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Minority Rights, Governing Regimes, or Secular Elites: Who Benefits from the Protection of Religious and Anti-Religious Speech by the U.S. Supreme Court and European Court of Human Rights?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2022

Nathan T. Carrington ,
Thomas M. Keck  and
Claire Sigsworth
Nathan T. Carrington*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, Louisiana, USA
Thomas M. Keck
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York, USA
Claire Sigsworth
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: carrington@louisiana.edu
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Abstract

This paper draws on new data regarding judicial decisions involving religious and anti-religious expression to map the political beneficiaries of judicial empowerment. In particular, the paper assesses the extent to which free-expression decisions issued by the U.S. Supreme Court and European Court of Human Rights have favored claimants who are religious majorities, religious minorities, or secular elites. We find the U.S. doctrine relatively more libertarian and the European Court of Human Rights doctrine relatively more secularist, but both bodies of case law extend regular and substantial rights protection to religious minorities.

Keywords

Freedom of expressionHate SpeechU.S. Supreme CourtEuropean Court of Human RightsReligious Speech
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Law and Courts , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , October 2023 , pp. 221 - 255
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Law and Courts Organized Section of the American Political Science Association

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