Today in Supreme Court History: November 14, 1922

11/14/1922: Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon argued.

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[JoeFromtheBronx]

On this day in 1878, the Supreme Court began hearing arguments in Reynolds v. United States, on whether a federal law banning bigamy violated the First Amendment’s free exercise clause. (The court ultimately held that it did not.)

https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/11/scotustoday-for-friday-november-14/

(Reynolds did later get a small win: the sentence of hard labor was overturned since the law only authorized imprisonment.)

The opinion provided an early interpretation of the reach of the Free Exercise Clause:

Congress was deprived of all legislative power over mere opinion, but was left free to reach actions which were in violation of social duties or subversive of good order.

It is not clear that this sets up a simple belief/action division.

Some scholarship argues the original understanding shows that it puts a higher test to justify regulation of religion-based action. It is a form of heightened scrutiny. Others used other types of interpretation to come to the same end.

That approach could accept a criminal ban on polygamy because of the particular harms (perhaps not framed in the same way as Reynolds did) the practice brings.

Others might argue the practice should be allowed privately without government providing marriage licenses. Polygamous families are let alone these days generally speaking unless some other problem arises.

At any rate, we respect some need for religious based action, providing some exceptions, at least pursuant to legislation. Such exemptions are not absolute. They remain concerned with "social duties or subversive of good order."