Latest Challenges to the Teaching of Evolution

Analysis: Court parsed anti-Christian remarks by teacher
(By SCOTT MARTINDALE, The Orange County Register, May 5, 2009)

The recent federal court ruling against a Mission Viejo high school teacher accused of displaying hostility toward Christians isn't likely to set a legal precedent, but should remind public school teachers that what they say in class can cross murky legal boundaries, analysts say.

U.S. District Judge James Selna ruled last week that Capistrano Valley High School history teacher James Corbett, a 36-year educator, violated the First Amendment's establishment clause by referring to Creationism as "religious, superstitious nonsense."

But the Santa Ana judge dismissed more than 20 other inflammatory statements attributed to Corbett cited in a 2007 lawsuit brought by Chad Farnan, one of Corbett's former Advanced Placement European history students.

"I'm not sure he drew the line in the right place," said Douglas Laycock, a University of Michigan law professor who is a nationally renowned expert on the law of religious liberty. "The line can be fine sometimes. But here we have a teacher who wasn't interested in finding the line, and the judge manages to explain away all but one of the teacher's comments."

Corbett made the "nonsense" remark during a class discussion about a 1993 court case in which former Capistrano Valley High science teacher John Peloza sued the Capistrano Unified School District challenging its requirement that Peloza teach evolution. Peloza lost in both a trial court and an appeals court.

Referring to his former colleague, Corbett told his class, "I will not leave John Peloza alone to propagandize kids with this religious, superstitious nonsense."

In a 37-page decision, Selna determined the comment had no "legitimate secular purpose" and thus declared it was a violation of the First Amendment's establishment clause. The clause prohibits the government from making any law "respecting an establishment of religion" and has been interpreted by U.S. courts to also prohibit government employees from displaying religious hostility.

But Selna decided a similar Corbett comment about Creationism " one that also included the word "nonsense" " was not a violation of federal law.

Creationists "never try to disprove Creationism," Corbett was quoted as saying. "They're all running around trying to prove it. That's deduction. It's not science. Scientifically, it's nonsense."

"Corbett did not say that he thinks Creationism is nonsense," Selna said in his ruling, "but that generally accepted scientific principles do not logically lead to the theory of Creationism."

With such a delicate parsing of words, the judge's ruling puts teachers who want to lead class discussions on religious topics into potentially dangerous waters, legal scholars say.

"What it means is that if you're a teacher, your liability can turn on a single sentence," said Rachel Moran, a UC Irvine law professor and an expert on constitutional law. "Teachers can avoid this by not talking about these issues at all, but that has a chilling effect."

Corbett is known among his students for being intentionally provocative, taking them out of their comfort zone and asking them to question long-held convictions.

But students say Corbett's teaching style encourages them to think critically and to speak up in defense of opposite viewpoints " skills they must hone to pass the college-level AP European history exam.

Indeed, the legal conflict has galvanized the Orange County Register's online audience, generating more than 700 comments in the last few days alone as readers debate the merit's ruling and personal theology.

"I highly doubt he's changed anything about his teaching," said his daughter, Quinn Corbett, 23, who is student-teaching at Capistrano Valley High this year and took AP European history with her father as a sophomore. "He's an active teacher " he doesn't just walk in and say the words that need to be said. He teaches hard. But he's 100 percent dedicated to his students."


Selna is to meet with both parties June 1 to discuss payment of fees and damages. Farnan plans to ask for attorneys' fees, nominal damages and a court injunction prohibiting Corbett from violating the establishment clause again, said his attorney, Jennifer Monk.

If Corbett opts to appeal the case, the Ninth Circuit court would be permitted to reconsider all 20-plus statements attributed to Corbett, although it could not listen to the original audio tapes of Corbett's lectures from fall 2007, legal experts said.

An appeals court ruling affirming Selna's decision might make a more lasting impact on future cases involving teachers and the establishment clause, but still would not set a precedent for the teaching profession itself.

"School districts are routinely sued for making one statement that favors a religion," said John Eastman, dean of Chapman University's law school and a constitutional scholar. "The rules apply both ways here."

SANTA ANA, Calif. " A federal judge ruled that a public high school history teacher violated the First Amendment when he called creationism "superstitious nonsense" during a classroom lecture.

U.S. District Judge James Selna ruled Friday in a lawsuit student Chad Farnan filed in 2007, alleging that teacher James Corbett violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment by making repeated comments in class that were hostile to Christian beliefs.

The lawsuit cited more than 20 statements made by Corbett during one day of class, which Farnan recorded, to support allegations of a broader teaching method that "favors irreligion over religion" and made Christian students feel uncomfortable.

During the course of the litigation, the judge found that most of the statements cited in the court papers did not violate the First Amendment because they did not refer directly to religion or were appropriate in the context of the classroom lecture.

But Selna ruled Friday that one comment, where Corbett referred to creationism as "religious, superstitious nonsense," did violate Farnan's constitutional rights.

Selna wrote in his ruling that he tried to balance Farnan's and Corbett's rights.

"The court's ruling today reflects the constitutionally permissible need for expansive discussion even if a given topic may be offensive to a particular religion," the judge wrote.

"The decision also reflects that there are boundaries. ... The ruling today protects Farnan, but also protects teachers like Corbett in carrying out their teaching duties."

Corbett, a 20-year teaching veteran, remains at Capistrano Valley High School.

Farnan is now a junior at the school, but quit Corbett's Advanced Placement European history class after his teacher made the comments.

Farnan is not interested in monetary damages, said his attorney, Jennifer Monk of the Murrieta-based Christian legal group Advocates for Faith & Freedom.

Instead, he plans to ask the court to prohibit Corbett from making similar comments in the future. Farnan's family would also like to see the school district offer teacher training and monitor Corbett's classroom for future violations, Monk said.

