FAYETTEVILLE — School officials in Cumberland and Harnett counties who have banned organizations from offering Bibles to elementary students may want to beef up their studies of Constitutional case law and reconsider their decisions. Posted on 11/29/2007 12:36:32 PM PST by Sopater
FAYETTEVILLE — School officials in Cumberland and Harnett counties who have banned organizations from offering Bibles to elementary students may want to beef up their studies of Constitutional case law and reconsider their decisions.
"In their efforts to appease the American Civil Liberties Union, these eastern North Carolina school systems are violating citizens' First Amendment rights to free speech and failing to acknowledge a 2001 Supreme Court ruling," said Christian Action League Executive Director Rev. Mark Creech.
The Cumberland County Public Schools notified elementary principals Nov. 19 to prohibit Bibles or other "poselytizing texts" from being handed out, citing a 1998 federal case (Peck v. the Upshur County Board of Education). The board's decision followed a nearly identical ruling by the adjacent Harnett County Schools earlier in November. Both were in response to legal threats from the ACLU, which reported complaints about Bibles being made available for students by The Gideons International, an evangelistic group known for its Scripture sharing efforts.
Both boards cited fears that the Gideon Bibles (actually, New Testaments which are typically placed on tables in a classroom for students who may choose to pick one up) would be misconstrued as the school's endorsement of a specific religion and violate the Establishment Clause.
The Alliance Defense Fund sent a letter Nov. 20 advising Cumberland County Schools Superintendent William C. Harrison that his administration did not need to prohibit outside groups from leaving Bibles at its elementary school campuses and that the school system is being "wrongly accused" by the ACLU.
"Bibles are not second-class to other types of written materials left for students to read voluntarily. There's nothing unconstitutional about outside groups leaving Bibles at public schools so long as the schools do not prohibit other groups from leaving their literature as well," wrorte ADF Senior Legal Counsel David Cortman in the letter.
Ironically the Peck ruling is, in part, the basis for the ADF's contention that the Bible distribution is perfectly legal. ("We hold, accordingly, that the state does not violate the Establishment Clause when it permits private entities to passively offer the Bible or other religious material to secondary school students ... pursuant to a policy of allowing private religious and nonreligious speech in its public schools.")
The ADF letter admits that the Peck ruling did raise some question about the impressionability of elementary age students but informs the school system of a clarifying ruling three years later from the U.S. Supreme Court. In Good News Club v. Milford Central School, the high court ruled that an outside group's religious activity cannot be prohibited "on the basis of what the youngest members of the audience might misperceive."
The ACLU had claimed that students might interpret the availability of the Bibles by an outside group as an endorsement of religion by the school, and education officials refused to stand up for free speech.
"If we tried to fight it we would have to be ready to take the case all the way to the United States Supreme Court, and that is not something I recommeded," Harnett County Schools attorney Duncan McCormick told The Daily Record in Dunn according to a Nov. 1 article.
While education officials cowered in the face of the ACLU complaint, the ADF is confident enough in its legal position to offer to represent Cumberland County Schools should the district resume allowing the distribution of Bibles and is then challenged in court by the ACLU or any other organization.
According to the Nov. 20 Fayetteville Observer, Cumberland County Schools' attorney David Phillips had initially said he believed the Peck ruling allowed for outside groups to make Bibles available to students. But he changed his mind a week later.
Creech and the Christian Action League hope to see both county school boards change their minds once again after hearing from the Alliance Defense Fund and from Christian constituents who are speaking out in favor of Bible distribution.
What happened to freedom of religion? The left is taking away our 2nd amendment rights, now they’re after the first.
In Saudi Arabia, Bibles are confiscated as well. The left takes another step closer to Shariah-fying our nation...
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