Entering a new battleground in the culture wars, the Supreme Court announced Friday that the Constitution gives parents of public school students the right to exempt their children from classroom discussions of fairy tales featuring LGBTQ characters or themes. They agreed to determine whether the Constitution guarantees this.
Montgomery County Public Schools, Maryland's largest school system, adopted a new curriculum in 2022. Among them were several children's stories featuring lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer characters for use in language arts curriculum, lawyers told the judge. Alongside the many books featuring straight characters in traditional gender roles that are already part of the curriculum. ”
Among the fairy tales was “Pride Puppy,'' an alphabet introduction book about a family whose puppy gets lost in a Pride parade. “My Rainbow” is a story about a mother who makes colorful wigs for her transgender daughter. And then there's “Love, Violet,'' a story about a girl who falls in love with a female classmate. (Some books have since been removed from the curriculum.)
In a series of recent cases, the Supreme Court has expanded the role of religion in public life, sometimes at the expense of other values such as gay rights and access to contraception.
In recent years, courts have ruled in favor of a web designer who said he didn't want to create a site for same-sex marriage, and a high school football coach who claimed he had a constitutional right to pray in a 50-yard plaza. are. A Catholic social services agency in Philadelphia said it may refuse to work with same-sex couples who apply to adopt a child, contrary to city rules.
The school system in the new suit, based in a liberal suburb of Washington, initially notified parents when storybooks were being discussed and gave their children the opportunity to exempt them from the class. The school system quickly changed its policy.
“The increase in opt-out requests raises three related concerns,” the attorneys wrote. “High student absenteeism rates, the impossibility of managing opt-outs across classrooms and schools, and the risk of exposure for students who believe fairy tales represent them.” Families are exposed to social stigma and isolation. ”
Several parents have filed lawsuits challenging the new policy, saying it violates their religious rights. A lower court refused to block the program while the case progressed.
Writing for a majority on a divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, Judge G. There is currently no evidence that the parents were forced to do so.” to the children change their religious beliefs and practices at school and elsewhere; ”
Judge Agee, who was appointed by President George W. “should be submitted,” he added. If children were directly or indirectly forced to change their religious views or practices, the analysis would change in light of that record. ”
In a dissenting opinion, Judge A. Marvin Quattlebaum Jr., appointed by President Donald J. Trump, said parents of several faiths had made modest requests.
“They do not claim that the use of the books itself is unconstitutional,” he wrote. “And they're not trying to ban them. Rather, they just want to exclude their children from instruction that includes such texts.”
The parents' attorney, Eric Baxter of the Beckett Fund for Religious Freedom, welcomed the Supreme Court's decision to hear the case.
“Imposing controversial gender ideologies on three-year-old children without their parents' permission is an affront to our nation's traditions, parental rights, and basic human decency,” he said in a statement.
In the Supreme Court's brief in Mahmoud v. Taylor, No. 24-297, the Board of Education stated that parents should not “understand the decades-old common understanding that parents who choose to send their children to public schools are inadmissible. “I'm trying to shake it up,” he wrote. Children are being deprived of the right to freely practice their religion simply because they are exposed to material that their parents find offensive. ”
