Newton Cantwell and his two sons, Jesse, and Russell who were claiming to be ordained ministers of Jehovah’s Witnesses were evangelizing a primarily Catholic neighborhood in Connecticut.
They were evangelizing as they moved from one doorstep to the other and also at some point approached people on the streets.
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However, some of the pedestrians reacted bitterly to their phonograph record criticizing the Catholic religion and Cantwell, and his sons were arrested and charged with defilement of a Connecticut decree requiring legal representatives to acquire a certificate before beseeching funds from the community and also incitement of a common-law break of the harmony.
Legal Issue
Did the conviction and apprehension of Cantwell for defiling the common law violation of breach of the peace infringe his legitimate rights of free communication given in the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States?
Holding
In the unanimous opinion written by Justice Roberts, the Supreme Court coincided with Cantwell. The court affirmed that the actions of Cantwell were enshrined by the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution.
The reasoning of the Court
Justice Roberts writing for the court argued that, even though the general codes of practice on solicitation were genuine, limitations established on religious grounds were not. Therefore, given the fact that the decree permitted local representatives to decide which causes were devout and which were not, it dishonored the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The court also stated that since the preservation of public mandate was a legal state concern, it could not be cast off to substantiate the dominance of unrestricted communication of opinions. The message of Cantwell and his sons even though was offensive to various people did not impend detriment physically and was secure religious discourse.
Religious Studies and Public Policy Questions
The Court discovered Connecticut's requesting grant law unlawful. The law required an administrative authority to decide whether the intention was religious and that it ''fits in with sensible norms of productivity and honesty.'' This set the city in place of choosing whether a specific lead is religious which at that point permits an investigation into the idea of the religion which is utilized to make a judgment. This puts the inquiries of the legitimacy of either outside the law and the courts.
Rightly or Wrongly Decided
The case was rightly decided because Cantwell and his two sons were acting within their legal boundaries of free communication of ideas enshrined in the First and Fourteenth Amendment.
Concurring Opinion
The concurring opinion is by Justice Roberts which offers a different insight that the limitations established on religious grounds were not genuine even though the general codes of solicitation were genuine.
Dissenting Opinion
There is no dissenting opinion for the decision made by the court regarding this case of Newton Cantwell and his sons.
