Posted on 09/30/2020 8:23:35 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
An atheist group has filed a brief in support of a lawsuit against a Georgia college that punished a Christian student for preaching outside of a limited free speech zone on campus.
The American Humanist Association filed an amicus brief on Tuesday in the case of Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, which will be argued before the United States Supreme Court.
The Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative law firm, filed suit against George Gwinnett College for its treatment of Christian student Chike Uzuegbunam.
Although the school has changed their policy on free speech and expression since stopping Uzuegbunam from preaching, they have refused to accept any penalty for their past actions.
In their amicus brief, the AHA noted that while they and the ADF fall on opposite sides of the political spectrum, they believe that Gwinnett owes damages for their past policy.
“On the chopping block is a time-honored remedy essential to vindicating the most important rights in our country. Religious freedom—the cornerstone of our democracy—could become an empty promise without nominal damages,” read the summary of the AHA brief.
“Religion Clause violations rarely produce actual damages and often stem from easily-mootable laws. Taking away from citizens the only remedy available in many such cases jeopardizes the rule of law itself.”
AHA Executive Director Roy Speckhardt said in a statement released Tuesday that he believes people must “be given every chance to preserve their First Amendment rights.”
“While the AHA and ADF may approach the Constitution from different angles, at the very least we agree that First Amendment litigation and the associated rights are essential to our democracy,” he stated.
In July 2016, while a student at Gwinnett, school officials stopped Uzuegbunam on multiple occasions from distributing Christian literature at an outdoor plaza space on campus.
According to official school policy at the time, Uzuegbunam could only distribute literature or speak about his beliefs at two predetermined free speech zones on campus.
In response, ADF filed a legal action on behalf of Uzuegbunam and another student named Joseph Bradford against the college, accusing them of violating their rights.
In 2017, Gwinnett amended their policies regarding speech and expression, arguing that the complaint against them by Uzuegbunam and Bradford had become moot.
A district court ruled in favor of Gwinnett on the claim that the complaint was moot and a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld its ruling last year.
In a Per Curiam decision released in July of last year, the panel concluded that the students’ complaint “did not include a well-pled request for compensatory damages, in part because it failed to allege any concrete injuries arising from the allegedly unconstitutional conduct of the GGC officials.”
ADF opted to appeal the panel decision and in July, the Supreme Court agreed to hear oral arguments in the case.
Never thought I’d see the day.
“two predetermined free speech zones on campus.”
There should only be one free speech zone on a campus.
This shouldn’t be a surprise. An Army chaplin told us that all faiths-including atheist, support one another by supporting the First Amendment. If the government starts shutting down one, they can shut down anyone.
>>Never thought I’d see the day.
why? classical atheists have always supported freedom of religion, they just don’t want to be coerced into participating. It was only after leftists took over atheist groups that they became hostile to Christians.
Here’s a story I didn’t expect to see today.
Good for them. Atheism isn’t a lack of belief. It is itself a belief system and therefore vulnerable to the same censorship and violations of individual rights as any. Those who try to shut down expression of others’ belief are simply Fascists.
“Whoever lives for the sake of combating an enemy has an interest in the enemy’s staying alive” - Nietzche
Gotta keep the Christians around or the atheists have nobody to act superior to.
Only in 2020!!! I guess...2020 is crazy...
Even back then, it was speculated that the ACLU's Skokie Nazis lawsuit was intended to drive Jews out of the ACLU and bring in some new blood that didn't support 1st Amendment protection so much as it supported, uh, something else. I used to think that was a little paranoid, but...
Free speech and the right to redress are both 1st Amendment rights.
Free speech being halted on a college campus, or hamstrung to a phyzical zone, is unconstitutional, regardless of what the speaker states in his language.
Refusal to admit redress bodes not well.
Free speech, whether athiest, spiritual, or religious, is still free speech, and shall not be muzzled.
Atheists have the same right to disbelieve as believers have to believe. And each has the right to ignore the other.
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