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Attorney Laments Roberts Court's Refusal to Hear Religious Freedom Case

by Jim Brown
October 6, 2005
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(AgapePress) - A civil liberties organization is expressing disappointment over the U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to hear a public school religious freedom case. The Rutherford Institute had asked the high court to overturn a 2004 ruling against a Florida high school student who was ordered to paint over religious references she had included on a school mural.

Student Sharah Harris alleged the school was engaging in viewpoint discrimination. However, the Eleventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed, holding that the school had the right to censor her religious words and symbols.

Harris' attorney, Rutherford Institute president John Whitehead, says he was surprised the Roberts court turned down the case. "Originally, the school's attorney refused to even brief the case," Whitehead notes, "and the court ordered them three or four months ago to brief it so they could see the other side. So we thought we might have had enough justices to hear the case."

At the Supreme Court, the attorney explains, a hearing requires that at least four justices will agree to hear the case. Although the prospects for getting Harris's case heard seemed initially promising, he says, "I think with the shift in the court and all the turmoil that has gone on recently, we started getting a little more pessimistic."

President Bush, through his appointments to the Supreme Court bench, appears to be creating a court that is "deferential to authority in all its forms," Whitehead contends. And unfortunately, he adds, religious discrimination and other First Amendment cases are not a high priority for the court.

"Mostly what courts hear, especially the lower federal courts and more so the Supreme Court these days, is cases dealing with corporation law and those kind of things," the Rutherford Institute spokesman says. "So I would say what we would call our 'basic constitutional case' is going to be more difficult to get before the courts."

Whitehead says he is sorry the high court "chose not to weigh in on what promised to be a critical religious freedom case." He feels the Roberts court, by refusing to hear the matter, missed a prime opportunity to show its commitment to First Amendment ideals.


Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.

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