Religious
Freedom in Focus is a
periodic email update about the Civil
Rights Division's religious liberty
and religious discrimination cases.
Assistant Attorney General R. Alexander
Acosta has placed a priority on these
cases. Through vigorous enforcement
of:
- Federal
statutes prohibiting religion-based discrimination
in education, employment, housing, public
facilities, and public accommodations;
- Federal
laws against arson and vandalism of houses
of worship and bias crimes against people
because of their faith; and
- The
Religious Land Use and Institutionalized
Persons Act (RLUIPA);
and
through participation as intervenor and
friend-of-the-court in cases involving
the denial of equal treatment based on
religion, the Civil Rights Division is
working to protect the right of people
of all faiths to participate fully in public
life.
More information about this initiative, and back issues
of this newsletter, may be found on the
religious discrimination home page of the Civil Rights
Division website. You may also contact the
Special Counsel for Religious Discrimination, Eric W. Treene,
at (202) 353-8622. |
IN
THIS ISSUE:
Community
College Reverses Ban on The Passion
of the Christ After DOJ Intervention
The
Civil Rights Division has closed its investigation
of a Florida community college, after the school
reversed course and removed its prior ban on a student
group showing Mel Gibson’s The
Passion of the Christ and agreed to remove other restrictions on the group’s
activities.
The
Christian Student Fellowship at Indian River
Community College in Fort Pierce, Florida had
sought to show The Passion
of the Christ in November
2004, but was told that it could not because
the film carried an R rating. The group protested
that at least one R-rated movie had in fact been
shown on campus recently. Moreover, the group
pointed out that a theater group on campus called
the “No Shame Theater” performed plays with
graphic language, including a piece entitled “[expletive]
for Jesus” that involved an actor telling a story
about sexual acts intertwined with religious beliefs
and religious symbols.
The
Christian Student Fellowship also had been told
that it could no longer meet on campus because
of a new rule requiring a faculty advisor to
attend all student group meetings. The Christian
Student Fellowship could not find an advisor
willing to attend all of its meetings, which
involved prayers, singing, and Bible study.
The
Civil Rights Division opened an investigation
of the college on February 1, requesting documents
and information about its policies and the allegations
of the Christian Student Fellowship. That evening,
the college issued a public statement that it
would permit the Christian Student Fellowship
to show The Passion of the
Christ, acknowledged
that it had not applied a consistent policy
for public presentations by student groups in
the past, and stated that it was adopting a new
policy to ensure that protected speech would
not be censored in the future. The school also
informed the Department of Justice that it only
would require faculty advisors to attend student
groups’ business meetings, and
that groups like the Christian Student Fellowship
would be able to otherwise meet freely. In
light of the school’s response, the Department
of Justice closed its investigation on February
28.
“The college realized that it could not selectively ban The
Passion of the Christ while permitting other works on campus that may
also challenge students,” Assistant Attorney General for Civil
Rights R. Alexander Acosta remarked. “We are pleased that the
college recognized that it could not discriminate against the
religious expression of its students.”
Civil Rights Division Settles Muslim
Student Harassment Case
On March 1, the Civil Rights
Division settled a case in which a Delaware student
alleged she was harassed by a teacher because of
her faith. In May 2004, the Department of Justice
received a complaint that a teacher in the Cape
Henlopen School District had harassed a fourth-grade
Muslim girl, and that school officials had not
taken adequate action in response. The Civil Rights
Division opened an investigation, which was resolved
by the March 1 settlement agreement.
The girl and her parents alleged that her teacher
told the class that the “Koran teaches
war and hatred” and made similar statements.
They also alleged that the teacher had directed
comments at the girl, such as ridiculing her
because her mother wore a headscarf. These incidents
led to severe ridicule by other students. The
complaint also alleged that the same teacher
also proselytized her students. As a result of
the teacher’s actions, the Muslim girl
experienced great distress and missed many days
of school. When her parents complained, the school
assigned the girl to a new class, but took no
significant other action.
In the settlement agreement reached between
the school district and the Civil Rights Division,
the school agreed to provide teacher training
on diversity and the school’s policies
regarding religious expression, to provide a
tolerance education program for all K-5 students,
and to create specific performance expectations
for the teacher and ensure that she achieves
them.
“We are pleased that this case has been
resolved without recourse to a lawsuit,” said
R. Alexander Acosta, Assistant Attorney General
for Civil Rights. “No student’s faith
should be attacked by school employees, whose
job it is to teach all children. Our country
has long had a rich diversity of faith traditions,
and the Department of Justice is committed to
ensuring that people of all faiths are welcomed
in our public institutions.”
