Prayer in Public Schools, Part II

Rev. Paul Beckel

First Universalist Unitarian Church ~ www.uuwausau.org

May 15, 2005

 

 

An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures.

Mark Twain

 

The most visible creators I know of are those artists whose medium is life itself.

The ones who express the inexpressible—without brush, hammer, clay, or guitar.

They neither paint nor sculpt—their medium is being.

Whatever their presence touches has increased life.

They see & don’t have to draw.

They are the artists of being alive.

                        Jane Stone

 

OPENING WORDS

A few weeks ago we began our conversation about Prayer in Public Schools, focusing on why church-state matters matter. Copies of that sermon are available at the back of the sanctuary and online. Today, in School Prayer, Part II, we’ll consider: How did we get to this point? And, how do we continue to provide an environment both free from governmental coercion and also free for religious, non-religious, and even anti-religious expression?

 

GATHERING HYMN                                  #23 Bring Many Names

CHILDREN’S FOCUS                                 Old Turtle, by Douglas Wood

Summary:  Back when all the birds and fish and stones could talk with one another, an argument began about the nature of God. Each being felt that God was like them—for example, majestic like the mountain, or intimate and close for the smallest creatures. The argument continued until Old Turtle, who hardly ever said anything, interrupted to teach that God was all of these things, including each characteristic and its opposite. Old Turtle continued by advising the beings of the earth that a new family of creatures would be arriving soon, and that they would be a message from God about all that God is.

 

And the new (human) family came, in myriad forms, and they were a symbol of all that God is. But then the people forgot. And they began to argue...about who knew God and who did not, and where God was, and was not... and they hurt one another, and the earth.... Until all the other beings spoke about what they had learned: the mountain saying that God is intimate...the small creatures saying that God is majestic. And they continued to speak until the people listened...and began to see God in one another. And Old Turtle smiled. And so did God.

 

READING                 from Gates of Prayer, the prayer book of Reform Judaism

Cherish your doubts, for doubt is the handmaiden of truth. Doubt is the key to the door of knowledge; it is the servant of discovery. A belief which many not be questioned binds us to error, for there is incompleteness and imperfection in every belief.

 

Doubt is the touchstone of truth; it is an acid which eats away the false.

 

Let none fear the truth, that doubt may consume it; for doubt is a testing of belief.

 

For truth, if it be truth, arises from each testing stronger, more secure. Those who would silence doubt are filled with fear; the house of their spirit is built on shifting sands.

 

But they that fear not doubt, and know its use, are founded on rock.

 

They shall walk in the light of growing knowledge; the work of their hands shall endure.

 

Therefore let us not fear doubt, but let us rejoice in its help: It is to the wise as a staff to the blind; doubt is the handmaiden of truth.

 

MUSICAL MEDITATION

MESSAGE

Horace Mann—I’ve been wondering about that name because my son began attending Horace Mann Middle School this year. In 1837, Horace Mann stepped down from the Massachusetts legislature when it established the first ever State Board of Education, and Mann was offered the job of secretary. Friends discouraged him from accepting the position, which would entail a significant reduction in status and pay. Clearly it would be an unstable, thankless job, traveling long distances, alone, in lousy conditions, to meet with local school authorities with a vast range in their training and philosophy—many who had no desire to be advised on how to run their schools.

 

But Horace Mann took the job, believing that, of all the social reforms he could promote, what set education apart is that it is preventative rather than remedial.

 

In his years as Secretary of the State Board of Education Mann successfully advocated for increased funding for public schools, advocated for teacher support, and for the creation of teacher training schools (“normal” schools), and initiated many reforms which spread to other states and essentially became the foundation for today’s public schools—ensuring universal basic education funded by local taxes.

One of Mann’s greatest achievements was to stand up to the religious majority of his state, the Congregationalists, to insist that public schools would be non-sectarian. (Given this legacy, it’s not surprising that schools around the country which have adopted the name, “Horace Mann” don’t go out of their way to mention that he was a Unitarian.)

 

Shortly before he died, Mann advised the graduating class at Antioch college: "Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity."  He himself had won many victories for humanity; still I doubt that he imagined any of his victories would be final. In education, politics, and religion, finals are only stepping stones.

