A federal appeals court yesterday upheld Virginia's moment of silence law, ruling that requiring public school children to begin each day with meditation does not violate the First Amendment's ban on state-sponsored religion.
Seven families backed by the American Civil Liberties Union had challenged the 2000 law, saying it promoted religion by requiring all of the state's 1 million public school children to set aside a minute each morning to "meditate, pray or engage in other silent activity."
_____Va. Moment of Silence_____
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Va. Minute Of Silence Survives Test In High Court (The Washington Post, Oct 30, 2001)
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Va. Minute of Silence Challenged (The Washington Post, Sep 1, 2001)
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Virginia School Day to Begin With Pledge -- or Not (The Washington Post, Aug 30, 2001)
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Court Hears Challenge To Silent Minute Law (The Washington Post, May 9, 2001)
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Judge Hears Debate on School Law (The Washington Post, Sep 9, 2000)
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Few Va. Students Opt to Walk Away From Moment of Silence (The Washington Post, Sep 6, 2000)
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Injunction Denied On School Silence (The Washington Post, Sep 1, 2000)
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Loudoun Student Pays for Protest (The Washington Post, Aug 30, 2000)
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Minute of Silence Starts (The Washington Post, Aug 29, 2000)
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Subdued Start for Minute of Silence (The Washington Post, Jul 4, 2000)
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A divided panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held yesterday that including the word "prayer" did not make the statute unconstitutional.
"Virginia has introduced at most a minor and nonintrusive accommodation of religion," Judge Paul V. Niemeyer wrote for the 2 to 1 majority. "Just as this short period of quiet serves the religious interests of those students who wish to pray silently, it serves the secular interests of those who do not wish to do so."
ACLU volunteer attorney Stuart Newberger vowed an immediate appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. He cited the dissent by Judge Robert B. King, who said the ruling "spurns controlling precedent" from a 1985 decision striking down a similar Alabama law.
"Minute of silence laws containing the word pray are illegal in Alabama and legal in Virginia. That is intolerable. We have a national system of laws," Newberger said.
But Virginia Attorney General Randolph A. Beales said: "This is a victory for common sense. . . . If the ACLU appeals this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, we will be there to defend the law, yet again."
Virginia schools observed the ritual all last year after U.S. District Judge Claude M. Hilton denied the ACLU's request for a temporary injunction. However, the 4th Circuit ruling has a broader reach because the Richmond-based appeals court's holdings are binding in Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia and the Carolinas.
This case has been closely watched as the first prayer case to reach a federal appeals court since the Supreme Court struck down student-led prayers at high school football games last year. The 6 to 3 majority in that case was skeptical of any effort to introduce religion into public schools.
"The court has shown a consistent intolerance for any formal role for religion in the public schools," said University of Virginia law professor Robert M. O'Neil.
Kent Willis, executive director of the ACLU of Virginia, said his group's hopes for an appeal were bolstered by the dissent.
"The 'minute of silence' mandated by the Virginia statute is, like the Trojan Horse, a hollow guise . . . [for] an effort to once more usher state-sponsored religion into public schools," wrote King, a Clinton appointee. "The majority cannot uphold the constitutionality of the Virginia statute without directly contravening controlling Supreme Court precedent."
But Niemeyer wrote for himself and Judge Karen J. Williams, both appointed by then-President George Bush, that facts surrounding Virginia's law differ from the circumstances in the 1985 case of Wallace v. Jaffree.
In that case, the Alabama legislature was deliberately challenging the ban on school prayer. But "there is no evidence that the Commonwealth of Virginia acted in open defiance of federal constitutional law. To the contrary, its debates reflected serious consideration of relevant Supreme Court precedents," the 40-page opinion said.
Legal analysts said it is not clear whether the high court would wade back into the prayer arena by taking the case of Brown v. Gilmore, when other Establishment Clause issues -- such as school vouchers -- may be more pressing.
"A lot of people who are otherwise strict separationists don't care much," about moment of silence laws, said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
But the student plaintiffs have high hopes.
"Obviously we're very disappointed by the ruling but . . . we've felt all along that this is an issue the Supreme Court should take up," said Katya Kruglak, 16, who attends Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax.
Jordan Kupersmith, 17, who attends Potomac Falls in Loudoun County, said, "This decision has really beaten me up . . . but it's not over."
