may place a court for freedom of religion it's religion it's a like that i enjoy as a citizen of the united states it's a right that you enjoy it's a right and people in front of the  that we know that we enjoy because our forefathers took it upon themselves to fight a war and to begin a big experiment in democracy to establish a government that would guarantee that write a motion for summary judgment that was granted the lower court's motion for summary great judgment we're asking court to uphold that motion for summary judgment establish the fact that the practice of the birdsville independent school district inviting students to present messages of their own choosing at the beginning of board meetings did not run afoul of the establishment clause of the united states even though those  presentations often included prayer by those students i know this court has previously addressed the issue of prayer at school board meetings i intend to address that those cases specifically but my bishop well why isn't this a pretty applied not only to legislatures but in that particular instance to city councils and we think that that makes it very clear your honor that one and i one of the cases that i mentioned that the for circuit's had the opportunity to examine this is the  and yet that inside at that time that decision was a split decision but justice clement correctly recognized and and very wisely for sol the result in town of greece because she said these are the liberty bodies if you look at the functions and  estate it's like vendors it approves purchases it does it sets tax rates it passes bonds these are governmental functions and so the it's exactly the type of body that the legislature would have contemplated would be a deliberative body the forefathers would not have it all been surprised to see a board of trustees engaging in exactly this type of legislative prayer but what do you do with a third in six circuits which seem to have gone the other one of the things that was relied upon by justice barksdale in that or was that he felt that the problem was that the prayer there was sectarian and he thought that the fact that the sectarian prayer was present precluded marsh from apply not just as clement appropriately recognised that that was not the case and a number of justices that have looked at the situation in light of town of greece have obviously concluded that sectarian prayer  permissible in situations like this that and the court is aware that in this particular instance the practice i haven't gone through the historical part of the practice but the practice is to randomly select students students are entitled under their board policy a local and if in a legal to sign up for these opportunities to speak a quick factual question and then a legal one understanding is that these students  primarily or maybe entirely elementary and middle school whatever it's called in this district is that correct that it's not correct or on it's all the schools in the district are there substantial numbers or is that broken down i know it was a chart of  how many the nature of the various presentations that were made and how many were prayers and whatever is there also a breakdown of how many elementary middle high school students i believe that information is within the briefing within the record your honor as to the number of elementary schools are far more elementary schools you're middle schools and then if you were still high schools but it's done on a rotational basis and so it is the case that there are fewer high school participants just because there are fewer high schools to to to be chosen for maybe is not legal question but in the your your friend opponents briefed on the second appeal it's said that you have conceded that you personally but that the board has conceded that these prayers are primarily for the benefit of students is that the canucks would sell legislative prayers for the benefit of those who can be making decisions and to put them in the right frame of mind and leave behind some of the rancor though as might be their successful otherwise you would call that in their brief and what is it i couldn't find it in the page pages if you ever made a statement about for whose benefit these careers are given in fact i have made that very strong point that they're primarily for the benefit of the governing trustees themselves i do not get acknowledged by any stretch of the imagine that they say of the imagination that they're for students because are very few students there in some instances the only student there may be the student who is delivering the prayer if they chose to do that now keep in mind that you think if the through record were developed more with out there more students on a more regular person became proselytizing if they crossed the line but in this particular case or not it's very clear mr smith who is the only representative of the american human association who claims to have attended any meetings specifically identifies team meetings that he attended those meetings are both after he has graduated from high school both of those after he is an adult at one of those meetings a young student presented this prayer and if i may read to the court please value our heads in prayer heavenly father thank you for the blessings that we have received please guide our school board in making the best decisions that w benefit the students parents and staff of the school district help them stay to stay focused on their goals to keep our schools for forward positive avenues one could hardly imagine a more prototypical legislative prayer that that is exactly the nature approach of legislating prayer to ask for guidance for those leaders who are making decisions on behalf of it's that whole concept that  initially the court recognizes there was there were pledges of allegiance and invocations now i think the courts also aware that subsequently the american cumulus association raised concerns about the use of the term invocations because they believe that that term itself suggested to students that they necessarily needed to give a per no trustee no had ever communicated with you go to their website you will discover that there are actually non secular implications that they have developed but but it would has been left to the students as to what they say that should be appropriate to the opening of the of the meeting and so if as i understood it from the brief these don't even have to be in the nature of prayer or an invocation to a higher be being they could just be a statement from the student is that right or do i misunderstand you that is correct it can be a statement these food and want to stand up and talk about how beautiful the earth is and to inspire the school board members to to maintain beauty in the world or something like that  for this event it should be related to the purpose of the event and the purpose of marking the opening of the event honoring the occasion the participants and those in attendance bringing the audience to order and focusing the audience on the purpose of the event and then there are restrictions that it not be obscene that it not be vulgar it not be offensively lewd or indecent and those are the restrictions that apply so yes your own and your your example is a part perfectly appropriate if the if a student chaplains are generally given those and that's the historical practice