Reading Room Document

Permissible Accommodation of Sacred Sites

The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment does not bar either an Executive Order that requires the accommodation of ceremonial use of sites on federal land that are sacred to federally recognized Indian tribes or a National Park Service regulation, designed to implement that Order, that prohibits the issuance of commercial climbing licenses at one such site during a period of religious significance. The OLC does not provide release dates for its opinions, so the release date listed is the date on which the opinion was authored. The original opinion is available at www.justice.gov/file/19956/download.

September 18, 1996