Malnak v. Yogi

This appeal requires us to decide whether the district court erred in determining that the teaching of a course called the Science of Creative Intelligence Transcendental Meditation (SCI/TM) in the New Jersey public high schools, under the circumstances presented in the record, constituted an establishment of religion in violation of the first amendment of the United States Constitution. Plaintiffs sought injunctive and declaratory relief and, after defendants had filed numerous depositions, answers to interrogatories, admissions, and other affidavits, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of plaintiffs. The court held that SCI/TM was religious activity for purposes of the establishment clause and that the teaching of SCI/TM in public schools is prohibited by the first amendment. The World Plan Executive Council United States and certain individual defendants have appealed. We affirm, essentially for the reasons set forth by Judge H. Curtis Meanor in Malnak v. Yogi, 440 F.Supp. 1284 (D.N.J.1977).

The course under examination here was offered as an elective at five high schools during the 1975-76 academic year and was taught four or five days a week by teachers specially trained by the World Plan Executive Council United States, an organization whose objective is to disseminate the teachings of SCI/TM throughout the United States. The textbook used was developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the Science of Creative Intelligence. It teaches that "pure creative intelligence" is the basis of life, and that through the process of Transcendental Meditation students can perceive the full potential of their lives.1

Essential to the practice of Transcendental Meditation is the "mantra"; a mantra is the sound aid used while meditating. Each meditator has his own personal mantra which is never to be revealed to any other person. It is by concentrating on the mantra that one receives the beneficial effects said to result from Transcendental Meditation.

To acquire his mantra, a meditator must attend a ceremony called a "puja." Every student who participated in the SCI/TM course was required to attend a puja as part of the course. A puja was performed by the teacher for each student individually; it was conducted off school premises on a Sunday; and the student was required to bring some fruit, flowers and a white handkerchief. During the puja the student stood or sat in front of a table while the teacher sang a chant and made offerings to a deified "Guru Dev." Each puja lasted between one and two hours.2

The district court found that the SCI/TM course constituted a religious activity under the first amendment. In its exhaustive and well-reasoned opinion, the court concluded its analysis by stating:

When courts are faced with . . . forms of "religion" unknown in prior decisional law, they must look to the prior interpretations of the constitutional provisions for guidance as to the substantive characteristics of theories or practices which have been found to constitute "religion" under the first amendment. The Supreme Court has interpreted the religion clauses of the first amendment several times in its recent history. E. g., Committee for Public Education v. Nyquist, 413 U.S. 756, 93 S.Ct. 2955, 37 L.Ed.2d 948 (1973); Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U.S. 97, 89 S.Ct. 266, 21 L.Ed.2d 228 (1968); Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 10 L.Ed.2d 844 (1963); Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 82 S.Ct. 1261, 8 L.Ed.2d 601 (1963); Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488, 81 S.Ct. 1680, 6 L.Ed.2d 982 (1961); Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1, 67 S.Ct. 504, 91 L.Ed. 711 (1947); Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296, 60 S.Ct. 900, 84 L.Ed. 1213 (1940). The historical development and purpose of the religion clauses have been elaborated in a number of these cases, especially in Engel and in Everson. Religion, as comprehended by the first amendment now includes mere affirmation of belief in a supreme being, Torcaso, supra, invocation of a supreme being in a public school, Engel, supra, and reading verses from the Bible without comment, Schempp, supra.

Defendants argue that all of the above-discussed decisions are inapposite to the issues in this suit because the activity in question in each of the prior cases was represented or conceded to be religious in nature whereas defendants in the instant action assert that the activities are not religious in nature. The court notes the distinction but cannot accept defendants' conclusion that the decisions are not relevant. The cases, at the very least, reveal the types of activity and belief that have been considered religious under the first amendment.

Malnak v. Yogi, 440 F.Supp. at 1315.

We agree with the district court's finding that the SCI/TM course was religious in nature. Careful examination of the textbook, the expert testimony elicited, and the uncontested facts concerning the puja convince us that religious activity was involved and that there was no reversible error in the district court's determination.

