ACLU invades Montgomery County
by Robert Morrison
February 25, 2010
The ACLU is at it again. This time, they are demanding an apology from a Montgomery County, Maryland, public school teacher. Behind this demand is, as always with this federally-funded outfit, the bludgeon-like threat of a huge lawsuit.
What was the teacher’s offense? Apparently, the teacher threatened a student with detention if she refused—as she repeatedly did—to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. The teacher sent the student to the counselor’s office for her refusal to stand.
The ACLU immediately invoked the Supreme Court’s ruling in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943). That case is often cited as a hallmark of American civil liberties, especially remarkable because it was handed down while the United States was engaged in a world war to defend democracy.
But the Court in 1943 said that students cannot be required to salute the flag or recite the Pledge. That was quite right.
If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us.
The Court did not say that students could not be required to stand quietly while other students recited the Pledge of Allegiance. If we stop for a moment, we can all readily agree that it would be wrong to require, for instance, the children of legal resident aliens to pledge their allegiance to our flag. In the famed 1943 case, the parents of the children who declined to take part in the flag salute and pledge were Jehovah’s Witnesses. These people had a religious conviction that led them to regard pledging allegiance to the flag as a violation of the Commandment against making graven images. We should not force these students to violate their consciences.
We are constantly told by liberals that the purpose of education is to prepare young people to take part in today’s complex and multi-cultural society. Does it? Surely, anyone attending a baseball game at Baltimore’s Camden Yards between a Canadian team and the home team is familiar with the two national anthems that are played. O Canada and The Star-Spangled Banner are both sung. What are Americans expected to do during the playing of the Canadian national anthem? Just stand silently and to show respect. It’s the civil and neighborly thing to do.
There’s rich historical irony in this, too. For the words of United States’ national anthem were composed at nearby Ft. McHenry during the War of 1812. Those “rockets’ red glare” and “bombs bursting in air” were weapons of our British enemies. And the Canadians’ national anthem contains this line: “O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.”
Against whom exactly were the Canadians standing guard? Hint: It wasn’t moose or polar bears. It was us. The Americans repeatedly had failed repeatedly to invade and conquer Canada when it was a British colony. But now, Americans and Canadians are the best of friends. We stand politely for each other’s national anthems, which may be the only two such anthems in the world that are actually written against each other.
Is the Montgomery County school case too trivial to merit national attention? No. It illustrates how classroom discipline and American patriotism are under constant assault by the ACLU. Our tax dollars are funding this radical outfit. Thomas Jefferson said “to require a man to provide contributions of money for the propagation of opinions he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical.” Surely, the fact that the ACLU uses our tax money against us is a gross violation of our rights.
Does it matter? John Walker Lindh is currently sitting in federal prison. He is the so-called American Taliban who was convicted of fighting against Americans in Afghanistan. Young Lindh was educated in Montgomery County Public Schools. Was he taught anything about why he should be loyal to his country? Why jihadism is a threat to all our rights? I seriously doubt it. By punishing a teacher who simply tried to give students the opportunity to express their patriotism and support for our country during a time of war, the Montgomery County public schools are doing nothing to avoid future American Talibans.
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Comments
Bob,
Excuse me, the teacher was trying to give an opportunity? What kind of tyrant are you? She yelled at her, making a spectacle, and then had the girl escorted from the classroom by school police officers! The girl is too traumatized by all the taunting from other students as a result of this to return to school. And what was her crime? All she did was sit quietly minding her own business.
The facts are not in dispute and a school spokesperson says the teacher’s actions violate the county school system’s student handbook, the Post says.
“The policy is very, very clearly stated,” Dana Tofig, a school spokesperson, tells the Post. “Our teachers are expected to know the students’ rights and responsibilities.”
The school regulations state that a student “cannot be required to say a pledge, sing an anthem, or take part in patriotic exercises. No one will be permitted to intentionally embarrass you if you choose not to participate.”
Just think, if this was a student who violated a rule that says “No one will be permitted…”, you can be sure the student would be disciplined, suspended or expelled. The teacher should be fired.
This is a simple matter of ignorance. Here in the United States we have laws that protect us from the ignorance of others. The teacher was either ignorant or belligerent. She failed to know or to respect the law. To frame the ACLU in the light of bully is ludicrous. The law broken against one is broken against the entire population.
