SERBIAN EASTERN ORTHODOX DIOCESE FOR THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND CANADA ET AL. v. MILIVOJEVICH ET AL.
No. 75-292
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 22, 1976—Decided June 21, 1976
426 U.S. 696
Albert E. Jenner, Jr., argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Keith F. Bode, Robert L. Graham, Thomas J. Karacic, and Henry D. Fisher.
Leo J. Sullivan III argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Richard J. Smith and Jerome H. Torshen.*
MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1963, the Holy Assembly of Bishops and the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church (Mother Church)
I
The basic dispute is over control of the Serbian Eastern Orthodox Diocese for the United States of America and Canada (American-Canadian Diocese), its property and assets. Petitioners are Bishops Firmilian, Gregory Udicki, and Sava Vukovich, and the Serbian Eastern
The Serbian Orthodox Church, one of the 14 autocephalous, hierarchical churches which came into existence following the schism of the universal Christian church in 1054, is an episcopal church whose seat is the Patriarchate in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. Its highest legislative, judicial, ecclesiastical, and administrative authority resides in the Holy Assembly of Bishops, a body composed of all Diocesan Bishops presided over by a Bishop designated by the Assembly to be Patriarch. The Church‘s highest executive body, the Holy Synod of Bishops, is composed of the Patriarch and four Diocesan Bishops selected by the Holy Assembly. The Holy Synod and the Holy Assembly have the exclusive power to remove, suspend, defrock, or appoint Diocesan Bishops. The Mother Church is governed according to the Holy Scriptures, Holy Tradition, Rules of the Ecumenical Councils, the Holy Apostles, the Holy Faiths of the Church, the Mother Church Constitution adopted in 1931, and a “penal code” adopted in 1961. These sources of law are sometimes ambiguous and seemingly inconsistent. Pertinent provisions of the Mother Church Constitution provide that the Church‘s “main administrative division is composed of dioceses, both in regard to church hierarchical and church administrative aspect,” Art. 12, and that “[d]ecisions of establishing, naming, liquidating, reorganizing, and the seat of the dioceses, and establishing or eliminating of position of vicar bish-
During the late 19th century, migrants to North America of Serbian descent formed autonomous religious congregations throughout this country and Canada. These congregations were then under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church, but that Church was unable to care for their needs and the congregations sought permission to bring themselves under the jurisdiction of the Serbian Orthodox Church.
In 1913 and 1916, Serbian priests and laymen organized a Serbian Orthodox Church in North America. The 32 Serbian Orthodox congregations were divided into 4 presbyteries, each presided over by a Bishop‘s Aide, and constitutions were adopted. In 1917, the Russian Orthodox Church commissioned a Serbian priest, Father Mardary, to organize an independent Serbian Diocese in America. Four years later, as a result of Father Mardary‘s efforts, the Holy Assembly of Bishops of the Mother Church created the Eastern Orthodox Diocese for the United States of America and Canada and designated a Serbian Bishop to complete the formal organization of a Diocese. From that time until 1963, each Bishop who governed the American-Canadian Diocese was a Yugoslav citizen appointed by the Mother Church without consultation with Diocesan officials.
In 1927, Father Mardary called a Church National Assembly embracing all of the known Serbian Orthodox congregations in the United States and Canada. The Assembly drafted and adopted the constitution of the Serbian Orthodox Diocese for the United States of America and Canada, and submitted the constitution to the Mother Church for approval. The Holy Assеmbly made changes to provide for appointment of the Diocesan Bishop by the Holy Assembly and to require Holy As-
Article 1 of the constitution provides that the American-Canadian Diocese “is considered ecclesiastically-judicially as an organic part of the Serbian Patriarchate in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia,” and Art. 2 provides that all “statutes and rules which regulate the ecclesiastical-canonical authority and position of the Serbian Orthodox Church in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia are also compulsory for” the American-Canadian Diocese. Article 3 states that the “jurisdiction of the... Diocese... includes the entire political territory of the United States of America and Canada, which as such by its geographical location enjoys full administrative freedom and accordingly, it can independently regulate and rule the activities of its church, school and other diocesan institutions and all funds and beneficiencies, through its organs....” Article 9 provides that the Bishop of the Diocese “is appointed by the Holy Assembly of Bishops of the Serbian Patriarchate“; various provisions of the constitution accord that Bishop extensive powers with respect to both religious matters and control of Diocesan property. The constitution also provides for such Diocesan organs as a Diocesan National Assembly, which exercises considerable legislative and administrative authority within the Diocese.
