Board-Led Prayer: Reasons to Beware
By Allison Cooper
Legislative prayer[1] is under attack and the challenges appear far from over. Our Fourth Circuit’s Lund v. Rowan County[2] decision, on rehearing en banc, declaring Rowan County’s[3] prayer practices unconstitutional is a perfect illustration. Despite years of protracted litigation, Lund‘s appellate history and that of its sister cases[4] represent the fundamental difficulty our courts have in evaluating the constitutionality of legislative prayer. Each case requires a fact intensive analysis considering whether the prayer practice is in fitting with historical practices; our nation’s Establishment Clause jurisprudence does not prescribe a particular test.[5]
