On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court released another blockbuster decision. The Court finally struck down a 51-year-old judicial activist decision known as Lemon v. Kurtzman. This is a resounding win for Free Speech and Free Exercise of Religion. Liberty Counsel is now 4-0 on rulings we either argued or for which we submitted extensive briefs to the High Court this term! Read on to learn about the latest ruling and how Liberty Counsel’s 9-0 decision in the Boston Christian flag case helped bring about this latest victory.

We thank God for these victories, but we need YOUR help to continue fighting for religious freedom, free speech and life. The last two years battling unbridled tyranny has stretched our team. And now, with the vaccine mandates and the exponential increase in work defending life in Congress and the states, we need your help. Please, consider a generous donation that will be DOUBLED in impact by the Challenge Grant. — Mat

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In 2008, Coach Joe Kennedy promised God he would pray and give thanks after each game he coached, regardless of the outcome. He would simply drop to one knee and “offer a silent or quiet prayer of thanksgiving for player safety, sportsmanship, and spirited competition.” He did this for many years without any complaints, and as time went on, members of the community and players often joined him.

In 2015, the school district ordered Kennedy to stop his post-game prayers, stating his practice violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, citing the 1971 so-called Lemon test. Then, the Bremerton, WA, School District FIRED Coach Kennedy.

The school district used the same false argument as Boston to unlawfully discriminate against Camp Constitution in our “Christian flag” case. In Shurtleff v. City of Boston, the city would allow the same flag if Hal Shurtleff deemed it secular. A “Camp Constitution flag,” with the same image, was fine. A “Christian flag” was not.

So, too, with Coach Kennedy. If he kneeled on the field and thought secular thoughts, that was permitted. But silent Christian thoughts were not. The governments in both cases used the 1971 Lemon test arguing that they had to censor the Christian speech and exercise of religion. They were wrong!

In our Christian flag case that I argued before Court, Boston said the private speech of Camp Constitution was actually “government speech.” Yet, Boston allowed every other viewpoint on its public forum flagpole—except Christian viewpoints. On May 2, 2022, the Court ruled 9-0 in our favor.

Coach Kennedy’s case was the same song, different verse. The facts in both cases were essentially the same—government censorship of religious viewpoints using the Lemon test as justification.

Since founding Liberty Counsel in 1989, we fought to overturn the judicial activist Lemon test that perverted the Establishment Clause and caused incredible damage to America. Lemon is now dead!

The Justices referred to our Christian flag case in the Coach Kennedy opinion, saying: “In fact, just this Term the Court unanimously rejected a city’s attempt to censor religious speech based on Lemon and the endorsement test (See Shurtleff, 596 U.S.).”

The High Court also wrote, “Respect for religious expressions is indispensable to life in a free and diverse Republic—whether those expressions take place in a sanctuary or on a field, and whether they manifest through the spoken word or a bowed head.”

“Here, a government entity sought to punish an individual for engaging in a brief, quiet, personal religious observance doubly protected by the Free Exercise and Free Speech Clauses of the First Amendment. And the only meaningful justification the government offered for its reprisal rested on a mistaken view that it had a duty to ferret out and suppress religious observances even as it allows comparable secular speech. The Constitution neither mandates nor tolerates that kind of discrimination.”

Praise God for a High Court that has reversed the errors of previous “activist” judges and Justices! The Supreme Court has restored the First Amendment, preserving the right to religious freedom and speech!

Liberty Counsel started this Supreme Court session’s advance of religious liberty with our Christian flag case, and we closed it with our work on the Coach Kennedy case. We won all four cases we argued or briefed before the High Court this session. These victories will have generational impact.

Please help us continue fighting for life and freedom with a recurring monthly donation and have YOUR GIFT’S IMPACT DOUBLED by a generous Challenge Grant. Please give today!

Mat Staver
Founder and Chairman
Liberty Counsel

Sources:

“SCOTUS Rules in Favor of Coach Kennedy.” Liberty Counsel, June 27, 2022. Lc.org/newsroom/details/062422-scotus-overturns-roe-v-wade.

Staver, Matthew, Anita Staver, Horatio Mihet, Roger Gannam, and Daniel Schmid. “Supreme Court of the United States on Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit BRIEF of AMICUS CURIAE LIBERTY COUNSEL in SUPPORT of PETITIONER Counsel for Amicus.” March 1, 2022. Lc.org/PDFs/Attachments2PRsLAs/2022/030222KennedyAmicusBrief.pdf.