Court: NYC can ban church service in public school

In the latest chapter of a long-running legal fight over separation of church and state, a federal appeals court again ruled on Thursday that New York City school officials can ban a small Christian congregation from holding weekend services in a grade school.

The 2^nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that a city Department of Education policy that prohibits church services in public schools is constitutional. The policy allows religious and other community organizations to use classrooms and other facilities for after-hours programs, but denies access to those seeking to use the space as a “house of worship.” …

Gonna be headed to SCOTUS. This ruling is in opposition to established law since it establishes an unequal policy when other organizations are given access to public buildings.

Such unequal policies amount to “viewpoint discrimination” and are per se unconstitutional. Good News Club v. Milford Cent. Sch., 533 U.S. 98 (2001); Rosenberger v. Rector & Visitors of Univ. of Virginia, 515 U.S. 819, 828-29 (1995); Lamb’s Chapel v. Ctr. Moriches Union Free Sch. Dist., 508 U.S. 384 (1993).

In Lamb’s Chapel, argued by Jay Sekulow as lead counsel, a unanimous Supreme Court held that the First Amendment requires religious groups to be treated equally with other groups that use public facilities. The court upheld two principles. First, denying religious organizations equal access to, and use of, public facilities for speech activities violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. Second, it is not a violation of the Establishment Clause (what some people mistakenly call “separation of church and state”) for a school to treat religious organizations equally with other organizations. These principles apply to all public facilities, not just school facilities, which have been opened for use by community organizations.

ACLJ

How pitifully ignorant are these judges--of America's founding history and of the ideas of liberty which were strongly held and advocated by the man (Jefferson) who authored the Declaration of Independence, with its recognition of a "Creator," of "Divine Providence," and of "Supreme judge of the world," as well as his letter to the Baptists--whose phrase about the "wall of separation" they love to twist and cite as the basis of their prejudice and tyranny against religious expression in the public square!

Perhaps these constitutionally illiterate judges might wish to read this portion of Thomas Jefferson's letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper:

"In our village of Charlottesville, there is a good degree of religion, with a small spice only of fanaticism. We have four sects, but without either church or meeting-house. . . .
. . . The court-house is the common temple, one Sunday in the month to each. Here, Episcopalian and Presbyterian, Methodist and Baptist, meet together, join in hymning their Maker, listen with attention and devotion to each others' preachers, and all mix in society with perfect harmony.
". . . .In our university you know there is no Professorship of Divinity. A handle has been made of this, to disseminate an idea that this is an institution, not merely of no religion, but against all religion. Occasion was taken at the last meeting of the Visitors, to bring forward an idea that might silence this calumny, which weighed on the minds of some honest friends to the institution. In our annual report to the legislature, after stating the constitutional reasons against a public establishment of any religious instruction, we suggest the expediency of encouraging the different religious sects to establish, each for itself, a professorship of their own tenets, on the confines of the university, so near as that their students may attend the lectures there, and have the free use of our library, and every other accommodation we can give them; preserving, however, their independence of us and of each other. This fills the chasm objected to ours, as a defect in an institution professing to give instruction in all useful sciences. I think the invitation will be accepted, by some sects from candid intentions, and by others from jealousy and rivalship. And by bringing the sects together, and mixing them with the mass of other students, we shall soften their asperities, liberalize and neutralize their prejudices, and make the general religion a religion of peace, reason, and morality." - Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper

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