 

Horace Mann was an early advocate for universal non-sectarian public education. The meaning of that term, “non-sectarian”—along with many other terms in legal history—has evolved. And evolution, of course, does not progress in a straight line.

 

There are many curiosities in this meandering history. What’s a prayer anyway? Is it a group recitation? Bible study? Silence? And where, when, and how can it be conducted? Each of these questions has been wrangled over at great length.

 

Perhaps most significantly, this history has been about who will decide about prayer in schools. Will it be state legislatures? Federal courts? Local school boards? Teachers? Students themselves? The answer has varied a great deal from one era to another and within the myriad jurisdictions where these questions have been raised over the past two centuries. 

***

So what do these words mean—“sectarian,” and “non-sectarian”? The legal definitions were first refined in the streets of Philadelphia and by the gangs of New York.  In the 1840 and 50s, crowded urban centers were rife with conflict between the established Protestant ethnic groups and waves of immigrants including, of course, Irish Catholics. Under these conditions public deliberation over prayer in schools would begin with arguments conducted via the newspapers, then escalate to riots in which dozens of people were killed, and homes, churches, and businesses were destroyed. On one occasion peacekeeping troops had to camp in Philadelphia for weeks.

 

Officials who attempted to reach compromise rarely satisfied anyone. Protestant majorities attempted to make peace by declaring that the schools would indeed be non-sectarian, but then clarify that “sectarian” meant, “anything other than the established religious norm.”

 

In other cases, “sectarian” was defined as “any theology which was distinctive to a single denomination.” This offered some hope that the Catholics and Protestants might get along by sticking to religious matters on which they agreed. But it was not so easy to find this common ground—especially when the Universalists and the Jews got into the mix, opening the door to the unthinkable—that Mahometans, Chinese or Pagans, would come and “object to our whole system of public instruction because it interfered with their monstrous, absurd, and unintelligible dogmas and superstitions.”[1]

 

At least through the Civil War, religious instruction in public schools was a given. But which Bible would be read? Protestants insisted upon the King James Bible, Catholics insisted upon the Douay Version. Two issues were at stake here. First, anything related to Catholicism was inherently suspect because Catholics were seen as having allegiance to the Pope, a foreign power. This was seen not just as unpatriotic, but a real threat to social order.

 

Second, the evidence was clear: the (Catholic) Douay version of the Bible contained notes and commentaries indicating how the Bible was to be interpreted. Catholic authorities insisted that the Bible could not be presented without these notes. Protestants saw this as an affront to the principle of individual interpretation. One school board proposed to “compromise” by permitting students to use “any particular version of the Bible, without note or comment.” (That is, they could use any version of the Bible as long as it wasn’t Catholic.)

 

Other disputes arose over the recitation of the 10 commandments. For many of us, the Catholic and Protestant versions of the commandments would be indistinguishable. We share this ignorance with our President who, when asked which version of the commandments should be posted in the public schools, suggested “a standard one.”

 

But back to the pre-civil war era: When the commandments were recited, some teachers looked the other way or found creative ways to accommodate Catholic students. Others used beatings to enforce their authority. In 1859, a Massachusetts court ruled against a child who had been beaten repeatedly for refusing to recite the King James Version of the commandments. The court stated this was “not an issue of religious liberty, but [a matter of] discipline...” because the student refused to do as he was instructed by his teacher. That is, the court affirmed the King James Bible as non-sectarian, generally accepted moral teaching.

 

Catholics who did not want their children to say Protestant prayers had reason to fear. If their kids were kicked out of school, truancy laws would ensure that they were sent to juvenile detention homes where, of course, they would be forced into King James devotionals.

 

Through decades of beatings, riots, lawsuits, and active and passive resistance, the Protestants found that enforcement of their majority voice was unsustainable. Most Americans did not support violent repression of religious dissent. In the early 20^th century, state courts increasingly ruled that students must be allowed to opt-out of devotionals.

 

But even this approach was gradually eroded. As early as 1890 the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in favor of Catholic parents from Edgerton. Their children had been allowed to opt out of Bible reading, but the court found it unconstitutional to have schools create such situations in which students who opted out would lose face among teachers and peers.

