Berkley Center

In this brief lecture given as part of an RFP panel on Threats to Religious Freedom in the US and Europe at the American Religious Freedom Program’s National Religious Freedom conference, David Little assesses three challenges to the American tradition of special protection for religious freedom. He finds that Winifred Sullivan, Marci Hamilton and Brian Leiter’s arguments against traditional protections for religious groups fall flat due to internal inconsistencies and caveats. The danger, Little argues, comes more from the perception that religious freedom is indefensible than from any actual argument made by these three scholars.