This year's school prayer bill is on a fast track, putting public school students' religious freedom in jeopardy.
By the third week of the session, the bill already had passed all of its committees and been sent to the Senate floor. Its rapid advancement raises the question: Why is this unnecessary, religiously coercive and unconstitutional legislation taking priority over, for instance, anti-bullying legislation that would safeguard our kids but has yet to be heard in any committee?
In its present form, the school prayer bill (CS-SB 98) authorizes school boards to adopt policies that give public secondary-school student government and students the "discretion" to have "inspirational message(s)," including sectarian or proselytizing "prayers of invocations or benedictions" at graduation ceremonies, football games, dances or other "noncompulsory" events that are a central part of student life. According to the bill, "the purpose" of these inspirational messages is "to provide for the solemnization and memorialization of secondary school events."
Setting aside the legalities for a moment, this legislation is unfair and contrary to the inclusive nature of our public schools. Students feel intense peer pressure to attend such so-called noncompulsory activities. No student should have to choose between attending a school event and being subjected to an unwanted religious activity. Many students, such as football players, cheerleaders and band members, are required to be at such events.
Some proponents say a student who is uncomfortable with a prayer should simply leave an event during the religious activity or show up afterward. Is that realistic? Do they really believe that such a student would not be ridiculed or ostracized? Would proponents have the same reaction if the prayer was to Allah, Buddha, or from another minority faith, or if an ethical humanist gave the inspirational message that "God may not exist, but we should all live by the Golden Rule"?
The U.S. Supreme Court in its most recent school-prayer case found a school policy remarkably similar to the policy authorized by CS-SB 98 unconstitutional. What proponents of this bill don't seem to or want to get is that our public schools are not devoid of religion. But this bill crosses the fundamental constitutional line between permissible private and voluntary prayer, and state-sponsored prayer.
Our state and federal constitutions, and federal law, already give public secondary-school students the right to privately pray in groups or alone during noncurricular time, form and participate in lunch-time Bible and religious clubs, and participate in after-school religious clubs run by private groups on the same terms and conditions as secular groups.
The school prayer bill, however, would result in unconstitutional state-sponsored prayer. While the bill does not dictate the exact wording of inspirational messages, invocations or benedictions, it explicitly limits content. And when the government has the power to censor content, the message is state-sponsored. How does the bill control content? First, it only allows inspirational messages, and invocations and benedictions are the only specific examples referenced in the bill. Second, an inspirational message or prayer must solemnize or memorialize a school event. And the U.S. Supreme Court found that a prayer is virtually the only way to solemnize an event. Undoubtedly, school districts and the Florida taxpayer are going to be on the hook for the litigation costs that will result should this unconstitutional bill become law.
There are a lot better uses of the Senate's time and the Florida taxpayer's money. Bullying is an epidemic in our schools. One third of our children are affected by bullying, and around 20 percent have experienced cyberbullying. Legislation has been filed in the House and Senate that would broaden cyberbullying protections and provide additional preventative instruction for students, teachers and parents. Isn't it just common sense for our legislators to focus their efforts on measures that safeguard kids across religious, racial and ethnic lines, instead of on legislation that would divide them and their communities along religious lines?