 

Still, laws varied a great deal from state to state until the 1960s—when federal courts began to take up this issue.  Until then religious observances were required in public schools in 12 states, and forbidden in 9 states (including Wisconsin). The other states left it up to local districts.[2]

 

But whether schools required or prohibited prayer, it was impossible to avoid lawsuits. As I described in more detail last time, the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution demands a difficult balance of rights which, at times, seem to be opposed to one another. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof....” That is, government must neither sponsor religion, nor restrict free religious expression. 

 

But wait, is it that the federal “Congress” shall make no law... or are governments at every level prohibited from establishing religion? Are governments at every level prohibited from restricting free expression?

 

Just after the Civil War, the 14^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. In plain language, the 14^th Amendment prohibits states from denying the rights of any U.S. citizen. It was intended to protect the voting rights of the newly freed slaves. Not until the mid-20^th century did the U.S. Supreme Court begin to incorporate the 14^th Amendment into its interpretation of other federal civil rights.

 

In effect, incorporation of the 14^th Amendment has shifted power from the states, which tend to favor majorities, toward federal rights, which tend to favor individuals. Prior to this of course, states routinely, legally, limited the rights of women, and racial and religious minorities.

 

***

Over the last 50 years the battle has raged on. In the 1950s, atheistic communism was seen as the ultimate threat to America. Worshipping the creator who gives us freedom was seen as the epitome of patriotism. In this context the Board of Regents prepared a prayer for the public schools of New York State. This time they carefully included Jews, crafted a bland monotheistic prayer, and insisted that they had no wish to introduce sectarianism or religious instruction into the schools. The Regents’ Prayer was assumed to be “inoffensive” since the majority accepted the ideal of ONE god -- who created the universe, and who responds to petitionary prayer. And it was seen as essential in times like these, I mean times like those... with the erosion of morality among our youth, and the growth of crime and atheism....

 

Like Unitarian Universalism, the Regent’s Prayer was attacked by all sides: by those who said it was too religious or creedal, and by those who felt it wasn’t religious enough...that it’s inclusivity made it meaningless.

 

***

In Pennsylvania, until the late 1950s, a statute required “at least 10 verses from the Holy Bible shall be read...each school day.” Ellory Schempp, a junior in high school, and his parents filed suit, objecting that this practice conflicted with their beliefs as Unitarians. The school argued that standing to recite the Lord’s prayer (daily, and without comment) was not a religious exercise, but a way of teaching literature. This argument failed. So when the case came before the U.S. Supreme court the school tried a new approach.  “In order to be truly neutral toward religion,” they asserted, “the courts must not change the way anything has been done in the past.”[3]

 

The courts found in favor of the Schempps on the principle, still in use, that for a law to be constitutional “there must be a secular legislative purpose and a primary effect which neither advances nor inhibits religion.”

 

***

Even after these cases clearly established the law, defiance was common. Governor George Wallace was open about it: “We’re going to keep on praying and reading the bible in Alabama....” Elsewhere around the country, schools and teachers quietly ignored the law, and little could be done to stop them except decades of individual lawsuits and court injunctions. (For a while one school read the daily congressional record—how could it be improper to read the daily congressional record? It’s just that they read the part that opened with a prayer. One member of congress even went out of his way to read into the congressional record children’s prayers, so schools could then read these aloud and claim they were “secular” studies.)

 

Throughout his long Senate career, Jesse Helms inserted school prayer provisions into countless unrelated bills—from the Equal Rights Amendment to budget bills—forcing his opponents to repeatedly “vote against God.”

 

Another approach, of course, has been the effort to amend the U.S. Constitution to permit or require prayer in public schools. These efforts petered out in the 1970s after several attempts and extensive wordsmithing. That is, school prayer appears to be highly popular until you try to say who, what, where, when, how students will pray.

 

Another tactic was called “court stripping.” In the early 1980s, school prayer advocates attempted to remove certain types of cases from review by federal courts (cases like school prayer, abortion, redistricting, or treatment of women in the military). If this had succeeded, it would have placed civil rights in the hands of state legislators, again giving majorities the power to deny minority rights. This may seem like a detail, but it’s so important to know these tactics because they re-appear in new guises all the time.

