Widmar v. Vincent: the Protection of Religious Speech in a Public Forum

Abstract

This brief article discusses the holding in Widmar v. Vincent, as well as the legacy of Widmar, especially in terms of how it limited the use of the Establishment Clause to deny a public forum to religious groups. At issue in Widmar was the right of a student religious group not to be discriminatorily denied access to educational facilities that were otherwise open to non-religious student organizations. This denial of access reflected a content-based discrimination against religious speech. Furthermore, the state’s interest in avoiding an Establishment Clause violation could not justify the discrimination, since, in fact, no violation would occur if the religious group was given access to university facilities. By incorporating into its Establishment Clause jurisprudence, a public forum analysis that examined the effect of government action on expressive freedoms, the Widmar Court issued a powerful precedent for protecting religious liberty in a public forum.

Keywords: Establishment Clause, religious liberty, religious speech, public forum

JEL Classification: K1, K3, K10, K30