Activist challenges the use of churches as polling places
By Peter Schworm, Globe Staff Correspondent, 3/31/2003
FRAMINGHAM -- As an observant Jew, Rob Meltzer was deeply troubled by the
prospect of entering a Methodist church, which became his Framingham
precinct's new polling place last year. Setting aside religious qualms to
take
part in the political process, he found himself standing in a voting booth
directly beneath a large cross. He filled out his ballot, but vowed never
to
return.
''In order to vote, you basically had to bow before the cross,'' Meltzer
said. ''I was sick for a week.''
He has since voted by absentee ballot while trying to persuade local
officials to move polling stations in the church and a Catholic school to
secular sites, saying the current locations infringe on voters'
constitutional
rights. Selectmen have refused, saying the practice is widely accepted and
that logistics make the church the only sensible spot.
Meltzer, a 37-year-old lawyer and political activist who plans to file a
federal civil suit against the town this week, said any inconvenience from
holding elections in a public building does not justify ''impinging upon
constitutional rights.''
A cornerstone of New England democracy, voting in churches is widespread
and permissible under state law. Some 60 communities -- including Boston,
Cambridge, Lowell, Somerville, and Worcester -- hold elections in houses
of
worship, according to the secretary of state's office. Weston votes only
in
churches.
''The law is silent on the subject,'' said Brian McNiff, a spokesman for
the office.
But Meltzer and many secularists say the practice, though routinely taken
for granted, brazenly breaches the church-state divide. Nowhere should
religion be less welcome, they say, than at the heart of the democratic
process.
''People are being forced to go to a religious setting to perform the most
basic civic function,'' said Annie Laurie Gaylor, cofounder of the Freedom
From Religion Foundation in Madison, Wis., an educational group working
for
the separation of state and church. ''Asking a feminist to vote in a Roman
Catholic church is like asking a black man to vote in a KKK hall. You are
being told to go somewhere that espouses beliefs that are antithetical to
your
own.''
While the practice of voting in churches or temples has gone largely
unchallenged, Gaylor speculated that many Christians would probably be
reluctant to vote in mosques.
And Meltzer said that as the country debates broader, more pressing
questions of funding faith-based charities, awarding vouchers that could
be
used at parochial schools, and allowing prayer in public schools, the time
is
ripe for questioning long-accepted intersections of religion and public
affairs.
But critics dismiss his campaign as quixotic and potentially divisive, and
First Amendment groups that accept religion in the public domain deride
the
case as civil libertarianism run amok. The First Amendment, they say,
prohibits government from establishing a certain religion, but does not
require banishing all forms of religious heritage from the public sphere.
''I don't think his claim has any merit,'' said Mathew Staver, president
of
Liberty Counsel, a civil liberties education and legal defense
organization,
affiliated with the Rev. Jerry Falwell, that is dedicated to preserving
religious freedom. ''It's an extreme example of trying to eradicate
anything
religious from the public square.''
Meltzer's precinct previously voted at a public school. But when
population
figures from the 2000 Census required Framingham to create a new precinct,
the
town had to reconfigure its voting locations. Officials decided the
school, on
a steep hill and narrow road, created too much traffic and provided too
little
parking. After a lengthy search, they were delighted when Wesley United
Methodist Church volunteered its space free of charge, Framingham Town
Clerk
Valerie Mulvey said.
''It's a find for the town,'' she said. ''Of course, we looked at schools
first, but this fell into our laps. We'd take a temple, too, if they'd
take
us.'' And in any case, Mulvey said, despite the presence of the cross,
church
halls lose any religious capacity on Election Day. ''It's not as if we're
having people vote at the altar,'' she said. ''It's a church hall with a
kitchen attached. It's not a religious setting.''
Meltzer says Jewish Scripture prohibits adherents from entering churches
for fear of ''idolatry'' and ''worshiping false divinities,'' and that a
few
voting booths do not erase the building's overarching religious purpose.
''I don't draw a distinction between a church sanctuary and the
basement,''
he said.
The Rev. Carol Ann Parsons, pastor of the church, declined to comment on
Meltzer's complaint, but said the cross had been removed from the church
hall.
Still, Meltzer said the cross was replaced by a children's drawing
depicting a biblical scene, which he believes shows the church ''obviously
didn't view it as a social hall.''
Rabbi Tsvi Blanchard of the National Jewish Center for Learning and
Leadership said that while Jewish Scripture can be interpreted to forbid
entering churches, few Jews do so.
''Certainly there is a basis for the views that he holds, though it is not
the view held by the majority,'' he said.
Melissa Rogers, executive director of the Pew Forum on Religion & Public
Life, said most Americans strike a ''rough balance'' in church-state
matters
between personal liberty and the broader interests of the community.
Public opinion would overwhelmingly back an individual's right to vote
elsewhere or by absentee ballot, but most people would not support banning
the
town from using a church as a polling place, Rogers said.
Courts, she added, typically use a three-pronged test to determine whether
a policy passes constitutional muster: Does it have a secular purpose,
avoid ''excessive entanglement'' with religion, and neither advance nor
inhibit religion?
In this case, she said, the policy seems to meet all three criteria.
Meltzer, a Democrat who is a political activist and an op-ed columnist for
the MetroWest Daily News, often prods local officials about various
issues.
Esther Hopkins, chairwoman of the Framingham Board of Selectmen,
downplayed
his complaints as ''Bob being Bob.'' ''Bob is ultra-sensitive to lots of
things,'' she said. ''Having started this, I don't think he wants to let
it
go.''
This story ran on page B1 of the Boston Globe on 3/31/2003.