In 1927, Father Mardary also organized a not-for-profit corporation, the Serbian Eastern Orthodox Council for the United States and Canada, under the laws of Illinois. The corporation was to hold title to 30 acres of land in Libertyville, Ill., that Father Mardary had personally purchased in 1924. The charter of that corporation was allowed to lapse, and Father Mardary organized
Respondent Bishop Dionisije was elected Bishop of the American-Canadian Diocese by the Holy Assembly of Bishops in 1939. He became a controversial figure; during thе years before 1963, the Holy Assembly received numerous complaints challenging his fitness to serve as Bishop and his administration of the Diocese.
During his tenure, however, the Diocese grew so substantially that Dionisije requested that the Patriarch and Holy Assembly appoint bishops to assist him but to serve under his supervision. Eventually, the Diocese sought its elevation by the Holy Assembly to the rank of Metropolia, that South America be added to the Diocese, and that several assistant bishops be appointed under Dionisije. Dionisije specifically recommended that petitioners Firmilian and Gregory Udicki, and one Stefan Lastavica be named assistant bishops. A delegation from the Diocese was sent to the May 1962 meeting of the Holy Assembly in Belgrade to urge adoption of these reorganization proposals, and on June 12, 1962, the Holy Synod appointed a delegation to visit the United States and study the proposals. The delegation was also directed to confer with Dionisije concerning the complaints made against him and his administration over the years.
The delegation remained in the United States for three
The Holy Assembly thereafter reconvened and, acting under Art. 16 of the constitution of the Mother Church, reorganized the American-Canadian Diocese into three new dioceses—the Middle Western, the Western, and the Eastern—whose boundaries were roughly those of the episcopal districts previously created by Dionisije.2 The final fixing of boundaries for the new dioceses and all other organizational and administrative matters were left to be determined by the officials of the old American-Canadian Diocese. Dionisije was appointed Bishop of the Middle Western Diocese and, seven days later, petitioners Archimandrites Firmilian, Gregory, and Stefan3 were appointed temporary administrators for the new Dioceses.
The Diocesan Council met on June 6, and Dionisije reaffirmed his refusal to turn over administration of the Diocese to Firmilian; he also announced that he had discharged two of his vicars general beсause of their loyalty to the Mother Church. The Council resolved at the meeting to advise the Holy Synod that the proposal to reorganize the Diocese into three dioceses would be submitted to the Diocesan National Assembly in August for acceptance or rejection. The Council also requested that the Holy Assembly promptly send a committee to investigate the complaints against Dionisije.
On June 13, the Holy Synod appointed such a commis-
On the basis of the commission‘s report and recommendations, which recited Dionisije‘s refusal to accept the decisions of the Holy Synod and Holy Assembly and his refusal to recognize the court of the Holy Synod or its competence to try him, the Holy Assembly met on July 27, 1963, and voted to remove Dionisije as Bishop. The minutes of the Holy Assembly meeting and the Patriarch‘s letter to Dionisije informing him of the Holy Assembly‘s actions made clear that the removal was based solely on his acts of defiance subsequent to his May 10, 1963, suspension, and his violation of his oath and loss of certain qualifications for Bishop under Art. 104 of the constitution of the Mother Church.
The Diocesan National Assembly, with Dionisije presiding despite his removal, met in August 1963 and issued a resolution repudiating the division of the Diocese into three Dioceses and demanding a revocation by the Mother Church of the decisions concerning that division. When the Holy Assembly refused to reconsider, the Diocesan National Assembly in November 1963 declared the Diocese completely autonomous and reinstated the provisions of the Diocesan constitution that provided for election of the Bishop of the Diocese itself and for amendments without the approval of the Holy Assembly.
Meanwhile, the Holy Synod in October 1963 for-
Dionisije returned the indictment in January, refusing to answer without the verified charges, denouncing the Holy Assembly and Holy Synod as schismatic and pro-Communist, and asserting that the Mother Church was proceeding in violation of its penal code and constitution.
