You might call it good news for Good News, but to Milford Central School, it meant the district needed to make some adjustments in 2001.
As The Daily Star of March 1, 2001 reported, “Opinions were divided following arguments before the (U.S.) Supreme Court Wednesday in the case of a local Christian youth group that has sued Milford Central School.
“The Good News Club offers religious instruction to children ages 6 to 12. It claims a First Amendment right to meet at the school.
“The club’s founders, the Rev. Stephen Fournier and his wife Darleen, said a school policy that prohibits them from using the building violates their free speech rights and discriminates against them because of their religious viewpoint.
“The school said the club’s activities violate the separation of church and state, and that its building use policy correctly established a limited open forum, which allows the club to be banned.”
So went the argument, and the case would be decided upon in May or June. The Star also reported that Hartwick College Professor Sugwon Kang took a few of his constitutional law students to watch the hearing in the nation’s capital.
“‘I walked in there thinking the Good News Club had a weak case,’ he said. ‘I walked out thinking it was a toss-up.'”
“‘This is a free speech case,’ the club’s lawyer, Thomas Marcelle argued. ‘We’re not asking for special access, just equal access.’
“Questioning by the justices focused on whether the activities of the Good News Club constituted religious worship, as the school lawyer, Frank Miller, argued.
“‘Teaching Scripture, teaching morality, I think it’s a great distortion to call that religious worship even if you do throw in a prayer or two,’ Justice Antonin Scalia said.
“Other justices seemed concerned with the young age of the grade-school children involved. Some justices suggested that the pupils might believe the club’s viewpoints were endorsed by the school because they were too young to understand otherwise.”
The case dated back to 1992 when Milford Central School created a policy that allowed groups such as Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts and 4-H to use the building for meetings and activities.
The policy prohibited groups and individuals from using the building for religious purposes and barred the Good News Club for that reason.
At the time the Fourniers ran the Milford Center Community Bible Church, they filed a suit in federal district court in 1997 and lost, but then appealed to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals and lost again.
The Fourniers then petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court, and the justices agreed to hear the case, which they did in March 2001.
The case was decided on June 11, 2001, and the Supreme Court made it a 6-3 decision in the case written by Clarence Thomas, holding that a public school’s exclusion of a club from its limited public forum based solely on the club’s religious nature was impermissible viewpoint discrimination.
There was plenty of reaction to the decision, and Star readers of June 16 found out, “Reacting to an unfavorable U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the Milford Central School District this week began a re-evaluation of its building use policy.
“The school board met Thursday, three days after the Supreme Court ruled in favor of a local Christian youth group that had sued the district for use of its cafeteria to hold after school religious instruction.
District Superintendent Peter Livshin said the board’s policy committee will now consider three options — bar all outside groups from meeting at the school, bar groups from meeting at the school before 5 p.m., or keep the policy unchanged.”
Stephen Fournier attended the meeting and said he hoped the school wouldn’t push back the meeting times.
“‘If they do change the time, the message they’re going to send is ‘We lost in court, but we’re going to do everything we can to keep those people out,’ Fournier said. ‘We should teach tolerance and not censorship.'”
The Milford school board was scheduled to vote on the policy at its September meeting.
This weekend, Oneonta took it easy on its celebration of America’s 150th anniversary in 1926.