Does Mandatory AA/NA Violate the First Amendment?

The First Amendment says, in part, that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . . ." There are two religion clauses in the amendment, the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause. Lately I've been getting a lot of questions about the Free Exercise Clause in relation to G.S. 14-208.18, the law that's preventing some sex offenders from attending church. Thinking about that issue reminded me of a question I was asked about the Establishment Clause: does it violate the Establishment Clause to require a probationer to attend Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous? Three federal circuit courts have held that coerced participation in 12-step programs like AA and NA violates the First Amendment. In Kerr v. Ferry, 95 F.3d 472 (7th Cir. 1996), the Seventh Circuit held that requiring an inmate to attend NA meetings or risk suffering adverse effects for parole eligibility violated the Establishment Clause. The Second Circuit reached a similar conclusion in Warner v. Orange County Department of Probation, 115 F.3d 1068 (2d Cir. 1997), striking a probation condition requiring attendance at AA meetings. And most recently the Ninth Circuit determined that a parolee's First Amendment rights were violated when his parole officer forced him to attend 12-step meetings as a condition of his parole. Inouye v. Kemna, 504 F.3d 705 (9th Cir. 2007). In the latter two cases the courts found the law sufficiently clearly established to abrogate the officers' qualified immunity. Qualified immunity shields government [...]