The Holy Synod, on February 25, 1964, declared that it could not proceed further without Dionisije and referred the matter to the Holy Assembly, which tried Dionisije as a default case on March 5, 1964, because of his refusal to participate. The indictment was also amended at that time to include charges based on Dionisije‘s acts of rebellion such as those committed at the November meeting of the National Assembly which had declared the Diocese separate from the Mother Church. Considering the original and amended indictments, the Holy Assembly unanimously found Dionisije guilty of all charges and divested him of his episcopal and monastic ranks.
Even before the Holy Assembly had removed Dionisije as Bishop, he had commenced what eventually became this protracted litigation, now carried on for almost 13 years. Acting upon the threat contained in his May 27, 1963, press release, Dionisije filed suit in
Following a lengthy trial, the trial court filed an unreported memorandum opinion and entered a final decree which concluded that “no substantial evidence was produced... that fraud, collusion or arbitrariness existed in any of the actions or decisions preliminary to or during the final proceedings of the decision to defrock Bishop Dionisije made by the highest Hierarchical bodies of the Mother Church,” Pet. for Cert., App. 44; that the property held by respondent corporations is held in trust for all members of the American-Canadian Diocese; that it was “improper and beyond the power of the Mother Church to take its action in dividing the whole American Diocese into three new Dioceses, changing its boundaries, and in appointing new bishops for
On appeal, the Supreme Court of Illinois affirmed in part and reversed in part, essentially holding that Dionisije‘s removal and defrockment had to be set aside as “arbitrary” because the proceedings resulting in those actions were not conducted according to the Illinois Supreme Court‘s interpretation of the Church‘s constitution and penal code, and that the Diocesan reorganization was invalid because it was beyond the scope of the Mother Church‘s authority to effectuate such changes without Diocesan approval. 60 Ill. 2d 477, 328 N. E. 2d 268 (1975). Although the court denied rehearing, it amended its original opinion to hold that, although Dionisije had been properly suspended, that suspension terminated by operation of church law when he was not validly tried within one year of his indictment. Thus, the court purported in effect to reinstate Dionisije as Diocesan Bishop.
II
The fallacy fatal to the judgment of the Illinois Supreme Court is that it rests upon an impermissible rejection of the decisions of the highest ecclesiastical tribunals of this hierarchical church upon the issues in dispute, and impermissibly substitutes its own inquiry into church polity and resolutions based thereon of those disputes. Consistently with the First and Fourteenth Amendments “civil courts do not inquire whether the relevant [hierarchical] church governing body has power under religious law [to decide such disputes]. . . Such a determination. . . frequently necessitates the interpretation of ambiguous religious law and usage.
Resolution of the religious disputes at issue here affects the control of church property in addition to the structure and administration of the American-Canadian Diocese. This is because the Diocesan Bishop controls respondent Monastery of St. Sava and is the principal officer of respondent property-holding corporations. Resolution of thе religious dispute over Dionisije‘s defrockment therefore determines control of the property. Thus, this case essentially involves not a church property dispute, but a religious dispute the resolution of which under our cases is for ecclesiastical and not civil tribunals. Even when rival church factions seek resolution of a church property dispute in the civil courts there is substantial danger that the State will become entangled in essentially religious controversies or intervene on behalf of groups espousing particular doctrinal beliefs. Because of this danger, “the First Amendment severely circumscribes the role that civil courts may play in resolving church property disputes.” Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, 393 U. S. 440, 449 (1969). “First Amend-
The principles limiting the role of civil courts in the resolution of religious controversies that incidentally affect civil rights were initially fashioned in Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall. 679 (1872), a diversity case decided before the First Amendment had been rendered applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment.5 With respect to hierarchical churches, Watson held:
“[T]he rule of action which should govern the civil courts... is, that, whenever the questions of discipline, or of faith, or ecclesiastical rule, custom, or law have been decided by the highest of these church judicatories to which the matter has been carried, the legal tribunals must accept such decisions as final, and as binding on them, in their application to the case before them.” Id., at 727.
