Faith-healing a First Amendment dilemma conditions, the state Legislature amended the law to eliminate the religious-
liberty defense for parents in some criminal prosecutions for child neglect.
By Robert M. Bernstein
First Amendment Center religious-liberty fellow Even without a statutory free-exercise defense, though, Carl and Raylene
03.24.10 Worthington, the son-in-law and daughter of the Beagleys, were acquitted of
manslaughter by a sympathetic jury last July in the death of their own 15-
A jury in February convicted an Oregon couple, Jeffrey and Marci Beagley, month-old daughter. They, too, shunned medical attention for their
of criminally negligent homicide in the death of their teenage son for relying daughter’s pneumonia in favor of praying over her and anointing her with
solely on faith-healing as their son lay severely ill. The sentencing of the oil; the jury did convict Carl Worthington of a lesser misdemeanor offense.
couple to 16 months in prison raises difficult questions about how states
should balance their obligation to uphold religious free-exercise and Judge Steven Maurer, the presiding judge in the Beagley trial, described the
parental rights against their interest in protecting child health. case as one in which parents should have understood “the boundaries of
their faith.” Demarcating those boundaries, however, is tricky business,
Sixteen-year-old Neil Beagley died from complications arising from a especially when they butt against medical science, child-abuse prevention,
urinary-tract blockage, a condition that could have been easily treated with parental rights and self-consent.
traditional medical care, according to doctors who testified at trial.
Under current case law, there is arguably little refuge under the First
The conviction in the Oregon case comes almost exactly two years after the Amendment’s free-exercise clause for failing to provide medical care to
15-month-old granddaughter of the couple, who belong to the Followers of children for religious reasons.
Christ church, which eschews standard medical care, died after her
parents denied her medical treatment. In 2001, the Supreme Court declined an opportunity to address directly the
First Amendment constitutionality of faith-healing in Nixon v. Pennsylvania,
Under the applicable federal law, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment leaving in place the conviction of a couple who prayed over their dying
Act, there is no federal requirement for parents to provide their children diabetic 16-year-old daughter rather than provide her with insulin.
with medical treatment that is against their religious belief. The law
essentially kicks the ball to the states to determine how to regulate faith- Sixty-year-old precedent holds that parental rights can be reasonably
healing, allowing them — but not requiring them — to prosecute parents restricted when the well-being of children is at stake. The Court held in
who rely on faith-healing rather than medical treatment for their children. Prince v. Massachusetts (1944) that states have wide discretion in limiting
parental authority to ensure children’s welfare.
Though every state has laws criminalizing child neglect, states vary in the
extent to which they allow parents to raise a free-exercise defense in “The right to practice religion freely does not include liberty to expose the
prosecutions for cases in which a child died after parents relied on faith- community or the child to … ill health or death,” Justice Wiley B. Rutledge
healing. A few states allow almost unconditional protection for parents, wrote. “Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it does not
while most limit exclusive reliance on faith-healing when a child’s life is in follow they are free, in identical circumstances, to make martyrs of their
danger. children before they have reached the age of full consent and legal
discretion when they can make that choice for themselves.”
States enacted such statutes in the 1970s, when the federal government
conditioned federal child abuse prevention grant money to the states on the It is that last phrase, though, that parents accused of neglect in faith-
legislatures’ shielding parents who refuse medical care for children for healing trials sometimes underscore. Under Oregon law, 16-year-old Neil
religious reasons. The provision was pushed by President Richard Nixon’s Beagley was old enough to make certain medical decisions on his own. The
advisers Bob Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, both Christian Scientists who Beagleys argued that their son himself decided not to seek medical care
also espoused faith-healing. Though the provision was rescinded in 1983, and adamantly made his wishes known to his family. The state contended, in
the state laws remained on the books. turn, that a boy who was raised to believe medicine was weakness could not
make an informed decision and could not understand the benefits that a
Oregon, because it is home to the small Followers of Christ community, has hospital might offer.
been a hotbed of controversy over how much deference to accord parents’
religious views when parents make life-or-death medical decisions for their With states differing widely on how much, if any, protection to afford
children. parents who rely on faith-healing, future battles are sure to ensue in both
the courtroom and the public arena. A child’s right to life is hardly
For several decades, Oregon had one of the most permissive religious- contentious, yet there remains no consensus on how to protect religious
exemption laws in the nation, and by the late 1990s it even granted immunity practice while ensuring that no child’s health is jeopardized.
against manslaughter charges to parents who relied on faith-healing.
Then in 1999, in response to an uproar after many Followers of Christ
children had died from what authorities said were easily treatable