A recognition of the religious nature of the teachings and activities questioned here is largely determinative of this appeal because of the apparent governmental action which is involved. Under the most recent Supreme Court pronouncement in this area, Committee for Public Education v. Nyquist, 413 U.S. 756, 773, 93 S.Ct. 2955, 37 L.Ed.2d 948 (1973), the Court reiterated the three criteria within which to scrutinize the involved governmental action. To pass muster, the action in question must: (1) reflect a clearly secular legislative purpose; (2) have a primary effect that neither advances nor inhibits religion; and (3) avoid excessive government entanglement with religion. The district court applied the Nyquist test and determined that the SCI/TM course has a primary effect of advancing religion and religious concepts, School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 10 L.Ed.2d 844 (1963); Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 82 S.Ct. 1261, 8 L.Ed.2d 601 (1962), and that the government aid given to teach the course and the use of public school facilities constituted excessive governmental entanglement with religion. Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 91 S.Ct. 2105, 29 L.Ed.2d 745 (1971).

Appellants urge that even if the SCI/TM course and the puja are clearly religious, the district court erred in applying the controlling legal precept because the religious effect of the course and the puja was not significant. In advancing this argument, appellants rely on Grossberg v. Deusebio, 380 F.Supp. 285 (E.D.Va.1974); Wood v. Mt. Lebanon Township School District, 342 F.Supp. 1293 (W.D.Pa.1972); and Wiest v. Mt. Lebanon School District, 457 Pa. 166, 320 A.2d 362 (1974), for the proposition that religious effect must be substantial in order to be unconstitutional. Grossberg, Wood, and Wiest upheld as constitutional the delivery of invocations and benedictions at high school graduation ceremonies.3 We are not persuaded that the reasoning employed in those cases requires reversal in this case because of the factual differences between a benediction at a non-instructional high school commencement exercise open to the public and the teaching of SCI/TM which includes ceremonial student offerings to deities as part of a regularly scheduled course in the schools' educational programs.

The judgment of the district court will be affirmed.

ADAMS, Circuit Judge, concurring in the result.

I concur in the judgment of the Court that the teaching of a course in the Science of Creative Intelligence, which was offered as an elective in certain New Jersey public schools, and was funded, in part, by a grant from a federal agency, constitutes an establishment of religion proscribed by the first amendment. In contrast to the majority, however, I am convinced that this appeal presents a novel and important question that may not be disposed of simply on the basis of past precedent. Rather, as I see it, the result reached today is largely based upon a newer, more expansive reading of "religion" that has been developed in the last two decades in the context of free exercise and selective service cases but not, until today, applied by an appellate court to invalidate a government program under the establishment clause. Moreover, this is the first appellate court decision, to my knowledge, that has concluded that a set of ideas constitutes a religion over the objection and protestations of secularity by those espousing those ideas. Under these circumstances, and recalling Justice Frankfurter's admonition that an individual expression of opinion is useful when the way a result is reached may be important to results hereafter to be reached,1 I am impelled to state my views separately.

The district court, while conceding that the decisions of the Supreme Court have avoided the creation of explicit criteria in determining what is a religion under the first amendment,2 nonetheless bases its result on those very decisions:

The (district) court finds it unnecessary to improvise an unprecedented definition of religion under the first amendment because it appears that this case is governed by the teachings of prior Supreme Court decisions. Careful inspection of the facts in this suit reveal that the novel aspects of the case are more apparent than real.3

It is my view that the teachings of those cases cited by the district court do indeed suggest the result reached by that court and affirmed today. But, as Judge Meanor's opinion amply illustrates, those opinions involve substantially different facts and problems than are presented here. And although the application of such cases to the factual situation here may be warranted, such an application is an extension of existing case law, and thus calls for both an explanation and a justification.

For purposes of the issues posed by this controversy, the arguably relevant decisional law may be divided into four principal groupings: cases announcing the traditional definition of religion, cases dealing with prayers recited in school, cases involving the conscientious objector exemption to the selective service laws, and cases touching on the newer constitutional definition of religion. Although the district court, and apparently the majority of this Court, consider these decisions to be controlling on the question raised here, careful reflection reveals as many differences as similarities.

The original definition of religion prevalent in this country was closely tied to a belief in God. James Madison called religion "the duty which we owe to our creator, and the manner of discharging it."4 Basically, this was the position of the Supreme Court at the end of the nineteenth century. In Davis v. Beason, 133 U.S. 333, 10 S.Ct. 299, 33 L.Ed. 637 (1890), the Court declared:

(T)he term "religion" has reference to one's views of his relations to his Creator, and to the obligations they impose of reverence for his being and character, and of obedience to his will.5

This attitude remained unchallenged for many years. Chief Justice Hughes, writing a dissent in 1931, could conclude without concern that

(t)he essence of religion is belief in a relation to God involving duties superior to those arising from any human relation.6

Thus, the traditional definition was grounded upon a Theistic perception of religion. It is not clear, however, given the absence of any concentration in SCI/TM on a "Supreme Being," that it may be considered a religion under this traditional formulation.