In language having “a clear constitutional ring,” Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, supra, at 446, Watson reasoned:
“The law knows no heresy, and is committed to the
support of no dogma, the establishment of no sect. The right to organize voluntary religious associations to assist in the expression and dissemination of any religious doctrine, and to create tribunals for the decision of controverted questions of faith within the association, and for the ecclesiastical government of all the individual members, congregations, and officers within the general association, is unquestioned. All who unite themselves to such a body do so with an implied consent to this government, and are bound to submit to it. But it would be a vain consent and would lead to the total subversion of such religious bodies, if any one aggrieved by one of their decisions could appeal to the secular courts and have them reversed. It is of the essence of these religious unions, and of their right to establish tribunals for the decision of questions arising among themselves, that those decisions should be binding in all cases of ecclesiastical cognizance, subject only to such appeals as the organism itself provides for.” 13 Wall., at 728-729 (emphasis supplied).
Gonzalez v. Archbishop, 280 U. S. 1 (1929), applied this principle in a case involving dispute over entitlement to certain income under a will that turned upon an ecclesiastical determination as to whether an individual would be appointed to a chaplaincy in the Roman Catholic Church. The Court, speaking through Mr. Justice Brandeis, observed:
“Because the appointment [to the chaplaincy] is a canonical act, it is the function of the church authorities to determine what the essential qualifications of a chaplain are and whether the candidate possesses them. In the absence of fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness, the decisions of the proper church
tribunals on matters purely ecclesiastical, although affecting civil rights, are accepted in litigation before the secular courts as conclusive, because the parties in interest made them so by contract or otherwise.” Id., at 16.
Thus, although Watson had left civil courts no role to play in reviewing ecclesiastical decisions during the course of resolving church property disputes, Gonzalez first adverted to the possibility of “marginal civil court review,” Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, supra, at 447, in cases challenging decisions of ecclesiastical tribunals as products of “fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness.” However, since there was “not even a suggestion that [the Archbishop] exercised his authority [in making the chaplaincy decision] arbitrarily,” 280 U. S., at 18, the suggested “fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness” exception to the Watson rule was dictum only. And although references to the suggested exception appear in opinions in cases decided since the Watson rule has been held to be mandated by the First Amendment,6 no decision of this Court has given concrete content to or applied the “exception.” However, it was the predicate for the Illinois Supreme Court‘s decision in this case, and we therefore turn to the question whether reliance upon it in the circumstances of this case was consistent with the prohibition of the First and Fourteenth Amendments against rejection of the decisions of the Mother Church upon the religious disputes in issue.
The conclusion of the Illinois Supreme Court that the decisions of the Mother Church were “arbitrary” was grounded upon an inquiry that persuaded the Illinois Su-
“But it is a very different thing where a subject-matter of dispute, strictly and purely ecclesiastical in its character, a matter over which the civil courts
exercise no jurisdiction, —a matter which concerns theological controversy, church discipline, ecclesiastical government, or the conformity of the members of the church to the standard of morals required of them,—becomes the subject of its action. It may be said here, also, that no jurisdiction has been conferred on the tribunal to try the particular case before it, or that, in its judgment, it exceeds the powers conferred upon it, or that the laws of the church do not authorize the particular form of proceeding adopted; and, in a sense often used in the courts, all of those may be said to be questions of jurisdiction. But it is easy to see that if the civil courts are to inquire into all these matters, the whole subject of the doctrinal theology, the usages and customs, the written laws, and fundamental organization of every religious denomination may, and must, be examined into with minuteness and care, for they would become, in almost every case, the criteria by which the validity of the ecclesiastical decree would be determined in the civil court. This рrinciple would deprive these bodies of the right of construing their own church laws, would open the way to all the evils which we have depicted as attendant upon the doctrine of Lord Eldon, and would, in effect, transfer to the civil courts where property rights were concerned the decision of all ecclesiastical questions.” 13 Wall., at 733-734. (Emphasis supplied.)
Indeed, it is the essence of religious faith that ecclesiastical decisions are reached and are to be accepted as matters of faith8 whether or not rational or measurable by
The constitutional evils that attend upon any “arbitrariness” exception in the sense applied by the Illinois Supreme Court to justify civil court review of ecclesiastical decisions of final church tribunals are manifest in the instant case. The Supreme Court of Illinois recognized that all parties agree that the Serbian Orthodox Church is a hierarchical church, and that the sole power to appoint and remove Bishops of the Church resides in its highest ranking organs, the Holy Assembly and the Holy Synod.9 Indeed, final authority with respect to the
submitting those decisions to review in the ordinary judicial tribunals. Each of these large and influential bodies (to mention no others, lеt reference be had to the Protestant Episcopal, the Methodist Episcopal, and the Presbyterian churches), has a body of constitutional and ecclesiastical law of its own, to be found in their written organic laws, their books of discipline, in their collections of precedents, in their usage and customs, which as to each constitute a system of ecclesiastical law and religious faith that tasks the ablest minds to become familiar with. It is not to be supposed that the judges of the civil courts can be as competent in the ecclesiastical law and religious faith of all these bodies as the ablest men in each are in reference to their own. It would therefore be an appeal from the more learned tribunal in the law which should decide the case, to one which is less so.”
