RE: Institutional Capacity to Manage Exemptions

[Douglas Laycock]

There are multiple issues mixed together in Marci's sentence about "forcing assimilation of many behaviors."   I think assimilation is generally a good thing, especially for religious and cultural practices so small or so odd that their members have difficulty functioning in the larger society.  That is of course a controversial view, but I have never understood the intense desire in some quarters to preserve odd practices and dying languages that communicate only among a few hundred people.   But that is not what Marci says.  She is for "forcing assimilation."  Forced assimilation is very different from voluntary assimilation, with a vastly higher cost in human suffering and social conflict.  Forced assimilation should be reserved for cases where forced assimilation is necessary to avoid greater harms.  The point of the compelling interest is to identify those cases.   Douglas Laycock University of Texas Law School 727 E. Dean Keeton St. Austin, TX  78705 512-232-1341 512-471-6988 (fax) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Fri 3/11/2005 6:01 AM To: religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu Subject: Re: Institutional Capacity to Manage Exemptions It is lamentable when an  accommodation that makes good sense is turned down by a legislature.   But I see no reason to think that forcing assimilation of many behaviors is lamentable.  Only the most rose-colored vision of religion that can think that it should not assimilate in many circumstances.  Religiously motivated practices have included slavery, the oppression of women, and polygamy.   The oppression of children for religious purposes continues to this day, putting them at risk of sex abuse, physical abuse, and the suffering and death associated with medical neglect.   Marci   It's just unavoidable that the Smith rule, without > strong and frequent legislative protection for religious > exemptions, will force religious observers to convert > outright, to minimize their own religiosity, or to change it > to fit the government regulation -- religious people will > have "to convert, to pass and to cover."  I find that lamentable. >     >     Chris Lund

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