and part of what the court relied on counter greece you're dealing with adults here you have students doing it it's here you have any  case that tells me or on which i should belie that the fact a student is going this career doesn't somehow put this in a different category take it out of the legislative prayer it is different at least in that extent i students speakers pacifically were included and that did not cause any anyone any concern on the body of the best judges i could ask for evidence of force controlling precedent it's not that strong of a president president searchlight of its history so does  it is very easy to imagine that if a person shows up to an attendance at a meeting and the president of the board of trustees or the president of the city council or a clergy person who is hired by them well brought in by them will have to give i would say would give more of an employment terms of endorsement of religion but in this instance you're talking about the speech of children and so again the claim of mr smith in december and fourteen is that he is an adult hears this speech by a student and i would say if anything if the court were not to look under this under the rubric of town of greece and marsh if they looked under another versus weissman and the coercion test that that very much indicates it it almost shoots that argument in the face because you're talking about a young child who presumably has  no reason to give the imprimatur of government endorsement and let me expound upon one point what i think about it before i forget and that is to say that further if you look at that same course and test under leave versus weizman i think that the circumstances this case completely make clear that mr smith was not suffering the effects of coercion because rather than the traditional things that are described that he was afraid that he might have been treated differently that he might have been received less favorable treatment because of and somehow was forced to bow his head what does he do he videotapes he stands in the or in the boardroom and  videotapes the young man giving the take them or invocation and so i think that that that the court if you were to look at that under course and i don't think you could the court could conclude that coercion applied but it is essential to recognize that this is the speech of the students now if the opportunity to speak clearly originated through the idea of legislative prayer i think this school boards are a brief makes clear insights to a law review article that there is a long long history in texas and other states of opening school board meetings with legislative type of prayer we think that that the decision in light of town of greece of town of the case would would be quite different today but let me give you a hypothetical like a hypothetical because far as i know it's has nothing to do with this record but supposed if the school district had a requirement that each high school  civics class once a year was required as a requirement of the course to attend a school board meeting just to understand how the legislative process works and how the school this is is governed so the students were required to be there or they would be marked absent in that hypothetical would with the with the result be different required to tennis could have an impact on your honor to concede that it that it could because if you look at the cases like the dover says duncanville if you look at places like santa fe mandatory attendance by students is is a thing that plays an apology but i will suggest in this instance is that the conduct of these meetings is again largely for adults all the tandy swore they'd be there to receive an award or be there to do a presentation are free other than their actual presentation to common leave as they see fit and our briefing makes clear that attendees do that with regularity it's quite often it's quite frequent that people come in after the meeting has already begun they leave in the middle of it they'll go out in the take telephone call so one of the things that frequently happens is people come for just their portion of his meeting and so it could be different i would concede your honor that it could be different if it were mandatory attendance and it was a mandatory audience of students that were there the case is that the american humanist point out to you of dull dough and colds and indian river you actually in this one instance had a student member who served on the school board and was always there always part of that you also had a situation where students came in and made reports to the board of things that they were doing but in this particular situation we're not talking about a student council meeting we're not talking about bodies of students you know groups of students who are there we're talking about meetings of adults for very governmental bureaucratic types of reasons and with this open mandatory is there any development of the records efficient where we can be sure that the students who are there for such things aren't in fact generally there at the very beginning in and do not leave i expectation was that developed or the students generally there do we know if they're generally there to hear these prayer i don't book and course we didn't have any students who were complaining but i don't know that there is a record it the meeting always begins with the pledge of allegiance followed but now of course followed by the student expression and so there is no suggestion as to the number of students based upon the record that might have been going on if the students expressions just discussing the beauty of the r or something like suggested by well how could that qualify as legislative prayer if it's not a prayer well and so this is an opportunity for legislati prayer but it's also an opportunity so originally the concept was amber cation again an appropriate message a message appropriate to the opening but and so when there is a prayer it falls under that legislati but based upon the concerns expressed by the american humanist association we wanted to make sure that it was the student's speech and so the students and the record demonstrates that it's more than i'll be able to address but the students are solely responsible for the content of their speech they present it and if it happens to be that they used a poem instead of a legislative per in that's just what they present and so some of the poems that you sell for instance could even potentially be religious in nature one of the students read a poem that said thank god for teachers we think that as a matter of student expression that if they don't engage in legislative prayer it's very clear that the students have a right to speak on topics of religious beliefs and if they want to say even though it's not in the form of a prayer i am thankful to god for my ability to attend school in a the parties a focus a lot of their attention on whether the current policy falls within the safe harbor town of greece but our submission is that's actually not the right fight at least it's not a fight this court needs to have first the tigris case concerns government speech however a deliber body like the school board can choose to open the meetings with a prayer in that prayer is something they're directing someone else to get but the student expressions under the current policy aren't government speech at