“The Holy Assembly of Bishops, as the highest hierarchical body, is legislative authority in the matters of faith, officiation, church order (discipline) and internal organization of the Church, as well as the highest church juridical authority within its jurisdiction (Article 69 sec. 28).” Art. 57.
“All the decisions of the Holy Assembly of Bishops and of the Holy Synod of Bishops of canonical
and church nature, in regard to faith, officiation, church order and internal organization of the church, are valid and final.” Art. 64. “The Holy Assembly of Bishops, whose purpose is noted in Article 57 of this Constitution:
. . . . .
“9) interprets canonical-ecclesiastical rules, those which are general and obligatory, and particular ones, and publishes their collections;
. . . . .
“12) prescribes the ecclesiastical-judicial procedure for all Ecclesiastical Courts;
. . . . .
“26) settles disputes of jurisdiction between hierarchical and church-self governing organs;
“27) ADJUDGES:
“A) In first and in final instances:
“a) disagreements between bishops and the Holy Synod, and between the bishops and the Patriarch;
“b) canonical offenses of the Patriarch;
“B) In the second and final instance:
“All matters which the Holy Synod of Bishops judged in the first instance.” Art. 69.
Nor is there any dispute that questions of church discipline and the composition of the church hierarchy are at the core of ecclesiastical concern; the bishop of a church is clearly one of the central figures in such a hierarchy and the embodiment of the church within his Diocese, and the Mother Church constitution states that “[h]e is, according to the church canonical regulations, chief representative and guiding leader of all church spiritual life and church order in the diocese.” Art. 13.
Yet having recognized that the Serbian Orthodox Church is hierarchical and that the decisions to suspend and
III
Similar considerations inform our resolution of the second question we must address—the constitutionality of the Supreme Court of Illinois’ holding that the Mother Church‘s reorganization of the American-Canadian Dio
This conclusion was not, however, explicitly based on the “fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness” exception. Rather, the Illinois Supreme Court relied on purported “neutral principles” for resolving property disputes which would “not in any way entangle this court in the determination of theological or doctrinal matters.” Id., at 505, 328 N. E. 2d, at 282. Nevertheless the Supreme Court of Illinois substituted its interpretation of the Diocesan and Mother Church constitutions for that of the highest ecclesiastical tribunals in which church law vests authority to make that interpretation. This the
We will not delve into the various church constitutional provisions relevant to this conclusion, for that would repeat the error of the Illinois Supreme Court. It suffices to note that the reorganization of the Diocese involves a matter of internal church government, an issue at the core of ecclesiastical affairs; Arts. 57 and 64 of the Mother Church constitution commit such questions of church polity to the final province of the Holy Assembly. Kedroff v. St. Nicholas Cathedral, 344 U. S. 94, 116 (1952), stated that religious freedom encompasses the
The control of Diocesan property may be little affected by the changes; respondents’ allegation that the reorganization was a fraudulent subterfuge to divert Diocesan property from its intended beneficiaries has been rejected by the Illinois courts. Formal title to the property remains in respondent property-holding corporations, to be held in trust for all members of the new Dioceses. The boundaries of the reorganized Dioceses generally conform to the episcopal districts which the American-Canadian Diocese had already employed for its internal government, and the appointed administrators of the new Dioceses were the same individuals nominated by Dionisije as assistant bishops to govern similar divisions under him. Indeed, even the Illinois courts’ rationale that the reorganization would effectuate an abrogation of the Diocesan constitution has no support in the record, which establishes rather that the details of the reorganization and any decisions pertaining to a distribution of
“1. That all the rights of the former American-Canadian Diocese, as they relate to the autonomy in the administrative sense, remain unchanged. The only exception is the forming of three dioceses and
“2. That the Constitution of the former American-Canadian Diocese remains the same and that the Dioceses in America and Canada will not, in an administrative sense (the management (or direction) of the properties) be managed (or directed) in the same manner as those in Yugoslavia.” App. 1446.
