United States v. Seeger

United States v. Seeger, 380 U.S. 163 (1965), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that the exemption from the military draft for conscientious objectors could be reserved not only for those professing conformity with the moral directives of a supreme being but also for those whose views on war derived from a "sincere and meaningful belief which occupies in the life of its possessor a place parallel to that filled by the God of those" who had routinely gotten the exemption.[1]

United States v. Seeger
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued November 16–17, 1964 Decided March 8, 1965
Full case name	United States v. Daniel Andrew Seeger; United States v. Arno Sascha Jakobson; Forest Britt Peter v. United States
Citations	380 U.S. 163 (more) 85 S. Ct. 850; 13 L. Ed. 2d 733; 1965 U.S. LEXIS 1666
Case history
Prior	United States v. Seeger, 216 F. Supp. 516 (S.D.N.Y. 1963); reversed, 326 F.2d 846 (2d Cir. 1964); cert. granted, 377 U.S. 922 (1964). United States v. Jakobson, 325 F.2d 409 (2d Cir. 1963); cert. granted, 377 U.S. 922 (1964). Peter v. United States, 324 F.2d 173 (9th Cir. 1963); cert. granted, 377 U.S. 922 (1964).
Court membership
Chief Justice Earl Warren Associate Justices Hugo Black · William O. Douglas Tom C. Clark · John M. Harlan II William J. Brennan Jr. · Potter Stewart Byron White · Arthur Goldberg
Case opinions
Majority	Clark, joined by Warren, Black, Harlan, Brennan, Stewart, White, Goldberg
Concurrence	Douglas

The case resolved, on diverse but related grounds, three cases, each involving conviction for failure to accept induction into the armed forces on the part of someone who sought conscientious-objector status without "belong[ing] to an orthodox religious sect". The accused, whose cases were otherwise unrelated, were Arno Sascha Jakobson, Forest Britt Peter, and Daniel Andrew Seeger; it was Seeger's case that gave its name to the multi-case decision. Archibald Cox, then Solicitor General, argued for the United States in every case.[1]