Judge Roy Moore and Foundation for Moral Law File Brief Defending Distribution of Gideon Bibles in Missouri School District
by Staff
July 10, 2008
WASHINGTON, (christiansunite.com) -- Former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore and attorneys with the Foundation for Moral Law argued in an amicus curiae brief filed today that Gideons International's 30-year tradition of distributing Bibles to fifth-grade students in the South Iron R-1 School District in Missouri did not violate the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. In this case, Roark v. South Iron R-1 School District, after the American Civil Liberties Union sued, a Missouri federal district court ordered the schools to stop allowing the Gideons to distribute Bibles, even though any other outside group may distribute material to the students. The South Iron School District is now appealing the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit.Judge Roy Moore commented on this important case:
"For a school district to allow the Gideons to distribute Bibles to fifth-graders is no more an establishment of religion than for a school to require the parents of such children to pay for school lunches with money marked 'In God We Trust.' The South Iron school policy allows others to distribute materials, so why should the Gideons be singled out for mistreatment?'€
Just as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last week'€ to uphold our right to keep and bear arms under the Second'€ Amendment, so should the Eighth Circuit uphold our right to acknowledge that faith upon which our Country began under the First Amendment."
For at least 30 years, Gideons International has offered free Bibles to fifth-grade students in the classrooms of the South Iron R-1 School District. After the ACLU sued to stop it, the school district enacted a new policy that expressly allows any outside group, including the Gideons, to distribute literature in front of the administrative offices or in the cafeteria. Neither practice satisfied the trial court, which ruled that the school district must lock its doors to Gideon Bibles because they violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.
The Foundation explains in its brief, however, that the Establishment Clause only prohibits laws "respecting an establishment of religion." In this case, no student is forced to read or even take a Bible, and the school district's policies allowing the distribution of religious texts do not officially "establish" any "religion," as those words were understood when the First Amendment was ratified. The U.S. Supreme Court last week in District of Columbia v. Heller interpreted the words of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to uphold the original meaning of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms." Likewise, the Foundation urges the 8th Circuit to return to the words of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, reverse the lower court, and once again permit Gideon Bibles to reach fifth-graders at South Iron schools.
