High Court rules for after-school Bible club

Christian Century, June 20, 2001

The U.S. Supreme Court has declared that an after-school Christian club for elementary-age children has the constitutional right to meet in a public school. In a 6-3 decision, the court ruled that when the Milford Central School in upstate New York excluded the Good News Club, its action amounted to "unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination."

The decision on June 11 over-turned an appellate court decision last year that prevented the club, an affiliate of an international group called Child Evangelism Fellowship, from holding meetings in the school.

The only major church-state separation case to come before the justices this term ended with a majority supporting the club's presence in a public school. The dissenting opinions cited the proselytizing of impressionable children. The club's activities include an opening prayer, religious songs, Bible stories and games, and an opportunity for children to convert to Christianity.

Church-state separationists criticized the ruling, among them People for the American Way, a church-state watchdog organization which filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the school. Ralph Neas, the organization's president, said the decision threatens to open public schools to evangelistic missionaries.

"This decision is a terrible mistake," added Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "The only good news here is that safeguards remain in place to prohibit evangelism during the school day," he said.

The court determined that the club could not be excluded simply because of its religious nature. The school permitted meetings of other community groups, including those that teach morality and character development. "We disagree that something that is `quintessentially religious' or `decidedly religious in nature' cannot also be characterized properly as the teaching of morals and character development from a particular viewpoint," wrote Justice Clarence Thomas for the majority. Joining Thomas in that view were Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy and Stephen Breyer.

The six justices were not persuaded that the First Amendment's establishment clause was violated because young children might think the school is endorsing the club's religious viewpoint when it allows the group to meet on school property.

In his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens said certain kinds of political meetings--such as those involving political recruitment--could be banned by education authorities. "School officials may reasonably believe that evangelical meetings designed to convert children to a particular religious faith pose the same risk," he said, noting that such meetings might create divisiveness.

Justice David Souter, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, argued in another dissenting opinion that the majority "ignores reality" by describing the club as one that teaches morality from a religious viewpoint. "It is beyond question that Good News intends to use the public school premises not for the mere discussion of a subject from a particular, Christian point of view, but for an evangelical service of worship that calls children to commit themselves in an act of Christian conversion," he wrote.

The decision was hailed by Stephen Fournier, a leader of the club. "We were discriminated against, not because we teach morals and values but because we teach morals and values from a Christian perspective," he said.