Hicks ex rel. Hicks v. Halifax County Bd. Educ.

• Decision Date: 15 December 1999
• Docket Number: No. 5:98-CV-981-BR(2).,5:98-CV-981-BR(2).
• Citation: 93 F.Supp.2d 649
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of North Carolina
• Parties: Catherine HICKS, Aaron Ganues, a minor, By and Through his Guardian ad Litem, Catherine HICKS, Plaintiffs. v. The HALIFAX COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION, Dr. Willie J. Gilchrist, in his individual and official capacity as Superintendent for the Halifax County Board of Education, and Jeffrey D. McCain, in his individual and official capacity as Principal of the McIver Elementary School, Defendants.

93 F.Supp.2d 649

Catherine HICKS, Aaron Ganues, a minor, By and Through his Guardian ad Litem, Catherine HICKS, Plaintiffs. v. The HALIFAX COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION, Dr. Willie J. Gilchrist, in his individual and official capacity as Superintendent for the Halifax County Board of Education, and Jeffrey D. McCain, in his individual and official capacity as Principal of the McIver Elementary School, Defendants.

No. 5:98-CV-981-BR(2).

United States District Court, E.D. North Carolina, Eastern Division.

December 15, 1999.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Martha A. Geer, Patterson, Harkavy & Lawrence, Raleigh, NC, Steven R. Edelstein, Edelstein & Payne, Raleigh, NC, Mebane Rash Whitman, ACLU of North Carolina, Raleigh, NC, for plaintiffs.

H. Lawrence Armstrong, Jr., Hux, Liverman & Armstrong, Enfield, NC, Ann L. Majestic, Tharrington Smith, Raleigh, NC, J. Michael Crowell, Tharrington Smith, Raleigh, NC, Louise M. Paglen, Tharrington Smith, Raleigh, NC, for defendants.

ORDER

BRITT, District Judge.

This matter is before the court on defendants' motion for summary judgment.

On 7 December 1998, plaintiffs Catherine Hicks and Aaron Ganues filed this action in Halifax County Superior Court. Defendants Dr. Willie J. Gilchrist, Jeffrey D. McCain, and the Halifax County Board of Education (the "School Board") removed the action to this court on 30 December 1998. On 25 January 1999, defendants filed an answer. In an Order dated 12 February 1999, the court denied plaintiffs' 14 January 1999 motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction. On 27 July 1999, the court allowed plaintiffs' motion to amend their complaint and denied their motion requesting the court to refuse to exercise supplemental jurisdiction with respect to the fourth and ninth claims of plaintiff's complaint. On that day, plaintiffs filed an amended complaint adding Fourteenth Amendment due process and equal protection claims. On 11 August 1999, defendants filed an answer to the amended complaint.

On 30 July 1999, defendants filed a memorandum in support of a motion for summary judgment, which motion was subsequently filed on 2 August 1999. On 30 August 1999, defendants filed a supplemental motion for summary judgment with a supporting memorandum. Plaintiffs filed a response on 20 September 1999, and defendants replied on 7 October 1999. The motion is now ripe for review.

Facts

Aaron Ganues, born on 31 March 1990, has lived with his great-grandmother, Catherine Hicks, since he was four years old. (Am.Compl. ¶¶ 3-4.) Hicks has legal custody of Ganues. Ganues attended McIver Elementary in Halifax County from pre-kindergarten through the beginning of his third grade year. (Am. Compl. ¶ 12.) During that time, Ganues consistently performed well in school, "receiving only As and Bs, and was never a discipline problem." (Hicks Decl. ¶ 5.) At the beginning of his third grade year, McIver placed Ganues on long-term suspension based on Ganues' failure to comply with the uniform policy adopted by the Halifax County Board of Education and implemented by McIver Elementary. This case is about the conflict between Hicks, who will not allow her great-grandson to wear a uniform for religious reasons, and the School Board, which maintains that its decision to enact a mandatory uniform policy without an opt-out provision for religious objections is constitutional and that Ganues' suspension is lawful.

Dr. Willie Gilchrist, the Superintendent of Halifax County Schools, decided to consider adopting a uniform policy for the Halifax County schools in the Spring of 1996 after attending a National School Board Association Meeting at which the benefits of such polices were explained. These benefits included: "1) improved student behavior, 2) increased safety in schools, 3) increased sense of belonging and school pride among students, 4) increased emphasis on individual personality and achievement rather than outward appearance among students, and 5) elimination of negative distinctions between wealthy and needy children." (Gilchrist Aff. ¶¶ 4-5; Gilchrist Dep. at 10.) Gilchrist's staff conducted research into the pros and cons of a uniform policy and sought information from other districts that had implemented such policies. (Gilchrist Aff. ¶ 5.) Gilchrist then sought permission from the School Board to explore parental reaction to the proposal. (Gilchrist Aff. ¶ 5; Moss Dep. at 7.) In the Fall of 1997, Gilchrist conducted public forums at all nine elementary schools in the district to introduce parents to the idea of a uniform policy and gauge public reaction. (Gilchrist Aff. ¶ 5.)

