Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia

rdf:langString Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia

rdf:langString Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia precludes the Commonwealth of Australia (i.e., the federal parliament) from making laws for establishing any religion, imposing any religious observance, or prohibiting the free exercise of any religion. Section 116 also provides that no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth. The product of a compromise in the pre-Federation constitutional conventions, Section 116 is based on similar provisions in the United States Constitution. However, Section 116 is more narrowly drafted than its US counterpart, and does not preclude the states of Australia from making such laws. Section 116 has been interpreted narrowly by the High Court of Australia: while the definition of "religion" adopted by the court is broad and flexible, the scope of the protection of religions is circumscribed. The result of the court's approach has been that no court has ever ruled a law to be in contravention of Section 116, and the provision has played only a minor role in Australian constitutional history. Among the laws that the High Court has ruled not to be in contravention of Section 116 are laws that provided government funding to religious schools, that authorised the dissolution of a branch of the Jehovah's Witnesses, and that enabled the forcible removal of Indigenous Australian children from their families. Federal Governments have twice proposed the amendment of Section 116, principally to apply its provisions to laws made by the states. On each occasion—in 1944 and 1988—the proposal failed in a referendum.