[Update:  Thanks to Episcopal Café and the comment from Jeff in VA below, they provided the link to the archived Supreme Court session and I was able to watch it again.  Jeff is right, the first time I missed a significant grilling of the denomination’s lawyer on Neutral Principles.  I have added one marked update based on my second viewing and adjusted a couple of my other comments.]

I am probably way too much of a polity wonk for my own good.  (That noise you heard was my wife saying “Amen!”)

I arranged my morning around the webcast of the oral arguments before the California Supreme Court of the consolidated Episcopal Church Cases about churches taking property when they leave a denomination.  While this case may be about three churches leaving the Episcopal Church, the decision will clarify California state law and PC(USA) governing bodies have filed amicus briefs in this case.  As a polity wonk I found the hour of arguments fascinating.

Some general impressions:  All of the lawyers were well prepared as were the justices.  They were quoting cases and statutes back and forth at each other by case name and number and frequently left me in the dust.  However, much of the time the discussion was in terms that I could understand and it was an interesting argument.  And while the lawyers may have had presentations ready to give, they were quickly interrupted by the justices who wanted to question them about the detailed legal points.

One of the most interesting points was that both sets of lawyers argued that under either legal principle, those being principle of government which would favor a hierarchical denomination and neutral principles which would favor the individual church, their side should prevail.  I must admit that between the legal argument and the interruptions (I could not completely shut the world out) I had trouble following why the denomination should win under neutral principles.  It may also have something to do with the weakness of the argument because it was clear that at least a couple of justices had trouble buying it.  What was more interesting, and has a certain degree of logic, was the individual church’s argument that they still win under principle of government.  The argument was that the actual church government was not the Episcopal Church but the Worldwide Anglican Communion which they have not left but are still under its governance.  This clearly is not an argument that can be used by a church trying to leave with contested property from the PC(USA).

A point where the denomination’s lawyers did better than the congregations’ lawyer was regarding the law in other states.  When the justices asked what the status is in other states (I think this was a “never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to”) the congregations’ lawyer answered “mixed.”  The denomination’s lawyers answered that other states have favored principle of government.  (It is my understanding that there are few similar cases which have made it all the way to the state supreme courts in this current round but that the government principle has been favored so far.)

The congregations’ lawyer took a real beating over the fact that one church (St. James) was originally an Episcopal mission church and when if became chartered it agreed to be “forever bound” by the Episcopal Church canons and attached those documents to the state incorporation papers.  His argument was that the canons are ecclesiastical law and property is not governed there but under state law.  One of the justices flatly stated that she was in favor of neutral principles but she can’t see how they could be applied here when the church agreed to be “forever bound” by the canons.  The counter argument from the lawyer was that “forever bound” was a spiritual promise like “death do us part” and that property is not a spiritual matter.  That and the canons don’t apply to property, or at least did not until the trust clause was added which was after chartering and incorporation.  The denomination’s lawyer argued that even if the current language of the trust clause was added more recently, language that covered the property was in the canons even at the time of incorporation.  Under questioning the lawyer also acknowledged that an independent church that joined the Episcopal could not, under canon law, leave with their property at a later time.

I wish I could tell you what the denomination’s lawyers got hammered on but I unfortunately had to deal with another item at work and missed  a segment of their arguments.  As I mentioned above there was some sharp questioning about their contention that the denomination should still win under neutral principles.

Update:  On viewing the archived video it is clear that the denomination’s lawyers did take a grilling on neutral principles.  The justices pointed out that the principle of government was an old, Civil War era decision and that neutral principles was the “modern” decision.  The denomination’s lawyer was quick with the response that as recently as a few years ago the body she was arguing in front of, the California Supreme Court, had reaffirmed principle of government for the state.  In addition, she made the “interesting” argument that principle of government was really just a religion specific sub-case of neutral principles because by deferring to the church government a court avoids the entanglement in religion of neutral principles.

While the trust clause issues are familiar on the national level, since that goes back to a U.S. Supreme Court case. The local twist is corporate law and much of the argument, especially with the congregations’ lawyer, was regarding the state donation statute and how, under that statute as I followed the argument, the aspect of property in trust must be explicit not implied like the canons are.

In spite of that last issue, which I had trouble judging, the general impression I got was that the justices seemed more sympathetic to the denomination’s arguments so I would not be surprised to see this decision come out in their favor, not withstanding the justice who sided with neutral principles but was pointing out the “forever bound.”

I must admit that in listening to the arguments I was bothered by the way the argument was made that the property was somehow separate from the ecclesiastical law.  I do realize that this was an argument from a legal perspective, but it just hit me wrong that somehow the property was separated as different in the mission to follow and serve Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

As I mentioned, if I had to bet on this one hour alone I would expect the denomination to win.  However, there are a lot of other parts to this case and it was clear that different justices were focusing on different aspects.  When the decision finally comes down it will be interesting to see what of today’s proceedings is found in it.

Update:  The Episcopal Café article in the comments also has part of an article from a subscription site on California Law where a legal counsel that saw the arguments discusses the session and feels that the court is favoring the denomination, or “over arching church,” in this case.

(As a side note, I had the webcast on a few minutes longer and the following case had some hilarious moments in the arguments.  It was something about parolees needing to inform their parole officer 24 hours in advance if there is a change in status with their pet, any pet.  The most obvious justification was for the officer’s safety if the individual got a
dog, but there were comments about “silent” animals like turtles alerting the parolee to the officer’s arrival and questions how you would notify the officer 24 hours in advance of the death of a goldfish.  On the latter the state conceded that there would need to be “reasonable enforcement.”  But at times I thought a Monty Python sketch was about to break out.)