Christian Legal Society v. Walker

Decision Date10 July 2006
Docket NumberNo. 05-3239.,05-3239.
PartiesCHRISTIAN LEGAL SOCIETY, Chapter at Southern Illinois University School of Law, a Student Organization at the Southern Illinois University School of Law on behalf of itself and its individual members, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. James E. WALKER, in his official capacity of President of Southern Illinois University, Peter C. Alexander, in his official capacity as Dean of Southern Illinois University School of Law, Jessica J. Davis, in her official capacity as Director of Law Student Development, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Gregory S. Baylor (argued), Springfield, VA, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Ian P. Cooper (argued), Tueth, Keeney, Cooper, Mohan & Jackstadt, St. Louis, MO, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before KANNE, WOOD, and SYKES, Circuit Judges.

SYKES, Circuit Judge.

The dean of Southern Illinois University's School of Law ("SIU") revoked the official student organization status of the Christian Legal Society ("CLS") chapter at SIU because he concluded that CLS's membership policies, which preclude membership to those who engage in or affirm homosexual conduct, violate SIU's nondiscrimination policies. CLS sued SIU for violating its First Amendment rights to free speech, expressive association, and free exercise of religion, and its Fourteenth Amendment rights of equal protection and due process. CLS moved for a preliminary injunction, asking that its official student organization status be restored, but the district court denied the motion. We reverse.

I. Background

Southern Illinois University at Carbondale and its School of Law, a public university and law school, encourage and support a wide variety of student organizations and invite them to apply for official recognition. The benefits of recognition are several. If an organization is officially recognized by the law school, benefits include access to the law school List-Serve (the law school's database of e-mail addresses), permission to post information on law school bulletin boards, an appearance on lists of official student organizations in law school publications and on its website, the ability to reserve conference rooms and meeting and storage space, a faculty advisor, and law school money. During the 2004-2005 school year, SIU School of Law recognized seventeen student organizations—among them, the Black Law Student Association, the Federalist Society, the Hispanic Law Student Association, Law School Democrats, Lesbian and Gay Law Students and Supporters, SIU Law School Republicans, the Student Animal Legal Defense Fund, Women's Law Forum, and CLS. Recognition by the law school does not automatically bestow upon an organization recognition by the larger university, however. For that, organizations must make separate application to SIU; the upside is even more benefits. Groups that register with the university also get university money (it is not clear how much) and access to meeting space at the SIU student center. In June 2005 SIU had 404 registered student organizations.

CLS is a nationwide association of legal professionals and law students who share (broadly speaking) a common faith—Christianity. Members are expected to subscribe to a statement of faith and agree to live by certain moral principles. One of those principles, the one that has caused the dispute in this case, is that sexual activity outside of a traditional (one man, one woman) marriage is forbidden. That means, in addition to fornication and adultery, CLS disapproves active homosexuality. CLS welcomes anyone to its meetings, but voting members and officers of the organization must subscribe to the statement of faith, meaning, among other things, that they must not engage in or approve of fornication, adultery, or homosexual conduct; or, having done so, must repent of that conduct.

In February 2005 someone complained to SIU about CLS's membership and leadership requirements that preclude active homosexuals from becoming voting members or officers. SIU informed CLS of the complaint and asked to see a statement of CLS's membership and leadership policies. CLS obliged. It explained that while "[a]ny student is welcome to participate in CLS chapter meetings and other activities," voting members and officers must subscribe to certain basic principles and beliefs contained in CLS's statement of faith, "including the Bible's prohibition of sexual conduct between persons of the same sex." CLS also told SIU that a person "who may have engaged in homosexual conduct in the past but has repented of that conduct, or who has homosexual inclinations but does not engage in or affirm homosexual conduct, would not be prevented from serving as an officer or member."

