Prince v. Massachusetts - 321 U.S. 158, 64 S. Ct. 438 (1944)

Rule:

The custody, care and nurture of the child reside first in the parents, whose primary function and freedom include preparation for obligations the State can neither supply nor hinder. There is a private realm of family life which the State cannot enter. But the family itself is not beyond regulation in the public interest, as against a claim of religious liberty. And neither rights of religion nor rights of parenthood are beyond limitation. Acting to guard the general interest in youth's well-being, the State as parens patriae may restrict the parent's control by requiring school attendance, regulating or prohibiting the child's labor, and in many other ways. Its authority is not nullified merely because the parent grounds his claim to control the child's course of conduct on religion or conscience. Thus, he cannot claim freedom from compulsory vaccination for the child more than for himself on religious grounds. The right to practice religion freely does not include liberty to expose the community or the child to communicable disease or the latter to ill health or death. The State has a wide range of power for limiting parental freedom and authority in things affecting the child's welfare; and that this includes, to some extent, matters of conscience and religious conviction. 

Facts:

Sarah Prince was convicted of violating the state child labor laws under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 149, §§ 80, 81 for allowing her child to engage in street preaching and selling religious pamphlets. She appealed, arguing that Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 149, §§ 80 and 81 contravened U.S. Const. amend. XIV by denying her freedom of religion and equal protection of the laws. 

Issue:

Were the state child labor laws constitutional?

Answer:

Yes.

Conclusion:

The Supreme Court of the United States affirmed Prince's conviction for violating the state child labor laws for engaging her child in street preaching. The Court held that the State had greater authority to control the acts of children and, in particular, to protect children against the dangers of preaching on a public road. The Court found that there were dangers in street preaching and selling the religious materials because that was not the primary purpose of the road. The Court noted that the State's authority over children's activities was broader than over like actions of adults. The Court further noted that parents could make martyrs out of themselves but not out of their children. The Court also noted that the street was not the Jehovah's Witnesses' church because the public highways were not their religious property merely by their assertion. There was no denial of equal protection in excluding their children from doing on the public highways what no other children could do. The Court noted that its ruling was restricted to the facts of the case.