Case Citator › Cantwell v. Connecticut

Cantwell v. Connecticut

Is it still good law? What later courts have actually done to this case.

Limited by some courts
Court
Supreme Court of the United States
Citation
310 U.S. 296
Decided
Confirmed treatments
1
Flagged citations read
123 of 123
Citing cases (total)
123
Treatment dates
1990
Limited by some courts
At least one reviewed court has limited this case’s holding to narrower facts or a narrower rule. No reviewed court has overruled it. Cantwell v. Connecticut is limited in one confirmed treatment listed below. Employment Division v. Smith treated Cantwell as a case involving free exercise together with another constitutional protection and declined to extend that protection to a standalone free-exercise claim.
More on how this was screened

All 123 flagged citations have been read. Later courts continue to apply Cantwell's incorporation and religious-expression holdings.

Every treatment on this page is written from the citing opinion itself, with a verbatim quote, never copied from a commercial citator. A citation flagged by our screen but not shown here was read and found not to weaken this case.

123 later cases cite Cantwell v. Connecticut; 123 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading, and all of them have been read. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Relying on Cantwell v. Connecticut?

This page shows what later courts did to it. Ask about your specific facts and see whether it still carries your argument, with citations you can check.

Treatments

Limited

  • The Court confined Cantwell to claims involving free exercise alongside another constitutional protection and declined to extend that approach to a standalone free-exercise claim.

    Employment Division v. Smith · Supreme Court of the United States · filed

    The only decisions in which we have held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivated action have involved not the Free Exercise Clause alone, but the Free Exercise Clause in conjunction with other constitutional protections, such as freedom of speech and of the press, see Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S., at 304-307 ... The present case does not present such a hybrid situation, but a free exercise claim unconnected with any communicative activity or parental right. Respondents urge us to hold, quite simply, that when otherwise prohibitable conduct is accompanied by religious convictions, not only the convictions but the conduct itself must be free from governmental regulation. We have never held that, and decline to do so now.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

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