“Justificatory liberalism” holds that citizens should refrain from advocating in favor of coercive policies for which they can only offer a religious justification. Christopher Eberle, a prominent critic of this view, calls this the “doctrine of restraint.” Eberle argues that the restraint requirement unfairly burdens religious citizens by prohibiting them from acting on their religious commitments in the public sphere. As an alternative he offers what he calls the “ideal of conscientious engagement” which does not require restraint. In this paper I contend that Eberle’s conscientious engagement standard fails to provide an adequate alternative to the “doctrine of restraint.” Using the current controversy over public funding for abortion as an example, I argue that, under the “ideal of conscientious engagement,” it is legitimate for the state to coerce religious citizens into violating their core moral commitments. Accordingly, this standard puts citizens’ religious freedom at serious risk.
Key words: religious tolerance, liberalism, public reason, abortion, Rawls, Eberle.
