Aclu Targets Graduation Prayers But Rexburg School District Says Prayers Initiated By Students

In fashioning the First Amendment and the right to free speech, President James Madison would have rejected student-led prayer at Madison High School graduation ceremonies, American Civil Liberties attorneys argue.

The ACLU asked U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge on Monday to outlaw student prayer held yearly at the Rexburg school.

The First Amendment permits free speech, but its establishment clause erects a big wall between church and state, ACLU attorney Stephen Pevar said.

“Prayers and religious hymns advance religion,” he said. “It has an effect on the speaker and everyone who hears it.”

The ACLU, representing anonymous “John Doe” parents and children, has asked Lodge for a summary judgment banning prayer before this spring’s graduation ceremony.

The ACLU sued the school district in 1990, claiming it had violated separation of church and state.

The district maintains it is not running counter to the U.S. Constitution because allowing honor students to talk or give a prayer is legal because the practice is student-initiated.

Pevar earlier won a case abolishing Grangeville High School graduation prayer. Upon appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, the case was declared moot because all the plaintiffs had graduated by the time the justices were prepared to hear the case.

Last year, the two sides in the Madison case went before Lodge arguing whether the plaintiffs’ names should be revealed to school district attorneys. Lodge did not require them to become public but confirmed one currently is attending school.

Pevar said he does not mind any private gatherings before or after commencement in which the students could say prayers or sing hymns. And valedictorians could thank God in their speeches without it becoming an established part of the graduation program.

Boise attorney James Lynch responded that the students giving speeches are selected based on their grades, not because they are members of the Mormon Church.

Lynch said the ACLU has built up its case with the idea that the graduating class always opts for a prayer rather than a poem or other expression, and the court should wait until after commencement to decide.

“We have assumptions piled on assumptions piled on assumptions,” he said. “I’ve always suspected the Does serve the ACLU, rather than the ACLU serving the Does,” he said.

Lodge took the arguments under advisement.