Good News Club v. Milford Central School

Good News Club v. Milford Central School, 533 U.S. 98 (2001), was a (6–3) decision of the U.S. Supreme Court written by Clarence Thomas holding that a public school's exclusion of a club from its limited public forum based solely on the club's religious nature was impermissible viewpoint discrimination .

Contents

• 1 Facts

• 2 Procedural history

• 3 Earlier cases

  • 3.1 Lamb's Chapel

  • 3.2 Rosenberger

• 4 Majority opinion

  • 4.1 The Establishment Clause claim

  • 4.2 Scalia's concurring opinion

  • 4.3 Breyer's concurring opinion

• 5 Dissenting opinions

• 6 See also

• 7 References

• 8 External links

Facts

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=1 "Edit section: Facts")

Under New York law, public schools may adopt regulations under which they open their facilities to public use during non-school hours. In 1992, Milford Central School adopted regulations under this law, allowing district residents to use the school for "instruction in any branch of education, learning, or the arts," and making the school available for "social, civic, and recreational meetings and entertainment events, and other uses pertaining to the welfare of the community, provided that such uses shall be nonexclusive and shall be opened to the general public."

The Fourniers, who reside in the district, applied to use the Milford Central School for meetings of a Good News Club . Their proposed use—to have "a fun time of singing songs, hearing a Bible lesson and memorizing scripture"—was deemed to be the equivalent of religious worship, and the Fourniers' application was denied on that basis; the school also claimed that its community use policy forbade use "by any individual or organization for religious purposes." The Fourniers contacted the school superintendent stating that they did not believe it was lawful for the school to allow other groups to use the school building, yet because they were religious in nature, teaching morals and values from a Christian perspective, they were denied access. The school concluded that "the kinds of activities proposed to be engaged in by the Good News Club were not a discussion of secular subjects such as child rearing, development of character and development of morals from a religious perspective, but were in fact the equivalent of religious instruction itself." The full school board rejected the club's application to use Milford's facilities.

Procedural history

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=2 "Edit section: Procedural history")

The Fourniers and the Good News Club filed suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the school. The club alleged that the school's denial of its application violated its free speech rights under the First Amendment , as well as its right to religious freedom under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act . The club won a preliminary injunction allowing it to conduct its meetings at the school from April 1997 to August 1998. In August 1998, however, the district court ruled against the club, finding that the club's "subject matter is decidedly religious in nature, and not merely a discussion of secular matters from a religious perspective that is otherwise permitted" by the school. Because the school forbade all religious instruction under its policy, the court ruled that it was not engaging in unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination .

The club appealed to the Second Circuit . The Second Circuit affirmed, holding that the school's restriction was not unreasonable. In light of the "quintessentially religious" nature of the club's activities, the court further held that the school district was engaging in "constitutional subject discrimination" rather than "unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination" when it excluded the club from meeting on its premises. In light of a split among the federal appeals courts regarding whether speech may be excluded from a limited public forum by reason of its religious content, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the Second Circuit's ruling in this case. Thomas Marcelle represented the Good News Club at oral argument, and Frank Miller represented Milford Central School.

Earlier cases

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=3 "Edit section: Earlier cases")

Lamb's Chapel

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=4 "Edit section: Lamb's Chapel")

Main article: Lamb's Chapel v. Center Moriches Union Free School District

In Lamb's Chapel, the Court held that a school district violated the First Amendment's Free Speech Clause when it excluded a private group from presenting films at the school solely on the basis of the religious perspective of the films on family values.

Rosenberger

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=5 "Edit section: Rosenberger")

Main article: Rosenberger v. University of Virginia

In Rosenberger, the Court held that a university's refusal to fund a student publication because of that publication's religious perspective violated the Free Speech Clause.

Majority opinion

(https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Good_News_Club_v._Milford_Central_School&action=edit&section=6 "Edit section: Majority opinion")

The Court found that the exclusion of the Good News Club was based solely on its religious nature. Milford had asserted before the Second Circuit that it would have allowed a public group to use Aesop's fables to impart moral values to children. Milford also allowed the Boy Scouts to "influence a boy's character, development, and spiritual growth". Likewise, the Good News Club also sought to teach moral values to children, albeit from an explicitly Christian viewpoint.

A "limited public forum " may "reserve its forum for certain groups or for the discussion of certain topics" but because the exclusion of the Good News Club discriminated against a viewpoint, the Court did not rule on whether the restriction was "reasonable in light of the purpose served by the forum". Applying _Lamb's Chapel v. Center Moriches Union Free School District _, 508 U.S. 384 (1993), and _Rosenberger v. University of Virginia _, 515 U.S. 819 (1995), the Court held that the exclusion of the Good News Club was impermissible viewpoint discrimination.

According to the majority, the Court's prior decisions in Lamb's Chapel and Rosenberger determined the outcome of the Good News Club's free speech claim. In Lamb's Chapel, the Court had ruled that a different New York public school had engaged in u

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