Facially, the Supreme Court decisions arguably most pertinent to this case are those involving school prayer. This is so, as I read the opinions of the district court and the majority of this Court, because an integral part of the preparation of the students for the practice of TM is the performance in Sanskrit of a chant, called the Puja. Accordingly, we are urged to engage in a "textual analysis" of the Puja, and then to compare that analysis to the prayers outlawed in the school prayer cases. In that the English translation of the Puja sounds at least as "religious" as the New York Regents prayer invalidated in Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 82 S.Ct. 1261, 8 L.Ed.2d 601 (1962), for instance, it is suggested that this case may be properly disposed of under that rubric.

I am not convinced, however, that the school prayer opinions provide particularly persuasive precedents for the resolution of the question presented here.7 Engel concerned a prayer8 composed by the New York Board of Regents that had to be said aloud in every public school classroom by order of the local board of education, acting in its official capacity under state law. Students could be excused from attendance in a classroom where the prayer was said, but they needed the written request of a parent or guardian, and, of course, would have to take the initiative, and possible social consequences, if they chose to leave their classrooms during the recital of the prayer. That the prayer itself was religious in nature was not questioned. Indeed, it was specifically recommended by the Regents as an aid in "spiritual training" in the schools.

Similar to Engel is Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 10 L.Ed.2d 844 (1963). There, the Court invalidated a Pennsylvania statute that required the reading of at least ten verses of the Bible, without comment, at the opening of each school day. As in Engel, participation was voluntary in the sense that a child could be excused from the exercise, although Mr. Schempp had declined to have his children excused because he feared they would suffer social ostracism by their teachers and classmates.9 That the reading of the verses of the Bible was religious in nature does not seem to have been questioned by any of the parties or Justices who heard the appeal, although it was argued that a secular as well as a religious purpose was served by the readings.10

The constitutional problems in Engel and Schempp are relatively straightforward. First, it is clear that the State, through the edict of a state agency or by statute, may not seek to require that school districts engage in a particular form of obviously religious activity. Such religious partisanship, even though nonsectarian, is forbidden by the establishment clause. Second, the general nature of the activities raised serious free exercise questions because they were "voluntary" only in form, not in practice.11 In order to avoid the official exercises, individual students had to take specific steps that were almost certain to draw attention to them, attention that was unlikely to be desirable, given the majority orientation of the religious practices. In neither case was the "wording" of the exercises of particular importance in resolving the constitutional problem.

Lower court decisions deflecting efforts to introduce prayers into public schools have expanded the teachings of Engel and Schempp to reach almost any prayer recited as such on school grounds,12 but none has sought to label as "religious" that which was presented as "nonreligious."13

In contrast, appellants here unwaveringly insist that the Puja chant has no religious meaning whatsoever and is, in fact, a "secular Puja," quite common in Eastern cultures. And, even if we reject this claim, we are still substantially removed from the facts of Engel and Schempp: (a) the Puja was never performed in a school classroom, or even on government property; (b) it was never performed during school hours, but only on a Sunday; (c) it was performed only once in the case of each student; (d) it was entirely in Sanskrit, with neither the student nor, apparently, the teacher who chanted it, knowing what the foreign words meant.

Moreover, the elements of involuntariness present in Engel and Schempp are wholly absent here. The SCI/TM course was an elective. No student in this case had to abandon his home classroom at the start of each school day or in any way risk notoriety for conscience sake. Only those students who sought a course in SCI/TM had any contact with the chant; they were specifically told that the chant had no religious meaning; and they stated in affidavits that they did not understand it to have such meaning.14

Most important for our purposes, however a court might resolve a challenge to the Puja under the school prayer cases, those cases provide few insights regarding the constitutional definition of religion. Both the prayer in Engel and the Bible readings in Schempp are unquestionably and uncompromisingly Theist. Even under the most narrow and traditional definition of religion, prayers to a Supreme Being and readings from the Bible would be considered "religious."15 But the important question presented by the present litigation is how far the constitutional definition of religion extends beyond the Theistic formulation; that it comprehends all Theistic faiths has, to my knowledge, not been questioned. The school prayer cases, then, cannot be said to control, or, it would seem, even to address the question whether a particular belief-system should be considered a religion for first amendment purposes.

