New York AG Spitzer Files Brief Supporting Hindu Temple SocietyJul 11, 2005 The Becket Fund Applauds Action On June 30, 2005, Eliot Spitzer, the Attorney General for the State of New York, filed a brief as Statutory Intervenor in the Hindu Temple Society of North America's case defending itself from a hostile takeover in New York State Court. This noteworthy step was taken after years of litigation trying to wrest religious control of the Temple away from its Trustees.
The Becket Fund is defending the Temple, the nation's oldest and most influential Hindu temple, and its Trustees in litigation before the New York federal and state courts. The Temple, located in Borough of Queens in New York City, has been the target of a hostile takeover attempt by six insurgents, some of whom rarely if ever attend the Temple. In response to the hostile takeover attempt, trial court judge Justice Joseph G. Golia and his appointed referee, Long Island lawyer Anthony J. Piacentini, are forcibly restructuring the Temple, imposing a membership requirement (allowing anyone with $5 to join) and forcing elections upon it. Instead of allowing the Temple to govern itself in the traditional Hindu religious manner, the court has been compelling the Temple to adopt a congregational structure.
In his Brief, the Attorney General acknowledges that the N.Y. courts' decisions in this matter have been erroneous: "[T]he Attorney General agrees with the Acting Board that as a matter of statutory interpretation, an Article 9 "free church" like the Society is governed by a self-perpetuating Board of Trustees. Thus, any bylaws supposedly adopted by an Article 9 religious corporation that authorize the election of a Board by the church's membership are null and void as a matter of law, . . . ."
Such an interpretation is necessary, as the Attorney General argues, to "avoid getting ensnared in a complicated constitutional thicket." The Temple agrees, having consistently maintained that imposing undesired membership and elections upon it violates the "Church Autonomy" doctrine of the First Amendment.
This Brief directly contradicts the position of the Temple's opponents in this litigation, as well as the decision by the New York Supreme Court's Appellate Division, which held that the Temple must be governed by a "membership" that it has never recognized, instead of the Trustee-based governance it has always enjoyed. "The Attorney General argues that the prior mistaken decision of the New York appellate court can be reversed," stated Becket Fund Of Counsel Roman P. Storzer, "and it certainly should to avoid becoming the first constitutional decision in this Nation's history permitting the government to decide how religious institutions will be run."
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