More than eight months after Kountze High School cheerleaders first hoisted banners at football games quoting Scripture, a judge Wednesday declared the signs OK, overturning an earlier school district prohibition against them and inviting more challenge from an out-of-state organization opposing them.
With less than a month to go before a scheduled hearing on the matter, Hardin County 356th District Court Judge Steve Thomas issued a written ruling that effectively formalized an injunction in effect all last fall that permitted the signs to be displayed.
The case created a national stir and the cheerleaders became somewhat famous with appearances on morning talk shows and headlines in papers across the country.
Thomas said in his ruling that the “evidence in this case confirms that religious messages expressed on run-through banners have not created, and will not create, an establishment of religion in the Kountze community,” and that the banners were constitutionally permissible.
The Liberty Institute, the group that represented the cheerleaders in the lawsuit along with a Beaumont attorney, hailed the decision as a “victory” and called it “a successful end,” according to a statement on its website.
But Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor said she anticipates the debate will continue.
Gaylor, whose group complained about the use of the signs last fall in response to a complaint from someone in the bleachers, said the case belonged in a federal court, not a local state court presided over by an elected judge.
She said her group hopes to represent someone – a student, parent, faculty or anyone else in the stands – who objects to the banners at high school football games.
Gaylor said the banners are divisive and send “a Christian message that Christians are insiders,” and everyone else is an outsider, something that could be particularly difficult for an atheist athlete who might not want to speak out due to fears of damaging his athletic career.
Thomas’ ruling was based on a Texas law that calls the cheerleaders’ banners “private speech,” though the sentiments they express are on view at a taxpayer-funded event.
“The establishment (of religion) clause just does not apply to the cheerleaders,” said Hiram Sasser, director of litigation for The Liberty Institute. “State law says it’s their banners, not the school district’s banners.”
After a former Kountze superintendent banned the use of the signs in September 2012, the cheerleaders’ parents hired Beaumont attorney David Starnes to file an injunction on their behalf. The 15 cheerleaders claimed the district could not tell them what message to put on the banners since the girls paid for the supplies and created the signs on their own time.
But Gaylor said she did not see how the cheerleaders, who wear uniforms with the school’s name on them, sign a code of conduct and perform at school events, aren’t considered to be representing the school with their banners.
“In our opinion, this court just said that Christianity is an official school religion,” Gaylor said, citing as a precedent, the case Santa Fe vs. Doe in 2000, when Mormon and Catholic students’ objections to Baptist student-led prayers over school intercoms were upheld in a federal court.
She also felt the court decision was unnecessary, since Gaylor said the school board recently decided to allow the cheerleaders to display the signs and thus end the injunction granted by Thomas in October.
The temporary injunction allowing the signs was originally scheduled to end June 17.
But Sasser said the district has been “saying one thing in the public and doing something different in the case. They have fought us tooth and nail and spent tens of thousands of dollars, maybe more than that fighting this.”
Starnes said he doesn’t expect the school district’s attorney to file an appeal, but if he does, the appeal would go to the Ninth Court of Appeals in Beaumont and then possibly to the Texas Supreme Court.
Starnes said he was glad the case did not go to trial because it would have been stressful for his clients.
Cheerleader Rebekah Richardson said the court process has taught her a new level of patience and increased her faith.
Kieara Moffett, who wore a “We cheer for Christ” T-shirt during a Wednesday news conference at Starnes’ office, said if future cheerleaders decide they don’t want to use banners with Scripture on them, that’s fine.
“We want it to be something that comes from the heart not because you have too,” the high school junior said.
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott and Gov. Rick Perry on Wednesday called the decision a victory for religious liberties and free speech.
“The Freedom From Religion Foundation was wrong in trying to bully Kountze ISD into prohibiting the cheerleaders from displaying banners with religious messages,” Abbot said in a Wednesday news release. “Students’ ability to express their religious views adds to the diversity of thought that has made this country so strong. I’m very proud of these young ladies – standing up for what you believe in isn’t always easy, but it’s always the right thing to do.”
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