School Officials and Student Speech
The courts have drawn a sharp distinction between
officially sponsored religious speech, such as a
benediction by an invited clergyman at a commencement
ceremony, and private religious speech
by students.The Supreme Court made clear in Lee v.Weisman (1992) that a clergyman’s benediction at
a public school event would violate the separation
of church and state. Judges usually reach that same
conclusion when school officials cooperate with
students to produce student-delivered religious
messages. But federal courts are more divided in
cases involving students acting on their own to
include a religious sentiment or prayer at a school
commencement or a similar activity.
Some courts, particularly in the South, have upheld
the constitutionality of student-initiated religious
speech, emphasizing the private origins of this kind
of religious expression. As long as school officials
did not encourage or explicitly approve the contents,
those courts have upheld religious content in
student commencement speeches.
In Adler v. Duval County School Board (1996), for
example, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
approved a system at a Florida high school in
which the senior class, acting independently of
school officials, selected a class member to deliver
a commencement address. School officials neither
influenced the choice of speaker nor screened the
speech. Under those circumstances, the appeals
court ruled that the school was not responsible for
the religious content of the address.
Other courts, however, have invalidated school policies
that permit student speakers to include religious
sentiments in graduation addresses. One
leading case is ACLU v. Black Horse Pike Regional Board of Education (1996), in which the senior class
of a New Jersey public high school selected the student
speaker by a vote without knowing in advance
the contents of the student’s remarks.The 3rd U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals nevertheless ruled that the
high school could not permit religious content in
the commencement speech.The court reasoned
that students attending the graduation ceremony
were as coerced to acquiesce in a student-led prayer
as they would be if the prayer were offered by a
member of the clergy, the practice forbidden by
Weisman in 1992. (Supreme Court Justice Samuel
Alito, who was then a member of the appeals court,
joined a dissenting opinion in the case, arguing that
the graduating students’ rights to religious and
expressive freedom should prevail over the
Establishment Clause concerns.)
Similarly, in Bannon v. School District of Palm Beach
County (2004), the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals ruled that Florida school officials were right
to order the removal of student-created religious
messages and symbols from a school beautification
project.The court reasoned that the project was not
intended as a forum for the expression of students’
private views but rather as a school activity for
which school officials would be held responsible.
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