After conducting the public forums, Gilchrist asked the Board if he could establish an ad hoc committee to draft a uniform policy. The Board agreed and appointed Donna Lynch, a School Board member, to the committee. Along with Selma Allen, the Halifax County Director of Elementary Education, and Sylvia Hughes, the Halifax schools' public relations officer, Gilchrist selected the other members of the committee: Carol Blankenship, the director of instructional technology for the Halifax County schools; Vivian Branch, a Halifax school principal; Mary McGee, a school counselor; and Shirley Fisher and Cassandra Dolberry, both parents with children attending Halifax County Schools. (Gilchrist Dep. at 12-14.)

The ad hoc committee met several times in February 1998 to create a workable uniform policy for Halifax County. The original draft of the policy included an opt-out provision pursuant to which a student would not be considered non-compliant "[w]hen wearing a school uniform violates a student's sincerely held religious belief." (Dep.Ex. 5.) That draft also stated that a student would not be considered non-compliant when "a student's parent or guardian has secured an exemption from the uniform policy." (Id.) The committee ultimately decided to delete those provisions from the final policy. (Gilchrist Dep. at 29.)

Gilchrist was aware of Hicks' religious objections to the uniform policy before the ad hoc committee was assembled. As he testified at his deposition, Gilchrist became aware of Hicks' opposition to the school uniform policy "very, very early on in the first initial year of research. From the [out]set, she made it clear that she was opposed." (Gilchrist Dep. at 82.)¹ Gilchrist also testified that he, Allen and Hughes, discussed Hicks' objections, "wrestled" with the "terminology anti-Christ" "trying to figure out what it was," and that they "couldn't figure out what she was talking about." (Gilchrist Dep. at 84.) Gilchrist stated that he never got a satisfactory answer to those questions. (Id. at 85.) Gilchrist did not convey Hicks' concerns to the ad hoc committee. (Id. at 84.) Nor did Gilchrist mention Hicks' specific objections to the School Board. (Id. at 83.)

Cassandra Dolberry, one of the parent representatives on the ad hoc committee, is the only individual who claims a recollection of the discussion leading up to the deletion of the religious exemption. (Dolberry Dep. at 16-28.) Dolberry affirmed that the ad hoc committee had reached the conclusion that the policy would not affect any religions in Halifax County and that "if it did, there would be a way that it would be a compromise.... I fairly thought that when the policy was made, that we did not hurt a group — a religious group because we had talked to every religion that we had in our county." (Dolberry Dep. at 18-20.) Dolberry suggested that she and others spoke with parents who were Jehovah's Witnesses, Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals, and Catholics, among others. (Id. at 25-26.) When asked whether "the recommendation that was made by the ad hoc committee considered at least the religious concerns of the parents [with] whom she [had conversed]," Dolberry responded, "[a]ll of the parents in the county." (Id. at 28.)

The ad hoc committee ultimately submitted the uniform policy without the religious opt-out provision to the School Board's policy committee, which approved it without making any changes after hearing a presentation by Gilchrist. (Gilchrist Dep. at 23.) The policy committee submitted it to the School Board, which approved and adopted the policy on 9 April 1998.

The mandatory uniform policy adopted by the School Board required all elementary school students to wear a school-approved uniform beginning in the 1998-99 school year. When he began the third grade in August 1998, Ganues did not wear the khaki pants and blue shirt required by the policy because Hicks, a self-described minister and prophetess, believes that adherence to the uniform policy would violate her basic religious beliefs. Hicks believes that wearing a uniform demonstrates an allegiance to the spirit of the anti-Christ, a being that requires uniformity, sameness, enforced conformity, and the absence of diversity. (Am.Compl. ¶ 20; Hicks Decl. ¶¶ 10-12.) Hicks does not have a problem with khaki pants and blue shirts in and of themselves. Rather, she objects, on religious grounds, to the fact that all choice and free will has been eliminated and uniformity is required. (Id. at 13.) The uniformity required by the policy is, in her opinion, characteristic of the "last days" and required by the anti-Christ. (Hicks Decl. ¶¶ 9-14.) Hicks believes that it is part of her religion and way of life to "oppose the coming of the Anti-Christ and prevent the programming of our children to accept the Anti-Christ, his orders, and his mark." (Hicks Decl. ¶¶ 13-14.)

Hicks conveyed her religious beliefs to the principal of McIver, Jeffrey McCain, by letter in July 1998. (Am.Compl. ¶ 21.) She also explained her views to McCain and Gilchrist in a meeting on the first day of school in August 1998. (Id. at ¶ 24.) Based upon Hicks' representation that Ganues would never comply with the uniform policy, Gilchrist asked Hicks and Ganues to leave the school, and Ganues was subsequently suspended for ten days. (Pls.' Resp. to Defs.' Req. for Admiss. 14-...