Religion in Public Schools (Update 1)

• Author: George W. Dent
• Pages: 2177-2178

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Despite several Supreme Court decisions on religion in public schools, conflict in this area has proliferated in recent years. One example is the discord that persists over the teaching of evolution. In EPPERSON V. ARKANSAS (1968) the Court struck down a statute prohibiting the teaching of evolution. In Edwards v. Aguillard (1987) the Court invalidated a Louisiana statute requiring that "creation science" be given equal exposure in public schools where evolution is taught. (Among other things, creation science teaches that plants and animals were created substantially as they now exist.) The majority reasoned that the statute was intended to promote the biblical version of creation or to hamper the teaching of evolution for religious reasons. However, the Court did not hold that teaching CREATIONISM is unconstitutional.

In several cases, religious parents have tried to turn the Court's expansive interpretation of the ESTABLISHMENT CLAUSE to their advantage by alleging that public schools were unconstitutionally establishing a religion of secular humanism. Although the Supreme Court has not tackled this issue, the lower federal courts have uniformly rejected these claims. These results seem appropriate. The Supreme Court has stated that nontheistic faiths, including secular humanism, can qualify as FIRST AMENDMENT religions. However, if secular humanism is defined narrowly enough to be a specific religion, the public schools are not establishing it, for they promote no particular dogma or rituals. In contrast, if secular humanism is defined broadly enough to include the education given in public schools, it ceases to be a religion for First Amendment purposes. A contrary conclusion would impel the untenable result that virtually any secular enthusiasm, such as music, art, or sports, would be considered a religion and thus barred from the public schools.

This conclusion does not end all controversy, however; parents often charge that teaching in public schools is inimical

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to their religious beliefs and therefore violates their right to free exercise of religion. The Supreme Court has not yet dealt with this issue, and its pronouncements elsewhere offer little guidance. The Court has often stated that a substantial burden of free exercise can be justified only by a COMPELLING STATE INTEREST pursued by the least restrictive means. Public schools have denied that their teaching burdens free exercise at...