Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 28, 1994 TAG: 9408300032
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: ATLANTA NOTE: ABOVE LENGTH: Medium
But a suburban Atlanta teacher's refusal last week to observe a new state law requiring a brief period of ``quiet reflection'' was a reminder that the question is very much alive and that voluntary school prayer has a constituency that extends far beyond the easily pigeonholed agenda of the religious right.
``This is an issue that's not going to go away,'' said Robert Peck, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. ``You're going to see more courts coming to different conclusions, and eventually the Supreme Court will have to take a case and announce a national rule.''
A year after a Mississippi principal became a local hero when he was dismissed for allowing students to begin the day by reading prayers over his school's public-address system, Brian Bown last week set off his own furor at South Gwinnett High School in Snellville.
Bown, 41, a social studies teacher, was suspended with pay for lecturing through the state-mandated period of silence Monday, then stalking out of the school Tuesday after telling the principal that he would not preside over such a period. A federal judge on Friday declined to reinstate him, and Bown faces a Sept.6 School Board hearing on whether he should be fired.
In the past year, Virginia, Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama have passed measures authorizing student-initiated, student-led prayers. The states say those laws conform with a 1992 Supreme Court ruling and a subsequent decision in another case by a U.S. appeals court in Texas allowing some forms of voluntary, student-initiated prayer. All of those statutes are being contested in court.
Georgia took a different tack. Its requirement for a special period, which took effect last week, mandates ``a brief period of quiet reflection for not more than 60 seconds'' at the opening of the school day.
The law is the work not of the religious right but of a black state senator concerned with the rising tide of violence.
``After every shooting, after every kid is killed, what do they do?'' asked David Scott.
``They get to their school, and they have a quiet moment of reflection. Now surely, if it is good to do that after the killing, surely to incorporate a silent moment of reflection at the beginning of the day would go a long way in calming down, toning down, setting a mood.''
The law states that the period of reflection ``is not intended to be and shall not be conducted as a religious service or exercise.''
But even those who do not agree with Bown's assertion that ``the legislature very clearly intended to make it a moment of prayer'' acknowledge that entirely divorcing religion from the period of reflection is impossible.
Indeed, proponents of the law say that although some students will use the time to think about schoolwork, some to clear their heads and some to stare blankly into space, others will use it to pray.
At South Gwinnett High, Josh Watson, a 17-year-old junior, said he uses the time to pray. Ryan Dollar, a 17-year-old senior, said he just thinks about the day ahead and tries to get focused.
The law's advocates say it reflects what they perceive as the wishes of most Americans: for some format that allows for, but does not mandate, private prayer.
``This is not a mandate for school prayer; it's a state saying, `Before you start the school day, think for 60 seconds,''' said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the conservative American Center for Law and Justice. ``To have a constitutional crisis over a moment of reflection shows the absurdity of how far the separation-of-church-and-state arguments are starting to go.''
But Bown's lawyers, trying to overturn the law, will argue in court that although Scott's original intentions may not have been entirely religious, the debate in the state legislature clearly reflected a desire to return prayer to the schools.
In reality, critics say, the law is resulting in classrooms where teachers close their eyes and bow their heads and where some form of prayer is expected. Steven Leibel, one of Bown's lawyers, said one argument offered by legislators for a 60-second period of silence was that it takes only 20 to 30 seconds to recite the Lord's Prayer.
by CNB