This week a federal appeals court in California ruled against a public school math teacher who claimed his right to free speech had been violated by his employer.� The employer is the Poway Unified School District of San Diego, which ordered the math teacher to remove some banners with religious messages from his classroom.
The very large banners displayed messages such as "In God We Trust," "One Nation Under God," "God Bless America," and "God Shed His Grace On Thee,"which the teacher said were� about America's religious heritage (and this has to do with mathematics, how?). To complicate matters, the school district had allowed a science teacher to display Tibetan Buddhist prayer flags in her classroom. This discrepancy allegedly showed a pattern of hostility toward "Judeo-Christian" religion and favoritism to other religions.
Predictably, a Christian newsletter headlined its story about the ruling "Buddha's fine, God is not." This reaction points to a long standing, and willful, refusal to understand the First Amendment. And it's not that hard to understand.
The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution begins, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." There are two clauses there, the "establishment" clause and the "free exercise" clause. It's the establishment clause that is most willfully misunderstood.
"Establishment," in the jargon of 18th century British common law, refers to the practice of adopting an official national religion. For example, for a long time the Catholic Church was the established religion of most European countries. Established religions enjoy the benefit of the government's financial support, meaning they get tax money to build churches and pay priests. The government may also promote that religion's prayers and practices or require citizens to take part in its rituals.
Europe suffered generations of religious warfare as various factions attempted to replace kings and queens who favored another religion with a monarch who favored theirs. By preventing the federal government from establishing religion, the authors of the Constitution hoped to discourage religious factions from starting new religious wars here. They also wanted to insure that a large religious faction that gained a majority of votes in Congress could not write laws telling Americans how to pray and worship.
The First Amendment itself speaks only to the federal government. It did not prohibit state governments from establishing religions, and for a time some of them did. However, the 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868, says that "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Eventually a series of Supreme Court decisions interpreted the 14th Amendment to mean that state governments may not deprive citizens of rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments), either.
So, way back in 1947, the Supreme Court ruled in Everson v. Board of Education that public school districts -- which receive state tax money and which are partly administered by state governments -- could not use the taxpayer's money for religious instruction or to promote religious beliefs. However, school districts could choose to support parochial school students by, for example, subsidizing buses to and from church-run schools. Although the Everson ruling has been tweaked a bit over the years, that's pretty much where the Court still stands.
Because public school teachers are public employees, they may not take advantage of their access to children to try to indoctrinate children in any religious belief. Put another way --
Public schools -- meaning teachers, administrators, school board members -- may not try to influence the religious beliefs and practices of students.
However, that doesn't mean religion is banned from school. If some students organize a prayer circle or religious study group, the Supreme Court says the school administration must allow this as long as it doesn't interfere with classes. However, teachers may not recruit students into a prayer circle or religious study group, and they may not lead prayers in classrooms, because that would amount to� the government influencing the religious beliefs and practices of students.
I mean, is this really that hard to understand? If you are confused please speak up, but I don't see this as rocket science.
Further, all mention of religion does not have to be stricken from the curriculum. Students may be taught about religion's place in history and culture in lessons about history and culture. Religious texts, including the Bible, may be studied as literature. Students may be taught about the world's religions in the context of studying the world's civilizations. But there is a difference between teaching, say, something about Hinduism in a lesson on India and trying to persuade children to be Hindus.
Again, as long as the teacher is not trying to influence the students' personal religious beliefs or opinions, including something about religion in a lesson usually is not a problem, although it would be hard to fit into a math class.
I have read the appeals court decision, and it says the science teacher with the Tibetan prayer flags brought the flags to school as part of a lesson about the Himalayas. Although one flag has a small picture of the Buddha, the teacher said she did not know if the flags had any religious significance. She said she had been told they represent the elements. Further,
She explained that she uses the flags as part of her discussion of fossils found on and near Mount Everest because the flags are authentic--bought in Nepal near Mount Everest--and are typically purchased by climbers to put "at the top of Mount Everest when they reach the peak." She described how she typically shows a video of scientists taking cores samples on Everest and uses the flags to further stimulate the interest of her students. She said that the flags "represent climbing a mountain" and accomplishing "an amazing goal."
So, while associating Tibetan prayer flags with a lesson on fossils may be a stretch, it doesn't sound as if the teacher was using the flags to indoctrinate kids to become little lamas. She was basically just using them as pretty shiny things to get the kids' attention. I assume any writing on the flags would be in Tibetan, so it is doubtful any of the students could read them.
The math teacher sued the school for violating his right to free speech. But, the Court said, the teacher is perfectly free to express his opinions on religion on sidewalks, in parks, in chat rooms, at his own dinner table, and in countless other locations. However, as a public school employee there are limits to what he can say in a classroom to children. The school district was within its authority to tell him to take down the banners.
Again, we go over and over and over this here in the U.S., and every time a court orders some teacher or administrator to stop trying to indoctrinate children with personal religious beliefs, religious people here start screaming about how God has been thrown out of classrooms and their rights are being violated. Just read some of the comments at BeliefNet.
To me, the reasons for the establishment clause are clear, and the differences between violating it and not violating it are not that fuzzy. Yet a large part of the American public will not understand this, and I think it's because they don't want to.
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