[U]ntil a Vermont Superior Court judge ruled against town meeting prayers in 2012, the Canadian-border community of Franklin sparked headlines for nearly a decade as residents argued whether its invocation violated the state constitution’s protection against forced participation in religious worship.
This year, the Caledonia County town of Groton, population 1,022, is citing a 2014 U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing prayer at government gatherings as it embarks on an untested plan to reinstate the tradition this year.
“Before officially opening each town hall meeting with the gavel, the moderator shall invite as many citizens who desire to offer prayer to do so in order of their volunteering,” the Groton Select Board writes in its annual report. “Upon the closing prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America shall be recited, audience seated and the gavel struck to begin the town’s business.”
But will such words also rekindle the debate on whether they comply with the federal and state constitutions?
“There are some questions, but it appears this does pass the test,” said Maura Carroll, a lawyer and executive director of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Vermont League of Cities and Towns. “It allows people who want to attend the full meeting to do so without being there for any of the prayer portion.”
But Allen Gilbert, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont, has doubts.
“What the town of Groton has planned sounds like it may be unconstitutional,” Gilbert said. “Even though the town’s meeting may not be officially opened before the moderator calls for prayers, the fact that the call is made in the same room where the meeting takes place, immediately before the meeting begins, suggests government endorsement of a religious practice.”
Some background: Vermont reports the country’s lowest church attendance — 17 percent of residents worship regularly, according to Gallup pollsters. But when Franklin resident Marilyn Hackett complained about her community’s town meeting prayer starting in 2004, it set off a court battle that seemingly ended in 2012 when Superior Court Judge Martin Maley ruled the invocation violated the state constitution.
Article 3 of the constitution says, in part, that “no person ought to, or of right can be compelled to attend any religious worship.”
The town of Franklin, choosing not to appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court, settled the dispute with a $5,000 check for compensatory damages from its insurer — a sum Hackett donated to the state chapter of the ACLU, which provided her lawyer free of charge.
The Hackett ruling covers only Franklin County, but lawyers with the League of Cities and Towns soon after advised all communities to abide by the decision, noting in a newsletter that “opinions of sister courts (those with the same adjudicatory authority but different jurisdictions) are given persuasive weight.”
Then in 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court voted 5-4 that the nation’s Constitution allows prayer at public meetings. That spurred Dennis Walton, pastor of Groton’s First Baptist Church, to ask to restore the tradition during “other business” at last year’s town meeting and formalize the request to the Selectboard this January.
Walton offered wording that the three-member Groton board unanimously voted to share in this year’s annual report, just mailed to all residents in anticipation of town meeting on Tuesday.
“Recognizing the need for divine wisdom, counsel and blessing upon government entities and civil communities, we do enter into agreement to exercise the God-given privilege to call upon the divine to solemnize the town hall meetings of Groton,” the board resolution says.
“No person in attendance shall be required to participate in any prayer that is offered,” it continues. “Prayers offered are not to be for the purpose of proselytizing, disparaging or expressing superiority over others. May there be mutual respect for persons, beliefs and diversities expressed and represented in our community.”
“This policy is not intended, and shall not be implemented or construed in any way, to affiliate the town with, nor express the town’s preference for, any faith or religious denomination,” it continues. “Rather, this policy is intended to acknowledge and express the town’s respect for the diversity and religious denominations and faiths represented and practiced among the citizens of Groton.”
But such prayer has just as much history of dividing as uniting people. In Franklin, Hackett rejected suggestions to change the order of proceedings so the invocation would precede the gavel to start official business. She stressed she wasn’t against prayer, only to being subjected to one “in a public governmental space, especially one where citizens go to vote.”
“If people truly feel a need to pray to sanctify the day,” Hackett said in 2013, “they don’t have to do it on government property that all of us pay for.”
Gilbert echoes that same concern Thursday.
“The ACLU will be watching to see what happens in Groton on Town Meeting Day,” the executive director said. “We invite any Groton residents who object to a call for prayers at their town meeting to contact us.”
A definitive answer to the plan’s constitutionality will come only if someone takes the issue to the Vermont Supreme Court.
“How the court would rule,” said Carroll at the Vermont League of Cities and Towns, “we can’t predict.”
