Many different constitutional precedents could be weighed in support of Margaret and her mother who filed the petition. If this case ended up going to court, before it was resolved internally, the court would rule that student to student literature exchange is within the confines of First Amendment protections unlike teacher to student religious literature exchange. If a teacher were to coerce students into adopting or supporting a specific religion, then the court would have a problem, but giving an invitation is not a demand to attend but rather Margaret being a supporter of her Church’s events, and as a first grader, she garners more leeway in First Amendment's protections than adults. This case represents a violation of the first grader's rights under the Equal Access Act (1984) that states “cannot discriminate against student extracurriculars based on religious, political, philosophical, or other content of the speech at student-run events.
These church events are outside the confines of school and should be equated to similar treatment as if the students were passing out invitations for a celebration which cannot be targeted even though it is religious in nature, because it is not supported nor funded by the school. The policy of the school targeted religious speech specifically for Christians, and were morally obligated to overturn their ruling which they rightfully did.
The school was wise to permit Margaret and other students to pass out invitations to church events such as Easter or else they would have faced a legal setback in court as students free speech rights are far more protected than state-employed teachers. On top of that was the issue that the school never even had a direct policy in place to ban students from passing out flyers to church-sponsored events which would thus make it illegal to ban them even if the constitution permitted that behavior of discriminating against the church and the students attempt to promote it. The Establishment Clause here is not violated as students are guaranteed rights to freely practice their religion even if that be in public school because they are not actors of the state and their actions towards religious events do not connote a state sponsorship of religion.
This case is almost identical to a lower court ruling K.A v Pocono Mountain School District in which a Pennsylvania court permitted a school girl from passing out invites to occasions of religious nature as the girl passed the Tinker test. The Tinker Test extended many First Amendment privileges to public school students and was used to expand from a previous ruling of West Virginia v Barnette which protected symbolic speech made by students first guaranteed back in 1919 in Stromberg v California. Justice Fortas wrote in Tinker that to ban the speech the school must “base it upon an urgent wish to avoid the controversy which might result from the expression.”
There wasn’t any urgency to ban the invitations or speech of the student because it was a welcoming event that just so happened to be religious. The issue would be greater if the girl refused to include religious minorities on the invite list, but the inclusive nature of the invites means there was no coercive nature to attend simply attempt to spread gospel. Also since the subject of the invites to church events were meant for youth they just so happened to be social gathering in which the main goal was to make new friends in the least coercive nature possible. The nonexistent law that the school had in penalizing Margaret for her invites would have failed the Tinker Test because there is no substantial risk to safety or wellbeing by the passing out of invites without the expectation of full attendance.
Personally, Margaret is well within her rights to try and pass out invites for her church-sponsored events as long as she does it without monetary benefit. Here the church does not hold direct influence over her, and there is no attempt at the church trying to coercive members to join as the events are explicitly focused on children and not on adult worshipping of a higher power. To make matters worse was the school had no written law down preventing religiously minded invites to be passed out in school which could have possibly given them the ability to take this to court but they were wise to prevent this from escalating. There is nothing malicious nor coercive, merely a young child trying to spread the gospel which has been protected by the court as long as it is not coercive or degrading which the school might then have interest in intervening. It is a minor accommodation the school should have permitted as students have rights to exercise their religion as they are not actors of the state and should not be treated as such.
6 comments:
Margaret seems to be within her rights considering there is no direct support of the school or mandate for other students to accept these invitations or to deny the right for any student to pass out invitations for other religious or secular events. There also seems to be no evidence of coercion from the church to proselytize at school through Margaret. I do wonder how much social pressure plays into the school's decision to not allow this practice. I can see a secular purpose for the school to forbid any invitation distribution of any kind on school grounds, as this could lead to children feeling left out from birthday parties and the like. However, since this rule did not exist and the school directly targeted religious invitations, the school was violating her religious rights. If this case had been one involving a teacher handing out invitations to attend church to students, I think the school would be allowed to stop this practice since children are taught to listen to what their teachers tell them and could arguably be coerced by an employee of the state to attend church.
I agree that Margaret is within her rights for passing out these invitations especially considering there is no type of monetary support coming from the school for doing so, and she is not forcing anyone to accept and/or attend. Margaret is a student, not a leader, and therefore it is not highly likely that students that were not planning on partaking in this religious event will once they get the invite. Also,. the school is required to allow Margaret to pass out these invitations if they allow invitations for secular events or invitations to other religious events to be passed out. But, that being said, my school did not allow any sort of invitation to be passed out, primarily for inclusivity reasons. Seeing that this rule does not apply to this school, Margaret should be allowed to pass out these invitations.
I agree with your stance. She is simply sending out invitations for an Easter mass to all students. She is not coercing any students, nor is she excluding any students from receiving an invite. It appears, her intent is to attempt to get classmates to experience an Easter celebration at her church hoping, they will either come back or she will make a friend. With no coercive intent, the school has no right to impede on her free speech rights. To make matters worse, they had no policy in place that prevented anyone from sending out invites, regarding religion. A rational solution would be to prevent any sort of invitations to be handed out by students because of inclusivity reasons, or it distracts students from schoolwork.
Highlighting the fact that students are allowed to pass out invitations to celebrate gatherings that regard to secular purposes, there should be no limitations or restrictions for religious gatherings. Additionally, to the point that there would be peer pressure to attend events due to these children being in first grade, I think that when the children receive the invitation it would be up to the parents to decide whether or not their child be in attendance. To that point, no child is being particularly exposed to a situation in which they feel vulnerable to submit to beliefs against their own because their parent would not allow them to go in the first place (most likely). Finally, due to the lack of a law in regards to this situation, the school has no legal grounds to limit Margaret or her peers to pass out invitations. Overall, Margaret should continue to pass out the invitation within the specific guidelines outlined in the post, particularly because everyone has the right to, of all religions and other secular purposes.
If Margaret decided to invite people electronically since it is 2018, the invites would be sent out. Considering that the invitations have nothing to do with the school, and do not coerce the children to convert to another religion, it seems within reason to believe that Margaret should be able to hand the invitations out. The people in charge of the school have not outlawed invitations for inclusivity reasons, and therefore it would be discriminatory against religion to allow secular invitations over religious invitations.
Harrison, I agree with your opinion that using the Tinker Test is vital to reach a conclusion in this case. I do not believe that Margret violated the First Amendment Establishment Clause in this case for the invites she handed out were only between students, a provision that is required within the Tinker Test. Additionally, there was no exclusivity when the invites were handed out and if the school allows invites for secular events then invites for this should be allowed too. Finally, the invites were for an extracurricular event that required no school funding nor taxpayer dollars, thus there is no infringement.
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