In response, the law school dean revoked CLS's registered student organization status, telling CLS that the "tenets of the national CLS" violated two university policies. The first is SIU's Affirmative Action/Equal Employment Opportunity Policy. In pertinent part, the policy states that SIU will "provide equal employment and education opportunities for all qualified persons without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, status as a disabled veteran of the Vietnam era, sexual orientation, or marital status." The second is a policy of the SIU Board of Trustees which provides that "[n]o student constituency body or recognized student organization shall be authorized unless it adheres to all appropriate federal or state laws concerning nondiscrimination and equal opportunity." As a result of derecognition, CLS was no longer able to reserve law school rooms for private meetings. CLS could use law school classrooms to meet, but not privately — other students and faculty were free to come and go from the room. CLS also was denied access to law school bulletin boards, representation on the law school's website or in its publications, and the liberty to refer to itself as the "SIU Chapter of" the Christian Legal Society. Finally, CLS was stripped of an official faculty advisor, free use of the SIU School of Law auditorium, access to the law school's List-Serve, and any funds provided to registered student organizations.

CLS brought suit against the dean and several other SIU officials — we will use the shorthand "SIU" to refer to all the defendants — and quickly moved for a preliminary injunction. CLS claimed that SIU violated CLS's First Amendment rights of expressive association, free speech, and free exercise of religion. CLS also alleged that it was denied equal protection and due process. On the basis of the record information we have recounted here, the district court denied the motion, holding that CLS's likelihood of success on the merits was "at best ... a close question." The district court also held that CLS had not suffered irreparable harm because CLS still existed as an organization, just without the official student organization recognition and benefits conferred by the university. At most, said the district judge, the harm from derecognition was "speculative." As the judge saw it, CLS would merely have to "use other meeting areas and other ways to communicate" with students.

CLS appealed and moved for an injunction pending appeal, focusing primarily on its expressive association claim and its right of access to a speaking forum. Granting the injunction pending appeal, we concluded preliminarily that CLS had a reasonable likelihood of success on the merits and that it had shown irreparable harm. The matter was expedited and has now been fully briefed and argued. Our decision has not changed.

II. Discussion

To win a preliminary injunction, a party must show that it is reasonably likely to succeed on the merits, it is suffering irreparable harm that outweighs any harm the nonmoving party will suffer if the injunction is granted, there is no adequate remedy at law, and an injunction would not harm the public interest. Joelner v. Vill. of Wash. Park, 378 F.3d 613, 619 (7th Cir.2004). If the moving party meets this threshold burden, the district court weighs the factors against one another in a sliding scale analysis, id., which is to say the district court must exercise its discretion to determine whether the balance of harms weighs in favor of the moving party or whether the nonmoving party or public interest will be harmed sufficiently that the injunction should be denied.

In a First Amendment case, we are required to make an independent review of the record because "the reaches of the First Amendment are ultimately defined by the facts it is held to embrace," and the reviewing court must decide independently whether "a given course of conduct falls on the near or far side of the line of constitutional protection." Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual Group of Boston, 515 U.S. 557, 567, 115 S.Ct. 2338, 132 L.Ed.2d 487 (1995); see also Boy Scouts of Am. v. Dale, 530 U.S. 640, 648-49, 120 S.Ct. 2446, 147 L.Ed.2d 554 (2000). On a review of the district court's denial of a preliminary injunction, legal conclusions are reviewed de novo, findings of historical or evidentiary fact for clear error, and the balancing of the injunction factors for an abuse of discretion. Joelner, 378 F.3d at 620. Our task is simplified here because only the first two injunction factors are disputed. The loss of First Amendment freedoms is presumed to constitute an irreparable injury for which money damages are not adequate, and injunctions protecting First Amendment freedoms are always in the public interest. Id.; see also Elrod v. Burns, 427 U.S. 347, 373, 96 S.Ct. 2673, 49 L.Ed.2d 547 (1976) ("The loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.").

A. Likelihood of Success on the Merits

The district court concluded that because...

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