Social and Religious Status Quo Act
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The Social and Religious Status Quo Act of 1947, also referred to as the Status Quo or SRSQA, was a high-profile and controversial socio-religious communal arrangement bill that passed the Imperial Senate in May 1947 with President Matthew Rabin's backing which created the so-called "Status Quo" in Belhavia on religious-secular matters.
Background
The religious status quo, agreed to by President Matthew Rabin in 1947 in the face of a left-wing, secularist, anti-religious majority in the post-Galarian Provisional Assembly under the Provisional Government with the Orthodox religious establishment, is an agreement on the role that Judaism would play in Belhavia's government and the judicial system in the wake of the Galarian autocracy.
Religious authorities in Belhavia, already powerful for centuries, were further granted increased social and political power under Supreme Autocrat Zachary Galarian's Autocracy government (1940-45). In these years, certain unscrupulous rabbis and rabbinical courts instituted rigorous decrees, abused grants of power and local funds, and other controversies. By 1945, there was a crisis in confidence of the rabbinical leadership to faithfully and piously lead the religious Belhavian Jewish world.
With Galarian's fall in Stein's Midnight Mutiny and installation of government-in-exile leader Matthew Rabin as the new President of a provisional regime, these doubts started to perculate into the Provisional Assembly's new social debates. Between 1945-46, Rabin's cautious centrism dominated Assembly politics and legislation, but the 77th Senate was dominated by a liberal left majority with strong secularist and radical leftist sentiments that often were antireligious.
The secularist left in the Assembly commanded a 36-34 margin, according to roll call votes, personal anecdotes, and whip votes early in 1947. The anti-religious bloc was cross-party, but made entirely of the United Left caucus (5) and most of Rabin's fellow Liberal Democrats (20 of 29), along with 5 of 6 independents and even 6 of the center-right Federalists. Only the National Patriotic Union caucus had no supporters of the bloc.
Using the allegations and known abuses by some rabbis under Galarian, this bloc pushed for a constitutional re-write to end the anchor of religious law at the heart of the 1812 Constitution. Furthermore, they wanted to pass a raft of bills promoting secularization of Belhavian law and overturn laws and regulations with religious inspiration.
Legislation
Lobbying and campaign
Bill passage
Overview of provisions
- Shabbos (the Jewish Sabbath): The Jewish nation's day of rest would be that of Torahic and Talmudic law, between sunset on Friday and nightfall on Saturday.
- Kashrus (Jewish dietary laws regarding food, cooking, and eating): Kitchens in the Jewish nation's official institutions would keep kosher as defined by the authorities of Orthodox Judaism, but privately each individual would be free to choose how to observe these rules, if at all, in their homes, offices, etc.
- Family laws (marriage, etc.): A single judicial system would be preserved for the purpose of marriage and divorce, with these being conducted in rabbinical courts for Jews and by the relevant religious authorities for people of other faiths, as was the case before; there would be no civil marriage.
- Education: Full autonomy to the different Jewish denominations, while stipulating the minimum standards in fields such as the Hebrew language, Jewish history, science, etc.