As a practical matter the effect of the reorganization is a tripling of the Diocesan representational strength in the Holy Assembly and a decentralization of hierarchical authority to permit closer attention to the needs of individual congregations within each of the new Dioceses, a result which Dionisije and Diocesan representatives had already concluded was necessary. Whether corporate bylaws or other documents governing the individual property-holding corporations may affect any desired disposition of the Diocesan property is a question not before us.
IV
In short, the
Reversed.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE concurs in the judgment.
MR. JUSTICE WHITE, concurring.
Major predicates for the Court‘s opinion are that the Serbian Orthodox Church is a hierarchical church and the American-Canadian Diocese, involved here, is part of that Church. These basic issues are for the courts’ ultimate decision, and the fact that church authorities may render their opinions on them does not foreclose the courts from coming to their independent judgment. I do not understand the Court‘s opinion to suggest otherwise and join the views expressed therein.
MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST, with whom MR. JUSTICE STEVENS joins, dissenting.
The Court‘s opinion, while long on the ecclesiastical history of the Serbiаn Orthodox Church, is somewhat short on the procedural history of this case. A casual reader of some of the passages in the Court‘s opinion could easily gain the impression that the State of Illinois had commenced a proceeding designed to brand Bishop Dionisije as a heretic, with appropriate pains and penalties. But the state trial judge in the Circuit Court of Lake County was not the Bishop of Beauvais, trying Joan of Arc for heresy; the jurisdiction of his court was invoked by petitioners themselves, who sought an injunction establishing their control over property of the American-Canadian Diocese of the church located in Lake County.
The jurisdiction of that court having been invoked
Unless civil courts are to be wholly divested of authority to resolve conflicting claims to real property owned by a hierarchical church, and such claims are to be resolved by brute force, civil courts must of necessity make some factual inquiry even under the rules the Court purports to apply in this case. We are told that “a civil court must accept the ecclesiastical decisions of church tribunals as it finds them,” ante, at 713. But even this rule requires that proof be made as to what these decisions are, and if proofs on that issue conflict the civil court will inevitably have to choose one over the other. In so choosing, if the choice is to be a rational one, reasons must be adduced as to why one proffered decision is to prevail over another. Such reasons will
If civil courts, consistently with the
The cases upon which the Court relies are not a uniform line of authorities leading inexorably to reversal of the Illinois judgment. On the contrary, they embody two distinct doctrines which have quite separate origins. The first is a common-law doctrine regarding the appropriate roles for civil courts called upon to adjudicate church property disputes—a doctrine which found general application in federal courts prior to Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64 (1938), but which has never had any application to our review of a state-court
The first decision of this Court regarding the role of civil courts in adjudicating church property disputes was Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall. 679 (1872). There the Court canvassed the American authorities and concluded that where people had chosen to organize themselves into voluntary religious associations, and had agreed to be bound by the decisions of the hierarchy created to govern such associations, the civil courts could not be availed of to hear appeals from otherwise final decisions of such hierarchical authorities. The bases from which this principle was derived clearly had no constitutional dimension; there was not the slightest suggestion that the
“Religious organizations come before us in the same attitude as other voluntary associations for benevolent or charitable purposes, and their rights of property, or of contract, are equally under the protection of the law, and the actions of their members subject to its restraints.” Id., at 714.
The Court‘s equation of religious bodies with other private voluntary associations makes it clear that the prin
Less than a year later Watson‘s observations about the roles of civil courts were followed in Bouldin v. Alexander, 15 Wall. 131 (1872), where the Court held that the appointed trustees of the property of a congregational church
“cannot be removed from their trusteeship by a minority of the church society or meeting, without warning, and acting without charges, without citation or trial, and in direct contravention of the church rules.” Id., at 140.
Again, there was nothing to suggest that this was based upon anything but commonsense rules for deciding an intraorganizational dispute: in an organization which has provided for majority rule through certain procedures, a minority‘s attempt to usurp that rule and those procedures need be given no effect by civil courts.
