Bell v. Little Axe Independent School Dist. No. 70 of Cleveland County, 70
| Decision Date | 26 June 1985 |
| Docket Number | 83-1493,Nos. 83-1458,No. 70,70,s. 83-1458 |
| Citation | 766 F.2d 1391 |
| Parties | , 26 Ed. Law Rep. 152 Joann BELL and Lucille McCord, Plaintiffs-Appellees-Cross-Appellants, v. The LITTLE AXE INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 70 OF CLEVELAND COUNTY; the Board of Education of the Little Axe Independent School Districtof Cleveland County, Elizabeth Butts, Henry Johnson, Charles Littlejim, Bill Scott, individually and as members of the Board of Education of Little Axe Independent School Districtof Cleveland County; and Michael Luther, as a member of the Board of Education of Little Axe Independent School District of Cleveland County; and Charles D. Holleyman, individually and as former superintendent of Little Axe Independent School Districtof Cleveland County; and Paul Pettigrew, individually and as superintendent of Little Axe Independent School Districtof Cleveland County; and Larry Garner, individually and as former elementary principal of Little Axe Independent School District of Cleveland County; and Randall Prestgrove, individually and as elementary principal of Little Axe Independent School Districtof Cleveland County, Defendants-Appellants-Cross- Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit |
Micheal Salem of Rawdon and Salem, Norman, Okl., for the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma for plaintiffs-appellees-cross-appellants.
Ruti G. Teitel, Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, New York City (Justin J. William D. Graves, Oklahoma City, Okl., for defendants-appellants-cross-appellees.
Finger and Jeffrey P. Sinensky, Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, New York City, and Marc D. Stern, American Jewish Congress, New York City, of counsel), as amici curiae for plaintiffs-appellees-cross-appellants.
Lee Boothby, Attorney for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Berrien Springs, Miss. (Robert W. Nixon, Washington, D.C., of counsel), filed an amicus brief for plaintiffs-appellees-cross-appellants.
Charles E. Rice of Notre Dame Law School, Notre Dame, Ind., filed an amicus brief for defendants-appellants-cross-appellees.
Samuel E. Ericsson and Kimberlee W. Colby, Attorneys for the Center for Law & Religious Freedom of the Christian Legal Society, Springfield, Va., filed an amicus brief for defendants-appellants-cross-appellees.
Before HOLLOWAY, Chief Judge, and BARRETT and SEYMOUR, Circuit Judges.
Plaintiff parents Joann Bell and Lucille McCord sued the Little Axe Independent School District, 1 the school board and its individual members, and several administrative officials (the District) under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 (1982), claiming that various District policies and practices violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. In their initial complaint, Bell and McCord sought injunctive relief against the District for permitting religious meetings to be held on school premises during school hours and for permitting the distribution of Bibles at the school. They also sought a declaration that the Oklahoma voluntary prayer statute, Okla.Stat. tit. 70, Sec. 11-101.1 (1981), was unconstitutional. When the District subsequently adopted an equal access policy, in part as a response to this lawsuit, Bell and McCord amended their complaint to challenge the policy and to request damages for the alleged violations of their civil rights.
Following a non-jury trial, the district court enjoined the religious meetings but found the Bible distribution claim to be moot. It further held that the District's policy was not facially unconstitutional and that the state prayer statute was never at issue since the District denied reliance on it for its actions. The court also refused to award either compensatory or punitive damages.
Both parties now appeal. Bell and McCord assert that the district court should have granted relief on all claims. The District, in turn, argues first that plaintiffs had no standing to bring this action, and second that enjoining the meetings violated the students' freedom of speech and religion. We affirm the district court in most respects but reverse and remand on the issue of damages.
Joann Bell and Lucille McCord each have several children who have attended Little Axe School. During the 1980-81 school year, their children told them of certain religious meetings held before class every Thursday morning. Testimony in the record indicates that other students asked the Bell and McCord children why they had not chosen to attend the meetings, asserting that they therefore must not believe in God. Consequently, Bell and McCord notified defendant Holleyman, then school superintendent of the district, of their concern. Upon investigation, he found that several teachers were supervising and participating in religiously-oriented meetings involving students and non-students on Thursdays between 8:00 and 8:25 a.m. He ordered the meetings suspended until the school board could consider the matter.
The meetings had been started by several students and a faculty sponsor so "that youth would be influenced in a positive way to seek God and good in their own lives and in others." 2 Pl.Ex. 35. The meetings were advertised by posters in the halls and announcements in school publications. 3 Between five and forty students, including elementary age schoolchildren, attended the meetings that began shortly after school buses arrived. 4 Speakers sometimes appeared at the invitation of a student, but usually at the behest of a teacher or a person unrelated to the school. The speakers included a minister, local athletes, and others speaking about how God and Christianity had benefited the speaker in his or her daily life. The program also included prayers, songs, and "testimony" of students and other individuals concerning the benefits of knowing Jesus Christ.
