Saving the World -- One Kindergartener at a Time

The United States Supreme Court recently denied certiorari in the case of Peck v. Baldwinsville Central School District, a case out of New York City that was decided in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The Court’s decision not to hear the case left intact the Second Circuit’s opinion, which ruled that a kindergartener named Antonio Peck (and his parents) had provided enough evidence to warrant a jury trial on whether the child's free speech rights had been violated. In brief, the child had been asked to make a poster that portrayed a way to save the environment. With the help of his mother, the child made a poster that said the only way the environment could be saved was through Jesus. School officials asked the child to redo the poster, which he did; the new poster contained less religious content, although it did depict a church, a cross, and a small Jesus figure. The school allowed the second poster to be displayed along with the other children's posters in the school auditorium, but the principal instructed that Antonio's poster be folded to conceal the religious components.

The Pecks sued for viewpoint discrimination, and the federal district court granted summary judgment to the school, effectively saying that the Pecks were not able to state a claim for a violation of free speech rights. But the Second Circuit reversed, saying that issues of fact remained on the free speech claim, which would need to be resolved by a jury. (Read a summary of the Second Circuit’s opinion here.) The Second Circuit wrote that "[A] manifestly viewpoint-discriminatory restriction on school-sponsored speech is . . . unconstitutional, even if reasonably related to legitimate pedagogical interests."

I tend to agree. These facts present a classic example of how American common law is often the manifestation of a nation arguing with its conscience. (Thanks, Senator Obama, for characterizing it this way in your memoir.) There is a deep balance that needs to be found between the various clauses in the First Amendment, especially these three: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech."

How to find this balance? Andrew made the excellent point that we can be guided here by Jacob Needleman’s vision of American society as the vehicle by which we create conditions of life in which the ultimate questions can be freely pursued. Our goal is to craft a society and a way of life where we can freely engage in our own intellectual, moral, and spiritual searches: a society that allows - and, in fact, encourages - persons to reach their full potential. How best to save the environment is a perfect example of the kind of ultimate question that everyone - from a kindergarten child to a twenty-something blogger to a national leader - must be able to search within himself to answer. My applause to the Second Circuit for taking a step forward in this direction, by creating an environment that allows young Mr. Peck, and others like him, to embark upon the crucial exploration.