>Please explain me where I am wrong in terms that use logic […] That’s not really possible, since logic isn’t the basis of law. This is a trap that the enginee

>Please explain me where I am wrong in terms that use logic […] That’s not really possible, since logic isn’t the basis of law. This is a trap that the engineering-minded seem to fall into frequently when examining the law: There is more to American jurisprudence than the literal text of the Bill of Rights. It’s not particularly difficult to see where this would fall apart, even. Imagine a religion which requires its adherents to kill one person per year. A person with the required “sincerely held beliefs” who follows this religion would be allowed to kill with impunity under a literal examination of the first amendment. (Or, maybe not. Since we’re looking only at the BoR, I guess we’re pretending there’s no incorporation in this hypothetical?) Rather than try to keep rewriting that one rule to greater and greater, more and more unwieldy specificity – don’t forget that the US Constitution is difficult to amend on purpose – the entire body of law applies. Given the prominence of the first amendment, there are likely more cases relating to it than one could conceivably read in order, beginning to end. Employment Division v. Smith [1] probably relates most directly to your question. (But do remember when you read it that incorporation is a real thing that exists. Don’t let it distract that it wasn’t federal action.) [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Division_v._Smith https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Division_v._Smith