This is not a matter of the teacher acting like a jerk in humiliating a young girl as egregious as that is socially. This is a matter of not respecting the rights of another citizen.
Jehovah’s Witnesses are amongst the most compliant US citizens, but we have one global unity based on allegence to the creator.
This permits our stand on war to be global, and doesn’t disadvantage one side. M
You’ve got to be pretty infantile to think a girl sitting during the pledge is an assault on anything that matters in anyway. Unless it hurts your feelings that your xtianist/loyalist ideas are not the law for everybody. And speaking of which, what if a scary atheist told you you couldn’t pray at work? Wouldn’t you like someone to stand up for your rights under the law? Betcha so. ‘God’s’ law is for believers, U.S. law is for all citizens. The teacher was way out of line, like an xtian, almost.
Just a point of clarification. The ACLU is 100% privately funded. They’re a PAC and receive no tax payer dollars.
The Supreme Court ruled in 1943 that students cannot be forced to salute the flag AND Maryland law explicitly allows any student or teacher to be excused from participating in the pledge. Case Closed FRC. Get a life. The real American Taliban is the rabid Right.
Bob, so wrong in so many ways…. “s always with this federally-funded outfit,” is wrong because the ACLU receives no tax dollars at all. Not even mine. I have to send them post-taxed dollars… “(This) illustrates how classroom discipline and American patriotism are under constant assault by the ACLU.” Uh, the teacher violated not only US law (precedent) but Maryland *state* law, which says a child has no obligation to either recite or stand during recitation of the pledge. Classroom discipline? Holding a teacher accountable for creating a bad situation? For hectoring a student in an illegal manner? Dude, you need to fix your priorities. “Our tax dollars are funding this radical outfit. ” Hello? Are you that clueless? NO tax dollars fund this outfit, and it’s not radical, quite the reverse: the ACLU attempts to support basic, Constitutional rights. How is that radical? “Surely, the fact that the ACLU uses our tax money against us is a gross violation of our rights.” STOP SAYING THAT! Repeating “our tax dollars” doesn’t make it true. The ACLU has NO TAX DOLLARS. Repeating an obvious untruth makes you not only subject to ridicule, which I am gracefully keeping at bay, but makes you a LIAR. You might have a legitimate gripe, but this isn’t the way to make it. “a teacher who simply tried to give students the opportunity to express their patriotism ” Dude: you do not coerce patriotism. “Those who wish may stand and recite the pledge/sing the national anthem/wear flag lapel pins etc” provides an opportunity. Yelling at someone to do any of those things is not “providing an opportunity”– it’s coercion, and in Maryland, in schools, it is illegal.
Dear Robert,
The ACLU is not federally funded.
Your tax dollars are not funding this “radical outfit”.
I think of us as conservative, trying to conserve our rights
under the constitution and bill of rights.
If you have information to the contrary, please share it.
Thanks,
Mike Mage, Co-Chair
Montgomery County Chapter, ACLU of MAryland
What I find interesting in a number of similar rants against the ACLU is declaring them subversive. Traitors to democracy. This is laughable because of its ignorance. Although I have nothing for or against the ACLU, I do know its sole function is to defend the US Constitution and make the country obey its own laws.
This would make it a necessary thing unless the ranters prefer living under governments like Somalia, France or Russia. These governments also have constitutions, but they are only given passing notice by the governments. The law is what the government says it is at the time. Try ranting there and see how long you last.
Freedoms of speech, assembly and freedom to exercise one’s own religion exist only so long as the governments obey their own laws. The American Civil Liberties Union, whether we personal like its actions at any given time, keeps working at keeping these laws working. Now if only they could have something like it for all the graft and corruption to save our tax money.
Excuse me, but the supreme court ruling in this matter is from 1943, long before the ACLU had any of the kind of power you would like to attribute to it.
We live in a republic based on representative democracy. Alone the 1st amendment, which we all cherish (left-right-middle) guarantees the right to free speech and therefore, the refusal to say the pledge, which is in and of itself an expression of free speech.
The strength of our system is allowing others their stupidity, based on the principle that the overwhelming majority will simply laugh down the ridiculous ones, for this is also the right of the majority.