In Gonzalez v. Archbishop, 280 U. S. 1 (1929), the Court again recognized the principles underlying Watson in upholding a decision оf the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands that the petitioner was not entitled to the chaplaincy which he claimed because the decision as to whether he possessed the necessary qualifications for that post was one committed to the appropriate church authorities. In dicta which the Court today conveniently truncates, Mr. Justice Brandeis observed:
“In the absence of fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness, the decisions of the proper church tribunals on matters purely ecclesiastical, although affecting civil rights, are accepted in litigation before the secular courts as conclusive, because the parties in interest made them so by contract or otherwise. Under like circumstances, effect is given in the courts to the determinations of the judicatory bodies estab
lished by clubs and civil associations.” Id., at 16-17 (emphasis supplied; footnotes omitted).
Gonzalez clearly has no more relevance to the meaning of the
The year 1952 was the first occasion on which this Court examined what limits the
“By fiat it displaces one church administrator with another. It passes the control of matters strictly ecclesiastical from one church authority to another. It thus intrudes for the benefit of one segment of a church the power of the state into the forbidden area of religious freedom contrary to the principles of the First Amendment.” 344 U. S., at 119.
On remand from the decision in Kedroff, the New York Court of Appeals again held that the American
“the decision now under review rests on the same premises which were found to have underlain the enactment of the statute struck down in Kedroff.” Id., at 191.
Nine years later, in Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church, 393 U. S. 440 (1969), the Court held that Georgia‘s common law, which implied a trust upon local church property for the benefit of the general church only on the condition that the general church adhere to its tenets of faith and practice existing at the time of affiliation by the local churches, was inconsistent with the
“[u]nder [the Georgia] approach, property rights do not turn on a church decision as to church doctrine. The standard of departure-from-doctrine, though it calls for resolution of ecclesiastical questions, is a creation of state, not church, law.” Id., at 451.
Finally, in Md. & Va. Churches v. Sharpsburg Church, 396 U. S. 367 (1970), the Court considered an appeal from a judgment of the Court of Appeals of Maryland upholding the dismissal of two actions brought by the Eldership seeking to prevent two of its local churches from withdrawing from that general religious association. The Eldership had also claimed the rights to select the
Despite the Court‘s failure to do so, it does not seem very difficult to derive the operative constitutional principle from this line of decisions. As should be clear from even this cursory study, Watson, Bouldin, and Gonzalez have no direct relevance* to the question before us today:
There is nothing in this record to indicate that the Illinois courts have been instruments of any such impermissible intrusion by the State on one side or the other of a religious dispute. There is nothing in the Supreme Court of Illinois’ opinion indicating that it placed its thumb on the scale in favor of the respondents. Instead that opinion appears to be precisely what it pur
In any event the Court‘s decision in Md. & Va. Churches demonstrates that petitioners’ position in this regard is untenable. And as I read that decision, it seems to me to compel affirmance of at least that portion of the Illinois court‘s decision which denied petitioners’ request for the aid of the civil courts in enforcing its desire to divide the American-Canadian Diocese. See ante, at 720-724 (Part III). I see no distinction between the Illinois courts’ refusal to place their weight behind the representatives of the Serbian Mother Church who sought to prevent portions of their American congregation from splitting off from that body and the Maryland courts’ refusal to do the same thing for the Eldership of the Church of God. The Court today expressly eschews any explanation for its failure to follow Md. & Va. Churches, see ante, at 721, contenting itself with this conclusory statement:
“The constitutional provisions of the American-Canadian Diocese were not so express that the civil
courts could enforce them without engaging in a searching and therefore impermissible inquiry into church polity.” Ante, at 723.
But comparison of the relevant discussions by the state tribunals regarding their consideration of church documents makes this claimed distinction seem quite specious. Compаre Md. & Va. Churches v. Sharpsburg Church, 254 Md. 162, 170, 254 A. 2d 162, 168 (1969), with Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Ocokoljich, 72 Ill. App. 2d 444, 458-462, 219 N. E. 2d 343, 350-353 (1966).
In conclusion, while there may be a number of good arguments that civil courts of a State should, as a matter of the wisest use of their authority, avoid adjudicating religious disputes to the maximum extent possible, they obviously cannot avoid all such adjudications. And while common-law principles like those discussed in Watson, Bouldin, and Gonzalez may offer some sound principles for those occasions when such adjudications are required, they are certainly not rules to which state courts are required to adhere by virtue of the
Notes
“Nor do we see that justice would be likely to be promoted by