The school board first considered the issue at a board meeting in April 1981 before an agitated crowd. On a 4-1 vote, the board decided to permit the meetings to continue until such time as the meetings were declared unlawful. Prior to the vote, the dissenting board member, Sheri Lambeth, expressed her concern that the meetings were against the law and that the board was obliged to uphold the law. Another board member shared Lambeth's concern that the meetings were unlawful, but voted to continue them. Following the vote, the board president, Elizabeth Butts, exclaimed, "bring on the ACLU." Tr., vol. I, at 35-36. At no time did the board or the administration solicit a legal opinion as to the constitutionality of the meetings. The meetings resumed, and the plaintiffs filed this action. 5
After initiating this lawsuit, both plaintiffs received numerous threatening telephone calls and letters. Their children were called "devil-worshippers" by other students and, in one instance, an upside-down cross was hung on Robert McCord's locker. At the school sports banquet, their two sons who had played football, basketball, and baseball, were the only two children who were not recognized by name as being Little Axe athletes. Joann Bell was the victim of a hair pulling incident committed by a school employee and, in September 1981, the Bells' home was destroyed by a fire of suspicious origin.
The meetings continued during this time. In November 1981, the board adopted an equal access policy purporting to regulate the student use of school facilities. Although board members generally asserted that they adopted the policy to ensure freedom of speech and religion for the students and to clarify past unwritten policy, at least one member favored the policy, in part, so that the meetings would be allowed to continue. Tr., vol. V, at 986. At the meetings conducted pursuant to this policy, teachers were designated as monitors rather than sponsors or supervisors and were Shortly thereafter, plaintiffs amended their complaint to challenge the new policy and to seek damages for the alleged unconstitutional acts of the District. The harassment persisted and was severe enough to force plaintiffs and their families to move into the adjoining school district for the 1982-83 school year. The meetings continued until October 1982, when the District agreed to suspend the meetings and implementation of the policy pending resolution of the merits at trial.
not permitted to participate. The school, moreover, disclaimed sponsorship of the group. A student committee was formed to solicit speakers, but the format remained unchanged.
At every step of this litigation, the District has asserted that plaintiffs lack standing to raise an Establishment Clause challenge to the meetings, the policy, or the Oklahoma voluntary prayer statute. The district court disagreed, rejecting the District's argument that plaintiffs had no individual standing or, alternatively, that plaintiffs had lost whatever standing they had when they moved out of the district.
As the Supreme Court recently explained, "the term 'standing' subsumes a blend of constitutional requirements and prudential considerations, ..." Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 471, 102 S.Ct. 752, 758, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (citing Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 2205, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975)). Article III requires a party to show that he personally has suffered some actual or threatened injury that can be traced to the challenged action and is likely to be redressed by a favorable decision. Valley Forge, 454 U.S. at 472, 102 S.Ct. at 758. Beyond the constitutional requirements are a set of prudential principles: (1) the plaintiff generally must assert his own legal rights; (2) the court must refrain from adjudicating "generalized grievances" most appropriately addressed by one of the other branches of government; and (3) the plaintiff's complaint must fall within the zone of interests to be protected by...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Roberts v. Madigan
... ... principal of Berkeley Gardens Elementary School, and Adams County School District No. 50, ... , Colo., for Kathleen Madigan and School Dist. No. 50 ... MEMORANDUM ... students for a daily fifteen-minute independent reading period. Students are free to choose the ... 97, 103-4, 89 S.Ct. 266, 269-70, 21 L.Ed.2d 228 (1968) ... Bell v. Little Axe Independent School Dist. No. 70, ... ...
-
Good News/Good Sports Club v. School Dist. of City of Ladue
... ... Maries County, 792 F.2d 746, 749 (8th Cir.1986) (construing ... 263, 271, 102 S.Ct. 269, 275, 70 L.Ed.2d 440 (1981)) (alteration by Lamb's Chapel ... at 5. We have little trouble concluding that opening the schools for ... In Bell v. Little Axe Indep. School Dist. No. 76, 766 ... ...
-
Oliverson v. West Valley City
... ... 464, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982). The constitutional claim must ... 1660, 75 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983); Little, It's About Time: Unravelling Standing and ... County of Riverside v. McLaughlin, 500 U.S. 44, 51, 111 ... 2d 49 (1991) ("direct & current injury"); Bell v. Little Axe Independent School Dist., 766 F.2d ... See also Cleveland v. United States, 146 F.2d 730 (10th Cir.1945), ... ...
-
Friedman v. Board of County Com'rs of Bernalillo County
... ... analysis with recitation of the three independent tests of Lemon, 403 U.S. at 612-13, 91 S.Ct. at ... 192, 193, 66 L.Ed.2d 199 (1980); Bell v. Little Axe Independent School District, 766 ... Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 10 ... 263, 271 n. 8, 102 S.Ct. 269, 275 n. 8, 70 L.Ed.2d 440 (1981). The Establishment Clause ... ...