In late 2015 a football coach was fired from his job because of his refusal to obey an unconstitutional order by the school to stop praying after games on the 50 yard line.
Coach Joe Kennedy sued the school has now won his case at the Supreme Court, which ruled 6-3 that his First Amendment rights were violated by the school.
SCOTUS sides with a high school football coach in a First Amendment case about prayer at the 50-yard-line. In a 6-3 ruling, SCOTUS says the public school district violated the coach's free speech and free exercise rights when it barred him from praying on the field after games.
— SCOTUSblog (@SCOTUSblog) June 27, 2022
Here is the opinion from Neil Gorsuch in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District: https://t.co/O263t1QPyw. Sonia Sotomayor dissents, joined by Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan.
— SCOTUSblog (@SCOTUSblog) June 27, 2022
In case you’ve forgotten, here’s the official summary from the court:
Petitioner Joseph Kennedy lost his job as a high school football coach in the Bremerton School District after he knelt at midfield after games to offer a quiet personal prayer. Mr. Kennedy sued in federal court, alleging that the District’s actions violated the First Amendment’s Free Speech and Free Exercise Clauses. He also moved for a preliminary injunction requiring the District to reinstate him. The District Court denied that motion, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. After the parties engaged in discovery, they filed cross-motions for summary judgment.
The District Court found that the “‘sole reason’” for the District’s decision to suspend Mr. Kennedy was its perceived “risk of constitutional
liability” under the Establishment Clause for his “religious conduct” after three games in October 2015. The District Court granted summary judgment to the District and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. The Ninth Circuit denied a petition to rehear the case en banc over the dissents of 11 judges. Several dissenters argued that the panel applied a flawed understanding of the Establishment Clause reflected in Lemon v. Kurtzman, and that this Court has abandoned Lemon’s “ahistorical, atextual” approach to discerning Establishment Clause violations.Held: The Free Exercise and Free Speech Clauses of the First Amendment protect an individual engaging in a personal religious observance
from government reprisal; the Constitution neither mandates nor permits the government to suppress such religious expression.
As you can see, the Supreme Court reversed the liberal Ninth Circuit’s ridiculous 2017 decision which was in favor of the school.
What this means for Kennedy I’m not exactly sure. He should get his job back if he wants it and I think he should be awarded back pay from 2015, at the very least.
Whatever the case, this is a great ruling for religious liberty and I’m so glad he finally won.