Constitutional Law Archives

“Justifiable Limitations Upon Freedom of Religion and Belief in Australia’s Draft Human Rights Bill: Lessons from the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990” by P. T. Babie

Apr 15, 2025Canopy ForumEssaysApril 2025, Babie, P. T., Constitutional Law, Oceania (Geography), Religious Freedom

Image of Dunedin, New Zealand by Arvid Olson from Pixabay While Section 116 of the Australian Constitution appears textually to provide broad protection for freedom of religion or belief (FoRB), its interpretation by the High Court of Australia severely restricts its potential. The problem stems from the judicial conflation of two questions: whether FoRB has been violated and,…

“Constitutions Address Religious Freedom, but Not as Much as Desired” by Dennis Petri and Jonathan Fox

Mar 27, 2025Canopy ForumEssaysConstitutional Law, Fox, Jonathan, March 2025, Petri, Dennis P., Religious Freedom

The Village Lawyer by Pieter Brueghel (US-PD). The following essay is reprinted and adapted on Canopy Forum in collaboration with the journal Derecho en Sociedad, a biannual electronic publication that is free and open access. Their issue 19(1) features full length articles in Spanish and English. Read Petri and Fox’s long-form essay on Constitutions Address of Religious Freedom here. See other…

“Defining a Muslim; The Case of Pakistan and its Ahmadis” by Yasser Latif Hamdani

Mar 12, 2025Canopy ForumEssaysAsia (Geography), Constitutional Law, Hamdani, Yasser Latif, Islam, March 2025

Main chamber of Badshahi Mosque by User:Amjad.m (CC BY-SA 3.0) On January 16th, 2025, the government of Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous province, demolished a historic Ahmadi mosque in the city of Daska. This mosque was built by Zafrullah Khan (1893-1985), Pakistan’s first foreign minister and one of the founding fathers of the country. This is…

“’No Idols In Our Town’: Competing for Religious Space in Kisumu, Kenya” by Esha Faki Mwinyihaji

Feb 14, 2025Canopy ForumEssaysAfrica (Geography), Constitutional Law, Mwinyihaji, Esha Faki, Religious Freedom, Sikhism

Photo of Kisumu Municipal Hall by (WT-fr) Omondi (CC BY-SA 3.0) Kisumu is a cosmopolitan city that lies on the shores of Lake Victoria in Western Kenya. The city is inhabited by the majority Luo ethnic group and other Kenyan ethnic groups as well as Arabs and Asians East Africa who work in the city…

“Religious Belief as an Existential Threat: How Russia Victimizes Religious Minorities in Russia and in the Occupied Territories of Ukraine” by Dr. Kyriaki Topidi

Nov 2, 2024Canopy ForumEssays, SeriesChristianity, Constitutional Law, Human Rights / Civil Rights, November 2024, Topidi, Kyriaki

“Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks” by Ilya Repin (CC0) This article is part of our series on Transnational Christian Nationalism, and its impact on politics, the rule of law, and religious freedom. If you’d like to explore other articles in this series, click here. Russia counts more than 200 ethnic groups among its more than 140 million…

“Good Vibes Only: The “Aloha Spirit” in Hawaiʻi Constitutional Interpretation” by Aaron Walayat

Oct 24, 2024Canopy ForumEssays“Other”, Constitutional Law, October 2024, Political Philosophy, Walayat, Aaron J.

Image by Talpa from Pixabay In 2017, Christopher Wilson, a resident of Maui, Hawaiʻi, was charged by the state for possession of an unregistered pistol, a violation of state statute. He moved to dismiss the charges, arguing that the statutes unconstitutionally infringed on his right to keep and bear arms under both the Hawaiʻi Constitution…

“What Do Protestants Believe about In Vitro Fertilization? It’s Complicated” by Whittney Barth

Oct 16, 2024Canopy ForumSeriesBarth, Whittney, Christianity, Constitutional Law, Healthcare, October 2024

Trinity Episcopal Church in Fredionia, New York via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0) This article is part of our “Religious Perspectives on Assisted Reproduction and Surrogacy” series. If you’d like to explore other articles in this series, click here. In February 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that, under state law, the loss of embryos during the process…

“Cuba: A Legal Framework that Restricts the Right to Religious Freedom” by Teresa I. Flores

Sep 23, 2024Canopy ForumEssaysConstitutional Law, Flores, Teresa, Latin America (Geography), Religious Freedom, September 2024

Image of Palacio del Centro Asturiano, Havana, Cuba by Carol M. Highsmith (CC0) The following essay is reprinted and adapted on Canopy Forum in collaboration with the journal Derecho en Sociedad, a biannual electronic publication that is free and open access. Their issue 18(2) features full length articles in Spanish and English. Read Flores’ long-form essay on the Cuban…

“Why ‘School Choice’ is a Strange Term: Educational Pluralism and International Norms” by Ashley Rogers Berner

Jun 14, 2024Canopy ForumLiterature HighlightsBerner, Ashley, Constitutional Law, Family Law, June 2024, Religious Freedom

Why ‘School Choice’ is a Strange Term: Educational Pluralism and International NormsAshley Rogers Berner The following is an excerpt from Ashley Rogers Berner’s new book, Educational Pluralism and Democracy, Reprinted with permission from Harvard Education Press. The United States needs a new conversation about education. Few areas of American life have experienced more conflict of…

“Seeing like a Church, Seeing like a State: The Church-State Relation in Religious Asylum Adjudications” by Jaeeun Kim

May 23, 2024Canopy ForumEssaysConstitutional Law, Human Rights / Civil Rights, Kim, Jaeeun, May 2024, Politics

Parish Church of Saint Mary the Virgin in Bury, England. Photo by Michael Beckwith (CC BY 3.0). Religion is one of the five categories of protection—along with race, nationality, political opinion, and membership in a particular social group—designated by the international and domestic refugee regimes. Migrants who claim a “well-founded fear of persecution” on account…