There are no plans to appeal the judge's rulings on the other statements listed in the litigation, she said.

"They lost, he violated the establishment clause," she told The Associated Press in a phone interview. "From our perspective, whether he violated it with one statement or with 19 statements is irrelevant."

The establishment clause of the First Amendment prohibits the government from making any law establishing religion. The clause has been interpreted by U.S. courts to also prohibit government employees from displaying religious hostility.

Selna said that although Corbett was only found to have violated the establishment clause in a single instance, he could not excuse or overlook the behavior.

In a ruling last month, the judge dismissed all but two of the statements Farnan complained about, including Corbett's comment that "when you put on your Jesus glasses, you can't see the truth."

On Friday, Selna also dismissed one of the two remaining statements, saying that Corbett may have been attempting to quote Mark Twain when he said religion was "invented when the first con man met the first fool."

Corbett has declined to comment throughout the litigation. His attorney, Dan Spradlin, did not immediately return a message left Monday by The Associated Press.

Spradlin has said, however, that Corbett made the remark about creationism during a classroom discussion about a 1993 case in which a former Capistrano Valley High science teacher sued the school district because it required instruction in evolution.

Spradlin has said Corbett was simply expressing his own opinion that the former teacher shouldn't have presented his religious views to students.

Farnan's family released a statement Friday calling the judge's ruling a vindication of the teen's constitutional rights.

The Capistrano Unified School District, which paid for Corbett's attorney, was found not liable for Corbett's classroom conduct.

Corbett is known among his students for being intentionally provocative, taking them out of their comfort zone and asking them to question long-held convictions.

But students say Corbett's teaching style encourages them to think critically and to speak up in defense of opposite viewpoints " skills they must hone to pass the college-level AP European history exam.

Retrograde bill hurts Alberta's fine reputation
(Editorial, The Star-Phoenix, May 7, 2009)

It's dismaying to see Alberta, which has created one of the world's best education systems with the vast wealth it's gained from oil deposits that date back hundreds of millions of years, enact legislation that could see teachers hauled before human rights panels for discussing geological science.

Or for delving into aspects of Shakespearean plays such Richard lll, where in discussing Richard's homosexuality might run afoul of Bill 44. The proposed legislation enshrines "parental rights" in Alberta's Human Rights Act and requires advance notice to guardians any time instructional materials or courses of study deal explicitly with religion, sexuality or sexual orientation, so that children may be pulled from the class.

This in a province that already makes ample provision within its education system so that proponents of religion-based instruction or various other causes can receive public funding to set up and operate schools in keeping with their beliefs. And this in a province where parents already have the right under the School Act to withdraw their children from classes where religion, sex education or sexual orientation is discussed.

Moving the provision to the Human Rights Act creates a whole new level of bureaucratic interference in the education process, where all students will be affected rather than simply those whose parents slap blinders on kids to prevent them from learning about scientific fact and reality.

Basically, Bill 44 boils down to the crassest form of political pandering by senior politicians in Premier Ed Stelmach's government who understand the legislation is unconscionable but are proceeding anyway because they lack the backbone to stand up to Alberta's ultraconservative religious right.

In essence, it's an effort to smooth the social conservatives' feathers ruffled when Alberta belatedly acted upon the Supreme Court's landmark 1998 ruling in the Delwin Vriend case and finally included sexual orientation as a protected category in its human rights legislation. So, the tradeoff was to include sexual orientation in the act, but to also throw in parents' rights to opt out when it comes to some topics, which Premier Stelmach has made it clear will include evolution.

Culture Minister Lindsay Blackett and Education Minister Dave Hancock, who personally favoured keeping the parental choice provision under the School Act instead of making it part of human rights legislation, buckled like six-buck lawnchairs under pressure from pandering caucus colleagues.

"Evolution isn't religion," Mr. Blackett suggested to Edmonton Journal columnist Paula Simons. "I can't be more clear than that. Ask a court. Ask anyone to determine where evolution becomes religion."

It's almost as if he hasn't heard about the bizarre world view of creationists and their gobbledegook of a Young Earth that's 6,000 years old. Does Mr. Blackett really think to these characters evolution doesn't conflict with their religious beliefs? Has he not heard of the high-profile legal challenges in some American jurisdictions that sought to ban public schools from teaching evolution?

It's not a case of whether but when Bill 44 will see some hapless teacher hauled before a human rights tribunal for exercising her free speech right and duty as an educator to offer an insight in a Shakespearean play or a 100-million-year-old geological formation. That is unless, of course, self-censorship becomes the norm, with classrooms the venue not for discussion and debate of ideas and concepts but of milquetoast tedium, where teachers remain ever mindful of offending even the most extremist of views.

Does the Holocaust become a taboo subject on religious grounds? How about the equality of women, as it pertains to anything from the Catholic Church, which bans them from its hierarchy, or the Pope to ultra-conservative Islamism? When does religion cross over to geography, politics and social studies, and who gets to set the boundaries before the whole mess ends up tied up in legal knots, first before a rights tribunal and then before the courts?

Whatever the gutless wonders at the government's top ranks claim, this legislation is a retrograde step for Alberta and one that does nothing to advance its interests in a world where science and knowledge loom ever larger as the keys to success.

Moving the provision to the Human Rights Act creates a whole new level of bureaucratic interference in the education process,

It's dismaying to see Alberta, which has created one of the world's best education systems with the vast wealth it's gained from oil deposits that date back hundreds of millions of years

Interesting description, spendi. So let's see, totalitarians then must include the Discovery Institute, fundamentalist Christians, anti-evolutionists, Spendius.....

Good point, MJ, but spendi et al will miss the irony.