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Though the US is the oldest & most thoroughgoing secular state, org'd religion plays a greater part there than anywhere else. Secular state & religious society are, in fact, complementary to each other. In America, the origins of secularism are religious - the belief in the uniqueness of the religious life - whereas in Europe the origins are pol'al - the attempt to ensure pol'al stability in an irreligious society. If religion is recognized as constituting belief in an after-life, then totalitarian creeds which believe that satisfaction can be attained in this world are not protected under the First Amendment. The line between the spheres of gov'al & religious action is, however, not clear, as was shown in the McCollum case where it was deemed unconstitutional for a Sch district to grant 'released time' for religious instruction. IPSA. Adapted from the source document.

Established at the time of the Dreyfus affair, the League of Human Rights (LHR) was an attempt to reestablish the rights written in the Declaration of 1789. However, since 1904, under the direction of a new president, it added to this defense of justice a struggle for a new right. Secularism, peace, the right to unionization by the workers were added to the program. An ideological association & not a pol'al party, the LHR, a friend to the Socialist Party & the Unions, was made up chiefly of academicians & members of the liberal professions. Its structure is simple: sections from which delegates come together in a congress & elect a central committee. As part of its activities, it publishes a newspaper & holds numerous meetings; its membership (there are almost 150,000 active members) distributes tracts & handbills; finally, the important inter-parliamentary group of the LHR represents an esp effective means of action. However, this powerful org received a serious setback as a result of WWII. The question now is: Can the LHR recover its previous prosperity in the face of its loss of both active members & wealth? Tr from IPSA by J. A. Broussard.