Civil Rights Division Defends Michigan Student’s Religious
Expression in “Candy-Cane” Case
The Civil Rights Division submitted
a federal court brief on February 18 arguing that
a Michigan school unconstitutionally censored a
fifth-grade boy’s religious expression when
it forbade him to pass out candy-cane ornaments
with religious messages attached during a class
exercise. The United States’
friend-of-the-court
brief in the case,
Curry
v. Saginaw School District, argues that the boy’s
speech was barred solely because it was religious,
in violation of the Free Speech Clause. The brief
also argues that the school’s asserted separation-of-church-and-state
concerns were unfounded.
Every year, in mid-December, a Saginaw, Michigan
elementary school holds an exercise called “Classroom
City” in which each fifth-graders is asked
to create, build, and market a product of his
or her own choosing, and then “sell” the
product to other students in exchange for pretend
money in “stores” each child constructs
from cardboard boxes in the school gymnasium.
The activity is designed to teach children about
business, commerce, and civics. In 2003, one
fifth-grader chose to make candy-cane Christmas
ornaments from pipe cleaners and beads to sell
at Classroom City. He attached a card to each
ornament entitled “The Meaning of the Candy
Cane,” which described the religious significance
of the colors and shape of the candy cane.
School officials, however, determined that the
boy would have to remove the explanatory cards
because of their religious content. His mother
complained first to his teacher, and then to
the school principal. However, after consultation
with the assistant superintendent of the Saginaw
schools, the principal informed his mother that
the card was inappropriate in a public school
because it was religious. The boy’s parents
filed a First Amendment suit in federal court.
The school has defended its actions on the ground
that it sought to avoid disruption and to avoid
a violation of the Establishment Clause of the
Constitution.
The Civil Rights Division brief argues that
the school’s actions discriminated against
the boy’s speech in violation of the free
speech clause, and that the school’s Establishment
Clause defense was meritless. The brief explains
that it is clear from the facts that other children
would view the speech on the cards as the boy’s
and would not attribute it to the school: “Given
the facts that each student was given a choice
of what to create; that more than 50 products
were selected, designed, and promoted by individual
students; and that students could purchase or
not purchase any given product, there was no
reasonable risk that students could have mistaken
Joel’s speech for the school’s. The
neutrality the Constitution demands both among
religions and between the religion and non-religion
requires equal access and equal treatment, not
such disparate exclusion.”
Maui
to Permit Church Construction; Suit Dismissed
at U.S. Request
On
the heels of an agreement between Maui and the
Hale O Kaula congregation that will permit it
to build a new church, the U.S. District Court
in Hawaii granted the United States’ request
to dismiss its suit alleging that Maui’s
treatment of the church violated the Religious
Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act
of 2000 (“RLUIPA”). The United
States’ suit,
filed by the Civil Rights Division on July
10, 2003,
was the first suit filed by the United States
under RLUIPA.
Hale O Kaula is a small, nondenominational Christian
church that has held services on Maui since 1960.
In 1991, seeking a larger space to accommodate
its approximately 60 members, the church bought
5.85 acres of land in the Pukalani area of Maui.
The property was in an agricultural zone. In
1999, the church applied for a special use permit
to build a small church on the property. As part
of that application, the church sought to use
a piece of the new property to grow food in support
of its Joseph Ministry, which encourages practitioners
to live in harmony with the land.
Despite the fact that at least five special use
permits had previously been granted to churches
of different denominations that sought to locate
in agricultural zones, and the allowance of residences
and various secular uses such as rodeo facilities,
petting zoos, and sports fields in the zone,
the Maui Planning Commission unanimously rejected
the church’s application for a special
use permit. The church brought an RLUIPA action
against the church on September 19, 2001. On
July 10, 2003, the United States filed a separate
suit under its RLUIPA enforcement authority,
alleging discrimination against the church. The
county sought to have both suits dismissed on
the grounds that RLUIPA was unconstitutional.
Senior Judge Samuel King of the United States
District Court for the District of Hawaii denied
the county’s motion on December 29, 2003.
On
March 8, 2004, the court ordered the United States,
Maui County and the church to mediation. Mediation
resulted in a tentative settlement between the
church and the county that, after additional
proceedings, culminated in a $700,000 payment
to the church and a November 17, 2004 decision
by the Maui Planning Commission to grant the
church a special use permit. On December 22,
2004, the United States moved to dismiss its
suit against the County in light of the finalized
settlement agreement. On February 9, 2005, the
court granted the United States’ motion
to dismiss.
Assistant Attorney General R. Alexander Acosta
applauded the decision: “We are pleased
that this case has been resolved and that the
discriminatory exclusion of this small church
is now a thing of the past.”
The
Department of Justice has opened 21 investigations
under RLUIPA since January 2001, in cases involving
mosques, synagogues, a Buddhist temple, a Sikh
Gurdwara, and churches of various denominations.
In addition to the Maui case, nine of these investigations
to date have resulted in favorable outcomes.
United
States Department of Justice
Civil Rights Division
http://www.usdoj.gov/crt
