JISHOU, HUNAN — I may seem to pay too much attention to religion in public high school graduation ceremonies, but for me it’s fascinating to see how the courts resolve two apparently conflicting clauses in the First Amendment.
On the one hand, the Establishment Clause states the government can neither promote a particular religion nor prevent the free exercise of any religion. On the other hand, the Free Speech clause prevents the government from limiting or banning speech or any other kind of expression, no matter how obnoxious it may be.
So, what happens when someone (a public school student, say) wants to talk about God or religion during a graduation ceremony? A public school is, after all, an institution of the government, so one might assume that student would have to rewrite the speech to omit the God stuff. This is exactly what school officials in a Nevada town believed in 2007 when they told Brittany McComb she had to take her witnessing for Jesus out of her valedictory. At first, McComb agreed, but when it came time to deliver her speech, she still referred to Jesus, etc., and school officials literally pulled the plug on her microphone.
Dumb.
If McComb were speaking just for herself, then her comments would have been protected under the Free Speech clause, although she was speaking to a captive audience in a public school. If, however, she were speaking on behalf of the school (or if a school official delivered such an address), it would run afoul of the Establishment Clause. A public school cannot legally teach one particular faith or insist its students, parents, staff, etc., worship in a particular way. Testifying would imply that there was only one “preferred” way to worship.
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