Faith and the Law note: The following is courtesy of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education otherwise known as FIRE. The mission of FIRE is to defend and sustain individual rights at America’s colleges and universities. These rights include freedom of speech, legal equality, due process, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscience — the essential qualities of individual liberty and dignity. FIRE’s core mission is to protect the unprotected and to educate the public and communities of concerned Americans about the threats to these rights on our campuses and about the means to preserve them. Their website is www.fire.org. The information below about Religious Liberty is from their website along with their Guide to Religious Liberty on Campus which is very helpful and some important cases on religous liberties on college campuses.
RELIGIOUS LIBERTY
Religious liberty is a cornerstone of our nation and is the very first freedom guaranteed to Americans by the Bill of Rights. Yet on many college and university campuses, the right to associate on the basis of religious belief and even the right to express those beliefs is under attack. Under the guise of “nondiscrimination” policies, religious groups are often told that they may not choose the membership or leadership of their groups using religious criteria. Other students who merely express religious beliefs in public are condemned for “hate speech” or “intolerance.” FIRE’s public cases dealing with religious liberty, listed below, display our commitment to defending America’s religious pluralism by protecting students’ rights to express their views and to associate around shared beliefs.
- Download and order FIRE’s Guide to Religious Liberty on Campus.
- Brown University: Wrongful Suspension of Religious Student Group
- Indian River Community College: Ban on ‘The Passion of the Christ’ and Repression of Free Speech
- Louisiana State University: Threat to Muslim Group’s Freedom of Association
- Pennsylvania State University: Charges of ‘Discrimination’ Due to Religious Language in Club Constitution
- Princeton University: Refusal to Recognize Religious Group
- Rutgers University: Refusal to Allow Christian Clubs to Require Christian Leadership
- Southern Illinois University at Carbondale: Derecognition of Christian Law School Group
- Tufts University: Refusal to Allow Evangelical Christian Club to Reject Homosexual Leadership
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Refusal to Allow Christian Clubs to Require Christian Leadership
- University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire: Ban on RAs’ Leading Bible Studies
- University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire: Unconstitutional Student Fee Funding Amendment
- Wright State University: Christian Group Banned from Campus
Key Cases
Courtesy of fire.org at http://www.thefire.org/cases/religiousliberty/
