Edwards v. Aguillard The United States constitution’s First Amendment states that congress cannot make laws that establish or respect a certain religion (Koppelman). Congress also cannot make laws that prevent people from practicing their prefered religion (Koppelman). The court case of Edwards v. Aguillard was imperative in confirming Louisiana’s, Creationism Act, forbade the teaching of the theory of evolution unless accompanied by the theory of creationism, gave credit to this religious theory, and violated the Establishment Clause in regards to the role of religion protected by the First Amendment of the United States of America (“Edwards”). In this court case, the state of Louisiana made a law that forbade the teaching of the theory of evolution in public schools unless the school were to teach the theory of creationism as well (“Edwards”). Though the law did not require the teaching of either of the theories, it did require one of the other if schools did decide to teach it (“Edwards”). Parents, teachers, and religious leaders seeked to prevent the forcing of this law (“Edwards”). Andrew Koppelman, the author of “Phony Originalism and the Establishment Clause,” says, “States are prohibited from …show more content…
Since the Act supports the idea that a supernatural being created the world, it is supporting religion (“Edwards”). The court case document states, “The court found that the Louisiana Legislature's actual intent was ‘to discredit evolution by counterbalancing its teaching at every turn with the teaching of creationism, a religious belief’” (“Edwards”). The state knew that they would be violating the First Amendment and possibly have to go to court, so they purposely made the Biblical beliefs sound more scientific in the event of contrasting them with evolution