Fellowship Baptist Church v. Benton, Civ. No. 81-546-C.

• Decision Date: 26 September 1985
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 81-546-C.
• Citation: 620 F. Supp. 308
• Parties: FELLOWSHIP BAPTIST CHURCH, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Robert T. BENTON, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Iowa

620 F. Supp. 308

FELLOWSHIP BAPTIST CHURCH, et al., Plaintiffs,
v.
Robert T. BENTON, et al., Defendants.

Civ. No. 81-546-C.

United States District Court, S.D. Iowa, C.D.

September 26, 1985.

620 F. Supp. 309

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

620 F. Supp. 310

Charles E. Craze and Daniel Loomis, Gibbs & Craze, Parma Heights, Ohio and Craig Hasting & Terry Hamilton, Clark, Clark & Hastings, Ames, Iowa, for plaintiffs

Thomas J. Miller, Atty. Gen. of Iowa, Merle Fleming, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Ivan T. Webber, Keokuk, Iowa, for defendants.

ORDER

STUART, District Judge.

This lawsuit involves the serious tensions that result when the religious freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution appear to be in conflict with the state's compelling interest in seeing that its children are properly educated.

Plaintiffs are two churches which operate Christian schools in Marshalltown and Keokuk, Iowa, as part of their "educational ministry"; the churches' pastors; the schools' principals and several teachers; students' parents; and students of the schools. They brought this action for declaratory and injunctive relief pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, with jurisdiction predicated on 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3) and (4). Plaintiffs challenge the constitutionality of Iowa's statutory and regulatory scheme which governs nonpublic education in the state. The broad issue is whether the requirements of Iowa's compulsory education laws impose unconstitutional burdens on the plaintiffs. "Courts must move with great circumspection in performing the sensitive and delicate task of weighing a State's legitimate social concern when faced with religious claims for exemption from generally applicable educational requirements." Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 235, 92 S.Ct. 1526, 1543, 32 L.Ed.2d 15 (1972).

The plaintiff churches operate day schools through the 12th grade. They do not comply with the reporting requirements of Iowa Code § 299.3. They do not employ certified teachers, which subjects the parents of the students to prosecution for failure to comply with the compulsory attendance requirements of § 299.1. Plaintiffs state their claims as follows:

I. Imposition of Iowa's School Regulatory Scheme Upon the Plaintiffs Violates Rights of Plaintiffs Protected By The Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and by Article I, Sections 3 and 4 of the Iowa Constitution.

II. Imposition of the State Regulatory Scheme Upon the Churches, Pastors, Administrators, and Instructors Violates Rights Protected By The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and By Article I, Sections 3 and 4 of the Iowa Constitution.

III. Imposition of the State Regulatory Scheme Violates the Rights of the Parents, Instructors and Children to Express, Transmit, and Receive Ideas Contrary To the Provisions of the First, Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States and Article I, Sections 9 and 20 of the Constitution of the State of Iowa.

620 F. Supp. 311

IV. The Iowa School Laws and Regulations are Vague in Violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 9 of the Iowa Constitution.

V. The Reporting Required of Plaintiffs by the Iowa School Laws and Regulations Violates Rights of Plaintiffs to Freedom of Association Protected By the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 20 of the Iowa Constitution.

VI. The Requirement That The Plaintiff Instructors Apply for and Accept a State Teacher's Certificate When Their Faith Prohibits Them From So Doing Absolutely Infringes Their Right to Pursue Their Religious Avocation in Violation of the Due Process Rights Guaranteed Them By the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 9 of the Iowa Constitution.

VII. By the Terms of the Iowa Constitution and the Statutes Promulgated Thereunder, The State of Iowa May Not Require Certification of Private School Teachers.

VIII. Plaintiffs Have Been Denied or Are Purportedly Ineligible for the Grant of Statutory Exemptions From the Strict Application of the System of School Regulations and Controls in Violation of Their Right to Equal Protection of the Law Guaranteed By the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The conflict between the free exercise of religion and government action is not new. In 1878 the Supreme Court dealt with the conflict between the Mormon Church's religious doctrine requiring the practice of polygamy and the statute prohibiting it. The Court there made the distinction between beliefs and practices that still exists:

Laws are made for the government of actions and while they cannot interfere with mere religious beliefs and opinions, they may with practices.

