, worship in a certain way, or profess specific beliefs; but it was never meant to purge all religion from public life. To the contrary, Massachusetts was originally founded to be a “city on a hill,” an example to others of a society that honored God, and John Adams and his fellow framers of the Massachusetts Constitution deeply desired to preserve and promote this rich religious heritage.
The total “separation of church and state,” a concept wielded as a weapon to suppress religious liberty and push people of faith out of the public square, would have been completely foreign to the people who ratified the Massachusetts Constitution. We are supporting Quincy in this case because if the ACLU and Freedom from Religion Foundation get their way, it will mean much more than the removal of a couple of statues of Catholic saints; it will likely mean that no government building can have any religious imagery; no public official can acknowledge God in their work; and the religious principles and values that have made our society great will be swept under the rug. This would not be neutrality toward religion – it would be hostility toward it.
Oral argument in this case will take place on May 6th. Please pray for favor before the Justices and that our religious heritage will be preserved in Massachusetts. You can read our full brief below.
P.S. We can only commit the time and resources required to draft briefs like this because of the generosity of supporters like you. If you want to ensure we can continue defending religious liberty in the Commonwealth and standing with families when it matters most, please consider making a gift today.