In contradistinction to the school prayer cases, United States v. Seeger, 380 U.S. 163, 85 S.Ct. 850, 13 L.Ed.2d 733 (1965) and Welsh v. United States, 398 U.S. 333, 90 S.Ct. 1792, 26 L.Ed.2d 308 (1970), the leading selective service decisions bespeak a broader definition of religion. Seeger and Welsh, of course, are not constitutional cases but rather concern the proper interpretation of section 6(j) of the Universal Military Service and Training Act.16 This provision allowed for conscientious objector status for those who, "by reason of religious training and belief," were "opposed to participation in war in any form." The statute went on to define "religious training or belief" in Theistic terms.17

The Supreme Court, in what has been characterized as "a remarkable feat of linguistic transmutation,"18 recast the language of section 6(j) in order to give the exemption a much broader scope. Thus Seeger was granted C.O. status notwithstanding his refusal to affirm his faith in a Supreme Being because the Court concluded that "religious training and belief" encompass non-Theist faiths provided that they are "sincere religious beliefs which (are) based upon a power or being, or upon a faith, to which all else is subordinate or upon which all else is ultimately dependent."19 Welsh was similarly favored despite his assertion of only "moral" opposition to war, but in his case the Court was sharply divided.

Although Seeger and Welsh turned on statutory interpretation, and despite some indication that the Court has, to some degree, drawn back from the broadest possible reading of these cases,20 they remain constitutionally significant. As a matter of logic and language, if the Court is willing to read "religious belief" so as to comprehend beliefs based upon pantheistic and ethical views, it might be presumed to favor a similar inclusive definition of "religion" as that term appears in the first amendment. Such logical conclusion has considerably more force when one considers the varying contexts of the language in question. As the district judge perceptively observed: "the Court defined the phrase broadly in an exercise of statutory construction, an area in which the Court is far more circumscribed in defining terms than it is in the area of constitutional interpretation."21 It can hardly be denied that the Supreme Court's reading of the statutory language was strained at best. The Court's willingness to depart so drastically from the plain language of a statute in order to produce an expansive definition almost certainly unintended by Congress, implies, as Justice Harlan observed in Welsh, a "distortion to avert an inevitable constitutional collision."22

Most importantly, the constitutional values prompting such a statutory construction can only be taken to suggest a broad definition of religion. Only four Justices explicitly discussed their constitutional concerns in Welsh. Justice Harlan was forthright in stating the problem:

The constitutional question that must be faced in this case is whether a statute that defers to the individual's conscience only when his views emanate from adherence to theistic religious beliefs is within the power of Congress. Congress, . . . having chosen to exempt, . . . cannot draw the line between theistic or non-theistic religious beliefs on the one hand and secular beliefs on the other. Any such distinctions are not, in my view, compatible with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.23

Justice Harlan found § 6(j) constitutionally deficient for two reasons. First, the subsection appeared to prefer the religious over the secular. Second, despite what the Court had said in Seeger, Justice Harlan also argued that on its face the statute favored Theistic religions over non-Theistic beliefs and, therefore, "disadvantages adherents of religions that do not worship a Supreme Being."24 Thus Justice Harlan explicitly recognized as "religions" various non-Theistic belief systems.25

The three dissenters, speaking through Justice White, were unprepared to extend § 6(j) to those professing no more than a philosophical or moral view. To Justice Harlan's assertion that such a result favors the religious over the secular, they replied that this was permissible as an accommodation of free exercise clause values. They dissented, then, because they were willing to read this accommodation as extending only to those with genuinely religious views, whether Theistic or non-Theistic and not to those with purely secular ideas to whom the free exercise clause offered "no protection whatsoever."26 Justice White's implicit definition of religion, therefore, included non-Theists but excluded economic, philosophical or merely personal opinions, however sincerely held.

In sum, then, all four Justices who addressed the constitutional issue concluded that "religion" should not be confined to a Theistic definition. Although four other Justices rested on statutory grounds and no exact definition was forthcoming in any event, Seeger and Welsh point to a definition at least somewhat broader than that advanced in the earlier decisions of the Supreme Court.

