Barnette v. West Virginia State Board of Ed.

• Decision Date: 06 October 1942
• Docket Number: No. 242.,242.
• Citation: 47 F. Supp. 251
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of West Virginia
• Parties: BARNETTE et al. v. WEST VIRGINIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION et al.

47 F. Supp. 251

BARNETTE et al. v. WEST VIRGINIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION et al.

No. 242.

District Court, S. D. West Virginia.

October 6, 1942.

Hayden C. Covington, of Brooklyn, N. Y., and Horace S. Meldahl, of Charleston, W. Va., for plaintiffs.

William S. Wysong, Atty. Gen. of West Virginia, and Ira J. Partlow, Asst. Atty. Gen. of West Virginia, for defendants.

Before PARKER, Circuit Judge, and HARRY E. WATKINS and MOORE, District Judges.

PARKER, Circuit Judge.

This is a suit by three persons belonging to the sect known as "Jehovah's Witnesses", who have children attending the public schools of West Virginia, against the Board of Education of that state. It is brought by plaintiffs in behalf of themselves and their children and all other persons in the State of West Virginia in like situation, and its purpose is to secure an injunction restraining the State Board of Education from enforcing against them a regulation of the Board requiring children in the public schools to salute the American flag. They allege that they and their children and other persons belonging to the sect of "Jehovah's Witnesses" believe that a flag salute of the kind required by the Board is a violation of the second commandment of the Decalogue, as contained in the 20th chapter of the Book of Exodus; that because of this belief they cannot comply with the regulation of the Board; that, if they fail to comply, the children will be expelled from school, and thus be deprived of the benefits of the state's public school system; and that plaintiffs, in such event, will have to provide them education in private schools at great expense or be subjected to prosecution for crime for failing to send them to school, as required by the compulsory school attendance law of the state. They contend, therefore, that the regulation amounts to a denial of religious liberty and is violative of rights which the first amendment to the federal Constitution protects against impairment by the federal government and which the 14th Amendment protects against impairment by the states.

A motion has been made to dismiss the bill on the ground that the regulation of the Board is a proper exercise of power vested in it by the State of West Virginia, and that, under the doctrine of Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586, 60 S.Ct. 1010, 84 L.Ed. 1375, 127 A.L.R. 1493, the flag salute which it requires cannot be held a violation of the religious rights of plaintiffs. The case was heard on application for interlocutory injunction; but the parties have agreed that it be submitted for final decree on the bill and motion to dismiss. No question is raised as to jurisdiction; and it appears from the face of the bill that the case is one arising under the Constitution of the United States involving, as to each plaintiff, a sum in excess of $3,000, since it is alleged that each of plaintiffs would be required to incur expense in excess of that amount if their children should be excluded from the public schools. And it seems clear that there is jurisdiction, irrespective of the amount involved, since the suit is for the protection of rights and privileges guaranteed by the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, and jurisdiction is given by Judicial Code § 24(14), 28 U.S.C.A. § 41(14). Hague v. C. I. O., 307 U.S. 496, 525, 59 S.Ct. 954, 83 L.Ed. 1423. There is, therefore, but one question for our decision, viz.: Whether children who for religious reasons have conscientious scruples against saluting the flag of the country can lawfully be required to salute it. We think that this question must be answered in the negative.

Ordinarily we would feel constrained to follow an unreversed decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, whether we agreed with it or not. It is true that decisions are but evidences of the law and not the law itself; but the decisions of the Supreme Court must be accepted by the lower courts as binding upon them if any orderly administration of justice is to be attained. The developments with respect to the Gobitis case, however, are such that we do not feel that it is incumbent upon us to accept it as binding authority. Of the seven justices now members of the Supreme Court who participated in that decision, four have given public expression to the view that it is unsound, the present Chief Justice in his dissenting opinion rendered therein and three other justices in a special dissenting opinion in Jones v. City of Opelika, 316 U.S. 584, 62 S.Ct. 1231, 1251, 86 L.Ed. 1691. The majority of the court in Jones v. City of Opelika, moreover, thought it worth while to distinguish the decision in the Gobitis case, instead of relying upon it as supporting authority. Under such circumstances and believing, as we do, that the flag salute here required is violative of religious liberty when required of persons holding the religious views of plaintiffs, we feel that we would be recreant to our duty as judges, if through a blind following of a decision which the Supreme Court itself has thus impaired as an authority, we should deny protection to rights which we regard as among the most sacred of those protected by constitutional guaranties.

There is, of course, nothing improper in requiring a flag salute in the schools. On the contrary, we regard it as a highly desirable ceremony calculated to inspire in the pupils a proper love of country and reverence for its institutions. And, from our point of view, we see nothing in the salute which could reasonably be held a violation of any of the commandments in the Bible or of any of the duties owing by man to his Maker. But this is not the question before us. Admittedly plaintiffs and their children do have conscientious scruples, whether reasonable or not, against saluting the flag, and these scruples are based on religious grounds. If they are required to salute the flag, or are denied rights or privileges which belong to them as citizens because they fail to salute it, they are unquestionably denied that religious freedom which the Constitution guarantees. The right of religious freedom embraces not only the right to worship God according to the dictates of one's...