The Free Exercise of It
Closed mid-August 1993 · On stands late August 1993
The Front
Field Notes: The August Recess
A tally of which national newsmagazine mastheads are running on half-staff this month, and why
The Essay
Free Exercise, After Smith
The Supreme Court's ruling for a Santería church in Hialeah is read here chiefly as the Free Exercise Clause's recovery from an earlier, narrower precedent; the botánica economy the ruling actually concerned is reduced to a single illustrative paragraph
The Foreign File
Prague, a Season After
A short dispatch on a country newly split in two, four years on from its own revolution
The Feature Well
The Anchor's August
A profile of a network news anchor's ritual summer ratings dip, and the affiliate stunts built to fight it
The City
Subject: A furniture piece on the August exodus to the Hamptons jitney stops
The Back
Books: A review essay on the season's religion-and-law titles · Art: A gallery note on devotional objects entering the contemporary market · Film: A dispatch on the year's documentary slate