October 22, 2001
Pewitt Schools case could impact Texas churches
___By George Henson
___Staff Writer
___Texas school districts and municipalities that open their facilities to community groups are finding the law affords them little standing to deny church or religious organizations the same opportunity, two equal-access experts recently maintained.
___In August, the Pewitt Consolidated Independent School District agreed to settle a lawsuit that had been ongoing for more than a year. The Northeast Texas school district had rejected a request by the pastor of CrossRoads Church to use school facilities after hours to hold a dinner theater that included Christian drama and music. The suit contended the school district had said the production would only be allowed if "very religious dramas" were omitted.
___The church is not affiliated with the Baptist General Convention of Texas, but the case has impact on all Texas churches, according to two experts.
___While the Pewitt lawsuit was tied up in U.S. District court in Marshall, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that a New York school had violated the free-speech rights of a Christian organization when it barred the group from holding after-school Bible and religion classes for children.
___That Good News Bible Club ruling probably led to settlement of the Texas case, according to Brent Walker, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, and Stuart Roth, senior counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice.
___The Good News case was a much tougher case to win, because the classes were taking place immediately after school, Walker explained. Since the Supreme Court ruled favorably in that instance, it will be much harder for governmental agencies to deny access for evening and weekend activities when the line between official school activities and the activities of religious organizations merely using school facilities is more clearly delineated, he said.
___That is not to say that equal access will cease to be an issue, warned Roth, who represented the CrossRoads church and its pastor in the Texas case.
___"The Supreme Court has made the law very clear that churches and other religious organizations cannot be discriminated against in equal-access matters, but I thought the law was already clear," he said.
___While Roth hopes the Good News ruling will make equal access easier for churches to come by, he is only cautiously optimistic. "I'm optimistic, but I've been disappointed by the reaction of some school and city officials who say the law only applies to this specific case."
___Walker agreed that not all issues of religious groups using public buildings are resolved.
___"These are tough cases, and that is why we have the Supreme Court to make these types of decisions," he said. "Even with the Good News decision, it was only by a 6-3 margin, so there are still some differences of opinion."
___One area of the law that has been clearly established by the courts, both Walker and Roth agreed, is that if a school district allows any outside groups to use school facilities, it cannot deny some groups use of the same facilities simply because their programming is religious in nature.
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