The Bible in the Public Schools:

Minor, John, Plaintiff. The Bible in the Public Schools: Arguments in the Case Of John D. Minor et al. versus The Board Of Education of the City of Cincinnati et al.: Superior Court of Cincinnati. With The Opinions and Decision of the Court. Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co. 1870. 420 pp. [With] The Board of Education of the City of Cincinnati v. John D. Minor Et. Al. 43 pp. Reprint available November 2004 by The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN 1-58477-514-9. Cloth. $95. * In 1868 the school board of the City of Cincinnati ended the practice of reading passages of the King James Bible in classrooms. Immediately challenged in the Superior Court, the school board's decision was revoked, in part, on the grounds that the readings were non-sectarian. In a ringing dissent, Justice Alphonso Taft, the father of William Howard Taft, declared: "This great principle of equality in the enjoyment of religious liberty, and the faithful preservation of the rights of each individual conscience is important in itself, and is essential to religious peace and temporal prosperity, in any country under a free government. But in a city and State whose people have been drawn from the four quarters of the world, with a great diversity of inherited religious opinions, it is indispensable" (417). The Ohio Supreme Court overturned on appeal. The latter decision and Taft's dissent were cited favorably by the U.S. Supreme Court in Abbington v. Schempp. With a new appendix containing the decision of the Ohio Supreme Court.