1st Amendment Violation

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Freedom From Religion Foundation, Inc., et al. v. Concord Community Schools

Case No.: 17-1683; 17-1591

Officials: WOOD, Chief Judge, and EASTERBROOK and SYKES, Circuit Judges.

Focus: 1^st Amendment Violation

Since ancient times, people have been celebrating the winter solstice, which occurs around the third week of December in the Northern Hemisphere. Many of these celebrations are religious in nature, and so in the modern United States they have led to a depressingly steady stream of First Amendment challenges, in which one party wishes to express its religious views in the public sphere and the other party asserts that the Establishment Clause would be violated by the display.

Our case fits that pattern to a T. It arose in Elkhart, Indiana, which is served by the Concord Community Schools. For nearly half a century, Concord High School spread holiday cheer with a “Christmas Spectacular”—a winter concert featuring an elaborate, student‐performed nativity scene. Things changed, however, when some parents, a student, and a non‐profit organization objected to what they perceived to be an impermissibly religious program. The school suggested that the 2015 version of the show would reflect modest alterations to the 2014 version. After the district court preliminarily enjoined the school from putting on even the revised show in 2015 as proposed, Concord scrubbed more of the religious content from the show.

The district court agreed with the plaintiffs that the 2014 Spectacular and the version initially proposed for 2015 violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause and awarded nominal damages. But the court sided with the school in finding the latest version of the show constitutional. Because we also find that the school’s second round of adjustments to the Spectacular were enough to push it over the line for compliance with the Constitution, we affirm the judgment of the district court.

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.