Edition: U.S. / Global

Saying A.A. Is Religious, Court Lets Inmate Skip It

Published: June 12, 1996

Ruling that Alcoholics Anonymous ''engages in religious activity and religious proselytization,'' New York State's highest court declared yesterday that state prison officials were wrong to penalize an inmate who stopped attending self-help meetings based on the organization's teachings because he said he was an atheist or an agnostic.

The court ordered prison officials not to tie the man's eligibility for a family reunion program to his refusal to join in the sessions, based on Alcoholics Anonymous, at Shawangunk state prison in Ulster County.

Alcohol and drug treatment programs are fixtures in the state's 69 prisons: 15,000 inmates, or two in nine, go through substance-abuse rehabilitation every year. About a third of the participants had been sent to prison for drug convictions, but another 40 percent have other drug-related problems: they committed a burglary so they could fence the goods they stole for cash for drugs, for example. Or they failed the drug test inmates are given when they arrive.

But the high court, in a 5-to-2 ruling, said that state prison officials violated the constitutional rights of the inmate who brought the case, David Griffin, a former heroin addict who complained that he found the Alcoholics Anonymous teachings objectionable because of agnostic or atheistic views he has held since the 1950's. An atheist denies the existence of God; an agnostic holds that the human mind cannot know whether there is a God. The court said Mr. Griffin had presented evidence that he had held both views at certain times.

''A fair reading of the fundamental A.A. doctrinal writings discloses that their dominant theme is unequivocally religious,'' the court said. ''Adherence to the A.A. fellowship entails engagement in religious activity and religious proselytization.''

The Pataki administration, which has lashed out at judges whom it considers soft on crime, immediately attacked the Court of Appeals. ''The ruling defies common sense,'' the State Attorney General, Dennis C. Vacco, said. ''This ruling erodes the authority of corrections officials to set certain requirements in order for inmates to enjoy their prison perks -- in this case, conjugal visits by a convicted pimp with a history of drug abuse.''

Mr. Vacco said he was considering whether to appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

Alcoholics Anonymous would not say whether it saw itself as a religious organization. A spokeswoman in Manhattan, who insisted that her name not be printed because she is also an A.A. member, said the group ''has always refrained from commenting on outside issues.''

''We do not want to take any stand that might deny an alcoholic A.A. as a resource,'' she said. ''We're nonprofessionals who meet together to share our personal experience, strength and hope.''

Other groups that seek to help people with alcohol and drug problems took issue with the ruling.

''I think it's a classic case of throwing the baby out with the bath water,'' said Abukarriem Shabazz, the president of the New York State Association of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Treatment Providers, which represents 130 member organizations and 20 coalitions.

''The bad situation was not the A.A.; that's the baby,'' he said. ''The bath water was the punitiveness because the person did not participate. Change that. But you put people's sobriety and recovery at risk if you remove a significant, important support mechanism.''

But Norman Siegel, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, called the decision ''constitutionally correct.''

''It's important that the court is recognizing the fundamental principle that Government can't force people to participate in religious activities that violate their own tenets,'' he said. ''Also, there's a sense more and more that whoever goes to jail forfeits all constitutional rights. The court is saying you don't.''

The Alcohol and Substance Abuse Treatment program Mr. Griffin dropped out of was run by counselors who are full-time state employees, not, for example, volunteers from Alcoholics Anonymous, whose programs are often based at local churches. But he stated that at a hearing with officials at Shawangunk, ''both staff and inmate representatives acknowledged that the A.S.A.T. program at the facility was a religious program.''

Noting that God is mentioned in five of the 12 steps that are the cornerstone of the Alcoholics Anonymous program, the Court of Appeals said the Appellate Division had wrongly applied ''too narrow a concept of religion or religious activity.'' The high court said that Alcoholics Anonymous meetings were ''heavily laced with at least general religious content.''

But the majority, in a decision written by Judge Howard A. Levine, said that it did not mean to denigrate the Alcoholics Anonymous approach to fighting addiction. Nor, the decision said, should the prison system scrap drug- and alcohol-abuse treatment programs if they are offered voluntarily.

Judges Joseph W. Bellacosa and Carmen B. Ciparick dissented from the ruling.

Richard Kohler, a former New York City corrections commissioner who is now a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, agreed that the case turned on First Amendment issues. He said that other courts had concluded that corrections officials had to raise legitimate concerns if they infringed inmates' constitutional rights -- for example, citing security concerns as a reason for refusing to let inmates gather for prayer services on Friday, when they are scheduled for a work detail.

''It's very difficult for the state to show there is a legitimate state interest in forcing someone into a rehab program when there's no evidence it works in the first place,'' he said.