Abington School District V. Schempp - Background - Origin of Case

Origin of Case

The Abington case began when Edward Schempp, a Unitarian Universalist and a resident of Abington Township, Pennsylvania, filed suit against the Abington School District in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania to prohibit the enforcement of a Pennsylvania state law that required his children, specifically Ellory Schempp, to hear and sometimes read portions of the Bible as part of their public school education. That law (24 Pa. Stat. 15-1516, as amended, Pub. Law 1928) required that "t least ten verses from the Holy Bible read, without comment, at the opening of each public school on each school day." Schempp specifically contended that the statute violated his and his family's rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

Like four other states, Pennsylvania law included a statute compelling school districts to perform Bible readings in the mornings before class. Twenty-five states had laws allowing "optional" Bible reading, with the remainder having no laws supporting or rejecting Bible reading. In eleven of those states with laws supportive of Bible reading or state-sponsored prayer, the state courts had declared them unconstitutional.

More famous than Schempp was Madalyn Murray O'Hair, mother of plaintiff William J. Murray III, in Murray v. Curlett. O'Hair founded the group American Atheists in 1963. The Murray case was consolidated with Schempp's on appeal to the Supreme Court.

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