D. Cases Suggesting a New Constitutional Definition

Seeger and Welsh, however, are not the only cases presaging a broader reading of "religion" for first amendment purposes. The district court notes other cases more directly on point in that they concern constitutional, not statutory challenges.

The most important of these, and the only Supreme Court cases among them, is Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488, 81 S.Ct. 1680, 6 L.Ed.2d 982 (1961). Torcaso involved a direct constitutional challenge to a Maryland provision that required an official to declare a belief in God in order to hold office in that state. A unanimous Court rejected this requirement, both as a matter of establishment clause values (the state may not favor Theism over pantheism or atheism) and free exercise clause values (an individual may not be barred from holding public office on the basis of his beliefs). In striking down the Maryland law, the Court specifically observed that neither the state nor the federal government "can aid those religions based on a belief in the existence of God as against those religions founded on different beliefs."27 The Court then added an instructive footnote:

Among religions in this country which do not teach what would generally be considered a belief in the existence of God are Buddhism, Taoism, Ethical Culture, Secular Humanism and others. See Washington Ethical Society v. District of Columbia, 101 U.S.App.D.C. 371, 249 F.2d 127; Fellowship of Humanity v. County of Alameda, 153 Cal.App.2d 673, 315 P.2d 394; II Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences 293; 4 Encyclopaedia Britannica (1957 ed.) 325-327; 21 Id., at 797; Archer, Faiths Men Live By (2d ed. revised by Purinton), 120-138, 254-313; 1961 World Almanac 695, 712; Year Book of American Churches for 1961, at 29, 47.28

This note, although dictum, represents a rejection of the view that religion may, consonant with first amendment values, be defined solely in terms of a Supreme Being. Buddhism and Taoism are, of course, recognized Eastern religions. The other two examples given by the Court refer to explicitly non-Theist organized groups, discussed in cases cited in the footnote, that were found to be religious for tax exemption purposes primarily because of their organizational similarity to traditional American church groups. "Ethical Culture" is a reference to the organization in Washington Ethical Society v. District of Columbia, 101 U.S.App.D.C. 371, 249 F.2d 127 (1957), which held regular Sunday services and espoused a group of defined moral precepts. Similarly, "Secular Humanism," however broad the term may sound, appears to be no more than a reference to the group seeking an exemption in Fellowship of Humanity v. County of Alameda, 153 Cal.App.2d 673, 315 P.2d 394 (1957) which, although non-Theist in belief, also met weekly on Sundays and functioned much like a church. In any event, the Court was willing to concede that these groups, "and others," were religious for constitutional purposes.

The broad reading of "religion" in Torcaso was drawn upon in Founding Church of Scientology v. United States, 133 U.S.App.D.C. 229, 409 F.2d 1146, Cert. denied, 396 U.S. 963, 90 S.Ct. 434, 24 L.Ed.2d 427 (1969). There, Scientology, a belief system providing a "general account of man and his nature comparable in scope, if not in content, to those of some organized religions," was found to be a religion for purposes of the free exercise clause.29 Judge Wright was willing to accept, as religious, ideas that are sufficiently comprehensive to be comparable to traditional religions in terms of content and subject matter. But it must be added that he did so only after observing that the government did not contest Scientology's religious nature, or rebut the prima facie case for religious classification made by its supporters.30

It would thus appear that the constitutional cases that have actually alluded to the definitional problem, like the selective service cases, strongly support a definition for religion broader than the Theistic formulation of the earlier Supreme Court cases. What this definition is, or should be, has not yet been made entirely clear.

It seems unavoidable, from Seeger, Welsh, and Torcaso, that the Theistic formulation presumed to be applicable in the late nineteenth century cases is no longer sustainable. Under the modern view, "religion" is not confined to the relationship of man with his Creator, either as a matter of law or as a matter of theology. Even theologians of traditionally recognized faiths have moved away from a strictly Theistic approach in explaining their own religions.31 Such movement, when coupled with the growth in the United States, of many Eastern and non-traditional belief systems, suggests that the older, limited definition would deny "religious" identification to faiths now adhered to by millions of Americans. The Court's more recent cases reject such a result.

If the old definition has been repudiated, however, the new definition remains not yet fully formed. It would appear to be properly described as a definition by analogy. The Seeger court advertently declined to distinguish beliefs holding "parallel positions in the lives of their respective holders."32 Presumably beliefs holding the same important position for members of one of the new religions as the tr