Religious Liberty in Public Schools

As an attorney with First Liberty Institute, I speak often with public school students, families and teachers across the country who have been intimidated, censored, shut down and blocked from expressing their faith while on public school grounds. 

Too often, students and teachers are told they can’t pray while on school grounds, are prevented from mentioning their faith publicly, or are forbidden from starting religious clubs. Frequently, opponents of religious expression attempt to scare public school leaders into believing any mention of faith is disallowed on school property. Their desired effect: to silence students and teachers from speaking of God or faith.

When this happens, the message from school administrators is direct: There is something wrong with your faith, and it is not welcome here. Perhaps the clearest example is Coach Joe Kennedy, who was fired from his coaching job at a public high school in Washington for bowing his head in prayer after a football game. Despite the game being over and his coaching responsibilities concluded, the school’s fear that he would be seen kneeling caused them to try to prohibit his silent prayers.  

Students experience similar discrimination. A school principal silenced Texas eighth-grader Hannah Allen’s lunchtime prayers with classmates. Valedictorians Elizabeth Turner and Savannah Lefler of Michigan, and Moriah Bridges of Pennsylvania, were prevented from mentioning their faith in Christ in their graduation speeches. Administrators told a Washington state fifth-grader she couldn’t host an interfaith prayer club on her school’s campus. 

FIRST AMENDMENT GUARANTEES

In each case, school officials were wrong. The First Amendment, along with federal and state religious liberty statutes, secures the religious expression of teachers, employees and students at public schools. 

Fifty-five years ago, the Supreme Court decided Tinker v. Des Moines, which explicitly affirmed students’ and teachers’ free speech rights in public schools. The high court famously declared students and teachers do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

Legally, what does this mean for students and teachers who are serious about their religious beliefs and expression? As one court put it, the “Free Exercise Clause does not permit the State to confine religious speech to whispers or banish it to broom closets.” 

The U.S. Department of Education itself—from the Clinton to the Biden administrations—recognizes that “Nothing in the First Amendment … converts the public schools into religion-free zones, or requires students, teachers or other school officials to leave their private religious expression behind at the schoolhouse door.”

Students have great latitude in the free exercise of their faith. With the full protection of the First Amendment, they can speak about their faith to others, pray during appropriate free time, read their Bible in the classroom, write about their faith in class assignments when appropriate to the assignment, and form religious clubs if other types of clubs are permitted. 

Teachers, meanwhile, also enjoy the protections of the First Amendment. What are they allowed to do? They can respectfully discuss their faith with other school employees, and, when relevant to their classes, they may discuss the influence of religion on history, societal development and cultural heritage. 

Schools can recognize religious holidays and must accommodate students’ religious beliefs. The Supreme Court put it simply: The Constitution “affirmatively mandates accommodation, not merely tolerance, of all religions, and forbids hostility toward any.”

EQUAL ACCESS

Beyond the First Amendment, students, teachers and employees also enjoy strong federal and state statutory protections. Under the federal Equal Access Act, secondary schools that accept federal funds must recognize student-initiated religious clubs just as they recognize secular clubs. And Title VII, the federal employment discrimination statute, generally requires schools to accommodate their religious employees’ beliefs and practices. Many states offer additional statutory protections in the form of religious freedom restoration acts that protect the religious expression of students and teachers. 

Those whom First Liberty has helped—people like Coach Kennedy, Hannah Allen, Elizabeth Turner, Savannah Lefler and Moriah Bridges—were acting within their rights. But, often, well-meaning school administrators with a mistaken understanding of the First Amendment choose to silence religious expression. It’s critical to know when to stand up for constitutional rights, especially in a place as important and influential as public schools. ©2024 First Liberty Institute

Justin Butterfield is senior counsel at First Liberty Institute, a national religious liberty legal firm based in Plano, Texas, that defends Americans’ religious liberties, including the rights of students and teachers. For more information about your rights in public schools, visit FirstLiberty.org.