Reynolds v. United States, 8 Otto 145, 98 U.S. 145, 166, 25 L.Ed. 244 (1878). See also Sherbert v. Verner, 374 U.S. 398, 402-03, 83 S.Ct. 1790, 1792-93, 10 L.Ed.2d 965 (1963).

In 1922, the Court in Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 403, 43 S.Ct. 625, 628, 67 L.Ed. 1042 (1923), considered the government's power to control education in dealing with a Nebraska statute that prohibited the teaching of German language in schools. Although the Court recognized the "power of the State to compel attendance at some school and to make reasonable regulations for all schools," it held that the statute interfered with the individual's liberty interest and as applied "is arbitrary and without reasonable relation to any end within the competency of the state." Ibid., 374 U.S., at 402-03, 83 S.Ct. at 1792-93.

In Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 45 S.Ct. 571, 69 L.Ed. 1070 (1925) the Supreme Court held that a statute requiring children between eight and sixteen who had not completed the 8th grade to attend public school interfered with "the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children under their control." Ibid. at 534, 45 S.Ct. at 573. In connection with the State's interest, the court stated:

No question is raised concerning the power of the State reasonably to regulate all schools, to inspect, supervise and examine them, their teachers and pupils; to require that all children of proper age attend some school, that teachers shall be of good moral character and patriotic disposition, that certain studies plainly essential to good citizenship must be taught and that nothing be taught that is manifestly inimical to the public welfare.

Ibid. at 534, 45 S.Ct. at 573.

This Court obtains much of its guidance from Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 92

620 F. Supp. 312

S.Ct. 1526, 32 L.Ed.2d 15 (1972), in which the court dealt with the conflict between Amish religious beliefs including their inseparable mode of life and the Wisconsin laws requirementing formal education to age sixteen, even if the 8th grade had been completed. The Yoder court sets forth the principles to be applied in resolving the conflict between the Free Exercise Clause and a State's compelling interest

There is no doubt as to the power of a State, having a high responsibility for education of its citizens, to impose reasonable regulations for the control and duration of basic education. See, e.g. Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 534 45 S.Ct. 571, 573, 69 L.Ed. 1070 (1925). Providing public schools ranks at the very apex of the function of a State. Yet even this paramount responsibility was, in Pierce, made to yield to the right of parents to provide an equivalent education in a privately operated system. There the Court held that Oregon's statute compelling attendance in a public school from age eight to age 16 unreasonably interfered with the interest of parents in directing the rearing of their offspring, including their education in church-operated schools. As that case suggests, the values of parental direction of the religious upbringing and education of their children in their early and formative years have a high place in our society. See also Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U.S. 629, 639 88 S.Ct. 1274, 1280, 20 L.Ed.2d 195 (1968); Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 43 S.Ct. 625, 67 L.Ed. 1042 (1923); cf. Rowan v. Post Office Dept., 397 U.S. 728 90 S.Ct. 1484, 25 L.Ed.2d 736 (1970). Thus, a State's interest in universal education, however highly we rank it, is not totally free from a balancing process when it impinges on fundamental rights and interests, such as those specifically protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, and the traditional interest of parents with respect to the religious upbringing of their children so long as they, in the words of Pierce, "prepare them for additional obligations." 268 U.S. at 535 45 S.Ct. at 573.

It follows that in order for Wisconsin to compel school attendance beyond the eighth grade against a claim that such attendance interferes with the practice of a legitimate religious belief, it must appear either that the State does not deny the free exercise of religious belief by its requirement, or that there is a state interest of sufficient magnitude to override the interest claiming protection under the Free Exercise Clause.

Ibid. at 213-14, 92 S.Ct. at 1532-33. The Court then stated:

The essence of all that has been said and written on the subject is that only those interests of the highest order and those not otherwise served can

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