Virginia Laws Affecting Churches - Restated

Twenty-five years ago, the late William T. Muse, then Dean of the University of Richmond School of Law, observed that although there was considerable law in Virginia relating to churches this law was widely scattered throughout the statutes and the cases. To remedy this state of affairs, Dean Muse wrote a concise but complete summary of these laws. In the quarter-century that has elapsed since Dean Muse's article was published, Virginia has adopted a new constitution, many church-related statutes have been enacted and a number of church-related cases have been decided, some of which have refined established principles and others of which have created or recognized new principles. The natural consequence of the foregoing activity has been to re-establish the need that prompted Dean Muse to write in the first instance.

Accordingly, the following is offered to the profession, in memory of the scholar and friend who authored the original, as a contemporary restatement of Virginia laws affecting churches.