Wisconsin: Freedom from Religion Foundation Asks State to Halt Assembly Prayers
Last July, Wisconsin State Representative Terry Moulton led his colleagues in prayer:
“In your name, and by the power of your spirit, I come against the Evil One. And I ask that he be cast from this place, this day.”
Not necessarily the most ecumenical of prayers, and now the Freedom from Religion Foundation has asked the Speaker of the Assembly, Mike Huebsch, to stop official prayers on the Floor before each session. You may remember FFRF from last year’s U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Hein v. Freedom from Religion Foundation case, which effectively, in this writer’s opinion, severely compromised the ability of individuals to use tax-payer standing to challenge Establishment Clause violations in court.
Rep. Moulton, who views his prayers as “exorcisms of the Assembly” called the Foundation “a very wacko group that is completely out of tune with mainstream America,” and said all he wanted to accomplish in the prayers was “to command that any satanic or evil forces be cast from the Assembly that day.”
Fair enough. Read more about this story at http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080618/GPG0101/80618075/1978/GPGsports
Holding: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that citizens did not have standing as taxpayers to bring an Establishment Clause challenge against President Bush's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.