Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, June 5, 1990 TAG: 9006050538
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/3 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The decision "should send a message to school administrators nationally that religious speech on the high school campus is as fully protected as any other student speech," said Jay Sekulow, an Atlanta lawyer for Christian Advocates Serving Evangelism.
In an 8-1 ruling Monday, the justices said public high schools generally must allow student prayer groups to meet and worship if other student clubs are permitted at school.
Such extracurricular prayer meetings do not violate the constitutionally required church-state separation when high school religious groups are given the same access accorded such activities as chess or scuba diving clubs, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said for the court. Justice John Paul Stevens dissented.
The decision upholds the Equal Access Act of 1984, in which Congress said public high schools accepting federal aid must not discriminate against groups based on "the religious, political, philosophical or other content of the speech at such meetings."
Liberals said the ruling was a pretext for reconsidering classroom prayer and could undermine earlier rulings that banned such activity.
Beverly LaHaye, president of Concerned Women for America, a conservative activist group, also applauded the high court. "The Supreme Court has ruled against religious apartheid in American high schools," she said. "To exclude student religious groups from meeting on campus is nothing more than bigoted discrimination."
But atheist activist Madalyn Murray O'Hair of Austin, Texas, called the ruling tragic. "This a major intrusion of religion into our secular public schools," she said.
In 1962, O'Hair filed the lawsuit that led to a Supreme Court ban of school-sponsored prayers.
by CNB