Contrary to myths spread by the legally misinformed, the
Supreme Court has not ruled that students are forbidden to pray, read a
religious book, or otherwise worship on their own while at school.
In Engle v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962)
the Supreme Court simply concluded that officially
conducted prayer, promulgated in this case by the Board of Regents in New
York, violated the Establishment Clause. Similarly, in a subsequent Supreme Court ruling
the following year involving school prayer and Bible reading, School
District of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203 (1963), the
Court decided that opening exercises promoting either the reading of the Bible
or recitation of the Lord's Prayer in a public school violated the
Establishment Clause as applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment.
That said, it is critically important to point out to
legally uninformed school officials that these decisions of the Supreme Court
did not "remove prayer [or other religious observances] from public
schools." The Supreme Court simply
and exclusively removed only government-sponsored worship
from the public schools, as is expressly outlined in the Court’s rulings in
both cases. Public school students have always had and still possess the right
to pray, read the Bible, or worship on their own while attending a public
school as class schedules permit.
Conversely, a public school official’s interference with
such private religious observances would constitute an impermissible intrusion
into religion by the state and would thereby violate the student’s First
Amendment rights. Officially interfering in any manner with an individual’s non-disruptive
religious observance, even within a public school environment, is proscribed by
the U.S. Constitution. This would include interfering with such activities as
quietly praying, reading the Bible, worshiping, or even outright proselytizing
during a scheduled break time or even during class time when objectively
appropriate due to the subject matter being discussed. Public School officials,
including teachers cannot engage in viewpoint discrimination, even if the
viewpoint in question is inherently religious.
I hope this information will help many of you in defending
your particular student’s constitutionally protected rights.