 

***

There is, of course, the matter of silence. Advocates for school prayer have had mixed opinions about this. Some object that moments of silence lack the necessary communal aspect of prayer. Others fear that silence could be interpreted by students as an affirmation of religious individualism or pluralism.

 

Court cases over moments of silence have had mixed results, often depending upon whether the intent of the legislators was to advance religion. Today about ½ of the states allow moments of silence as part of official school program. They can do this if the silence

·         has a secular purpose

·         is optional

·         there is no government encouragement or discouragement of religion.

 

***

Still another angle is student-initiated prayer. The legal basis for student-initiated expression arose out of the Vietnam War era. It began with students wearing black armbands to protest the war in Vietnam. School officials tried to prevent this form of silent protest. The case was eventually decided by the U.S. Supreme Court: as long as the protestors were not disruptive they are protected by 1^st Amendment, even if they’re expressing a controversial view. The threat that their foes may become disruptive does not justify shutting down their right to expression.

 

Yes, the court said, any expression contains the risk of fear, argument, or even disturbance. “But our constitution says we must take this risk.” (Tinker v. Des Moines, US Supreme court 1969)

 

***

As we get into the more recent history we find principles which are still being argued and developed and therefore rules differing from one jurisdiction to another. Concepts like “voluntary participation” and “equal access” have evolved into the federal rules in place today. Every word has been defined and redefined through legislation and litigation over the past 20 years—not only to protect the rights of students and schools, but also to ensure that teachers are not put in compromised positions.

 

In the 1990s the graduation prayer battle flared. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down clergy-led prayer at graduations, but it was a virtual tie between those justices who felt that any endorsement of religion by government was unconstitutional vs. those who felt that the bar is much higher and that the government should be free to endorse generic “Judeo-Christian”  religion as long as those who opted out are not penalized by law. A reminder of how important it is who sits on the court.

 

The law on prayers at events like graduations and football games remains a little murky.[4] In general, prayers are considered constitutional if the speakers are selected through a religiously neutral process, if there is no pretext of continuing an existing religious tradition in new forms, and if school officials avoid screening or approving what is going to be said.[5]

 

***

“...In times like these” is a comforting delusion, repeated in every era. In terrible times like these the obvious solution is for students to pray in the public schools. Some call it allowing God back into our lives. Some call it coercive, meaningless, or blasphemous. If nothing else is clear, then, it’s clear to me that the vigilance necessary to oppose prayer in public schools will not end in my lifetime. And the need to propose other solutions to our national problems will continue. I propose:

·         educational processes that involve self-critical reflection rather than appeal to an absolute authority,

·         democratic processes that involve both constitutional protection of individuals and majorities.

·         And a healthy decentralization of the power and the self-righteousness which religious and national identities can provoke.

 

Horace Mann was convinced that universal secular education would bring forth political stability and social harmony through good citizenship, and democratic participation.

 

I agree. And, in today’s context, I would add that universal secular education includes celebrating this marvelous, incredibly difficult idealistic Constitutional balancing act of not establishing religion, and not inhibiting religious expression.

 

And I would add that universal secular education also includes teaching about religion. Absolutely eliminating religion from the public schools would not only violate the civil rights of students, it would be socially counterproductive. One of the great things about public schools is that we get exposed to people who are not like us. We get exposed to ideas that provoke and offend us. We are challenged by those who experience the world differently than we do. Universal secular education does not eliminate religious discussion or conflict, but could guide us through the valley of relevant conflict. Horace Mann would smile. And so would God.

 

CLOSING HYMN                 #203 All Creatures of the Earth and Sky

BENEDICTION       

Again from Gates of Prayer: Sinai was only the beginning. The Torah has never ceased to grow. In every age it has been purified and enlarged. It has a permanent core and an expanding periphery. It expands as the horizon of our vision grows.

 

Nor are God’s revelations confined to Israel.  He has been the inspiration of the great and good among all families of the earth. His love and guidance reach out to all the world.

 

Let us then give thanks for the wise and noble of every age and [for] people who, by word and example, have shed light on our way....