WASHINGTON — Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund filed a petition asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case regarding a high school student who was prohibited from wearing a T-shirt at school expressing his biblical views on homosexual behavior.
“Students do not lose their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse door,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “Two 9th Circuit judges issued an extremely poor ruling in April, allowing a school to censor the Christian point of view, while permitting students to speak out in support of homosexual behavior.”
ADF attorneys are representing Chase Harper, a student at Poway High School who was prohibited by school officials from wearing a T-shirt expressing his religious point of view on homosexual behavior. A school administrator told Harper to “leave his faith in the car” when his faith might offend others. Harper’s younger sister Kelsie is also represented by ADF in the case.
Two judges on a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit denied Harper’s motion for preliminary injunction on April 20 (
www.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3733). The court refused to rehear the case despite the uproar it caused in the community of those who support free speech rights.
Circuit Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain wrote, on behalf of the dissenters to the denial of rehearing, that “the panel majority’s decision amounts to approval of blatant viewpoint discrimination.... No Supreme Court decision empowers our public schools to engage in such censorship nor has gone so far in favoring one viewpoint over another.”
ADF attorneys are now asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take up this case to protect the rights of Christian students to express their views at school. A copy of ADF’s writ of certiori petition to the U.S. Supreme Court in
Harper v. Poway Unified School District can be read at
www.telladf.org/UserDocs/HarperPetition.pdf.
“School officials do not have the right to engage in viewpoint discrimination, and this case is very important for those who support true tolerance and diversity in public schools,” said Theriot. “The core of the First Amendment is all about the right of Americans to express their sincerely held beliefs. In appealing this case to the U.S. Supreme Court, we hope the justices reverse the 9th Circuit’s terrible ruling.”
The U.S. Supreme Court has reversed the 9th Circuit, which includes the state of California, more times than any of the other federal appellate circuits across the country.
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.
www.telladf.org