But what this teacher did harkens back to 1933-1945 nazi terror or the communist systems in the former USSR or China.
People strong in their beliefs do not have to resort to this kind of thing. The teacher was way off base here and so is your blog post. You are more concerned with the trappings of things that appear to make us look great as a people instead of honoring the principle that indeed makes us great: the 1st amendment to the constitution and all other parts of it. And there is absolutely no mention in the US constitution about reciting the pledge, putting your hand on your heart for it, singing the national anthem at baseball games, etc.. these are all trappings of culture that have appeared with time. Your very stand on protecting freedom actually denies freedom to others.
Are you really so weak in your own beliefs that you get hacked off then a young student who has her own mind and her own will decides to not say the pledge?
And what will come next? Will all students be required to sing christian hymns at school concerts, regardless of religion or creed? Will all be required to participate in invocations with “in Jesus’ name” at the end of the invocation, regardless of religion or creed? Is that freedom? Or is this all your attempt to superimpose your worldview on others?
Think about it. Long and hard.
“The right to practice religion, or no religion at all, is among the most fundamental of the freedoms guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. The ACLU works to ensure that this essential freedom is protected by keeping the government out of religion.”
— The ACLU
Just look at what the ACLU has done!!
“The ACLU and the ACLU of New Jersey (2009) filed a successful lawsuit on behalf of a New Jersey prisoner – an ordained Pentecostal minister – to restore his fundamental right to preach to other inmates. The minister had preached at weekly Christian worship services at the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, NJ for more than a decade when prison officials suddenly banned that activity without any justification. As a result of the ACLU lawsuit, state officials agreed to allow the minister to resume preaching and teaching Bible study classes under the supervision of prison staff.”
Look here for more examples of ACLU’s work — does FRC have a problem with this?
http://www.aclu.org/aclu-defense-religious-practice-and-expression
Actually, in the 2006 case Frazier V. Alexandre, a Federal District Court ruled that requiring students to stand for the pledge (even silently) violates the First Amendment. And they have the same authority as SCOTUS, since SCOTUS didn’t overrule them.
And even if that were not the case, both Maryland and Montgomery County rules are quite explicit that neither students nor teachers can be required to participate in the pledge in any way.
That said, as a high school senior, I honestly don’t get why people think it makes such a difference to kids patriotism. If you’re forced to say the same set of words for 12 years, it becomes nothing more than a formula to you, and the Pledge loses its specialness. This is especially true if you make kids start doing it from a young age, where the full meaning and significance of those words will probably be lost to them. (Ex: throughout elementary school, most of us thought “please be seated was the last line of the Pledge).
I think Justice Robert Jackson (who wrote the majority opinion for the 1943 case) put it best: “To believe that patriotism will not flourish if patriotic ceremonies are voluntary and spontaneous instead of a compulsory routine is to make an unflattering estimate of the appeal of our institutions to free minds.”
Bob, you can complain about the ACLU all you want. However, that does not make them wrong. Several court cases … federal and in the state of Maryland … as well as Maryland statute, all make it abundantly, crystal-clear that this student could not be compelled to say the Pledge of Allegiance.
If the teacher had been a mature adult, she would have known this, and not carried on like a child throwing a tantrum.
The rational thing to do is accept the reality that the law happens to be on this student’s side. I get that you and the FRC does not like the ACLU. The truth is, though, that the ACLU has defended religious folks’ rights as well as those of the atheists you would like to see scrubbed from the face of the earth. You’re free not to like the ACLU. You are not, however, free to reinvent the truth, either about this event, or about the ACLU.
The behavior of this teacher … and your defense of her juvenile caterwauling … just goes to show what is wrong with religiosity in the U.S. The question is, do you have the integrity and courage to admit this, and change your tune? (Why do I doubt it?)
Bravo to the ACLU. The school system/government has no right to intrude on the personal rights of a student.
By: Tom Baxter | February 25, 2010 at 6:53 pm
This traitor and the traitors of the ACLU should have been treated the same way our noble founding fathers treated the Anabaptists during our noble war against the greatest evil of all times, King George, and his terrorist savage allies to establish freedom of religion not freedom from religion.