Written by Don Byrd
The Oklahoma House voted to send a bill on to the State Senate that purports to expand student religious freedom. The measure empowers school districts to allow students to make religious statements at school assemblies and events. House Bill 1940 passed by a vote of 79-13.
Rep. John Bennett, R-Sallisaw, the bill’s author, said it would require public schools to allow and protect religious student expression and to allow students to express religious beliefs in homework, art and other assignments. The bill, modeled after a Texas law, would require school districts to treat the voluntary student expressions of a religious viewpoint the same as voluntary student expressions of a secular viewpoint.
Of course, students are already allowed voluntary religious expression. The questions arise over whether some speech is student speech or is school (i.e. government) speech. When a student is chosen to give the public address system at a football game or a student assembly, it is not just the student who is speaking. His or her religious sentiments expressed in such a forum, whether or not voluntary, may reasonably be interpreted as representing the school’s perspective, especially if officials approve the remarks before they are delivered.
This bill does nothing to solve or undo this problem; it just announces that such statements are allowed. Given the particular facts surrounding an event, that may or may not be the case. Certainly no state law can magically transform conduct that violates the First Amendment into conduct that does not.
As many of the bill’s detractors note, including the former Oklahoma Governor who vetoed a similar measure in 2008, bills like this raise more questions than they answer, and cause more problems than they solve.
