Voters at Cedar Hill Lutheran Church
Cedar Hill, Missouri, 2004
Photo: Elsa / Getty Images
Many communities in America put polling stations in churches instead of fire halls, town halls, libraries, schools, or other neutral sites. Atheists as well as many theists rightfully object to being forced to use sectarian, religious institutions for voting in secular, civil elections. Such institutional mixing of religion and government violates the church-state separation. It not only conditions civil rights on entering a religious institution, but makes things difficult for churches too.
Read Article: Why Must Non-Christians Use Christian Churches to Vote in Civil Elections?
My polling place has generally been a private, non-faith school a block from where I live. It appears it’s being retrofitted for earthquake hazard mitigation now, and classes are being held in the Sunday-school rooms of a local church (which must be thrilled about the rent). It may be back in functional condition for the general election, but certainly not for the primary. So what will they do? The question remains to be answered.
I intend to vote by mail anyhow, but my leave-things-until-the-last-minute husband might have to darken the doors of a church — which would be particularly unpleasant for him. Rather than that, he might choose not to vote, which would be a shame. While neither of us is a Republican, we live in California, which, for better or worse, does a lot of lawmaking by referendum. So a missed election is potentially a missed vote on a lot of key issues.
Could you imagine the uproar if evangelical christians were expected to vote within a mosque on a regular basis?
You raise a very valid point that I think would be worth challenging in court. If only us atheists had endless financial resources to get our point across legally.