all they are given by randomly selected students in a specific message delivered frankly the overall content the message is one that's chosen by the student it may be a prayer or may not be a prayer as we learned you know earlier today according to these student expressions or the private speech of the student or at most school sponsored speech but whether it's private or school sponsored speech the important thing is expressions are not government speech and therefore there is no territories now says all because there is no establishment clause pro said was despite all this you know superficial level of student choice and stuff what was going on that case was essentially a sham the school the school district to create a system by which their message could come across and they do to a very unique set of circumstances for example in the santa fe case what happened was a student election a two parts to an election first the entire student body voted as to whether any statement should be given at all and second the entire student body chose one person to represent that in giving that speech where the court said is that this combination of facts a one sou of the entire b the fact that it is a majority election essentially took this out of the private school sponsored speech well and turned it into government speech  just to go to go too deep in the facts that cases but it really was a very unique scenario for example the school board passed a policy right before that was during the course allegation that said we're going to have a selection process within that policy they included a provision that said these policies that this speech cannot be proselytizing or or sectarian however that was only triggered if a court enjoined their more broader policy they clearly intended to have crepes prayers given and created this this carve out only if a court enjoying that provision given those unique facts the court found look this is really government speech this is not like that this is more similar to be other cases i cite in my brief you know for example a just said they can give a speech on any topic the schools not directing what they set in that world what they will the series speaking cannot be got a speech in declaring a government teacher might actually violate their first amendment rights they have a right to give a speech of their students to attend meetings of legislatures and stuff like that the important thing to realize in this case is we are not talking about a school organization we're not talking about a meeting of teachers we're not talking about  court i like you know not in for a moment that you are an elementary student who's been selected not to deliver the invocation but the pledge of allegiance up the school board meetings you were told to meet your principal fifteen minutes before the meeting to go over the procedure then follow your principal into the meeting and sit in the front row in your reserved seat the gavel is pounded in your principal walks up to the podium you and another student fall behind her she announces to the audience that you are there to represent your school and that you serve as a campus leader she then asked the entire audience to rise the principal does immediately after you deliver the pledge is while everyone is still standing the other student the invocation giver the student expression giver takes the microphone and began to deliver player that is against your beliefs says the other students there you want to leave but you look around and everyone's standing and participating including the principal few teachers there's sixteen students in the audience that represent the whole t read what you're talking about you talk about a very narrow example of the one person there perhaps in the student category who might be less able to leave another should be that if you want to get down to that micro level you might just talking about the invocation of the expression but the pledge so it's a lot of talk meetings that a student and elementary student is basically compelled to stand at the podium while purse being delivered there's no evidence for instance that i mean a student has left this dynamic but there's also many other students that are at these meetings that and the their campuses you also have every december students with the bottom singers overage them bible there is a one of the school choral groups come perform for the board and they're often in uniform under the supervision of a faculty member they represent the hymn books effectively mandatory and certainly more mandatory than a student merely attending a voluntary high school football game so there's not just this this might myopic you know elementary school situation it's students are present at every single meeting they're participating in every  to really is getting is we were required to do a newtown agrees to look at the very specific facts of he sees me at most what you may be doing is saying that the policy there needs to be changed if there are students every single meeting but it's all to also the role and nature of a school board and its entire purpose being for students as well as the principles underlying the supreme court's pillowcases i mean not only do you have students at all these meeting and hear what you're saying even if there is no student who  certain it disciplinary actions students have to come before the board for this address the situation where there is no student there who has to be there if mr has to be there i would argue that it's certainly closer to a tonic or situation but you still have a situation where the board should not be mandating or should not be participating in something that they would be able to mandate in the classrooms but yeah we can see that as students were never present at these things we'd be talking about different pockets the problem to say a school exam would makes the equivalent of a classroom it does seem to me that if you just come out of school board meeting you much closer to a city council then you are to a school well it's the fact that it's on school campus it's conducted by school officials and ministers and teachers are often present at these meetings so it's not just some elected board members but you have faculty and the superintendent actively involved in these meetings when you start throwing the students into the mix first student with the you know b s d is written across the podium you know it looks to them like any other school event and we're not asking if this is more similar to a classroom but is it more like for instance a football game where adult outside adult community members are regularly present robert a football game there's a deliberative body usually it's not your honor but the different what we should look at is the focus on what the students are perceiving and because the focus on the supreme court's purposes on protecting students from subtle chorus of pressures and here you do have those those issues present and what i would ask the court to consider is would a student say even though it was a student at the podium or the student to help them singers do they have any more freedom to absent themselves from a parent than a mature adult or a mature high school student attending a completely voluntary football game if not then the circumstances to that student whether they are feeling the pressure to remain and participate in a prayer with all that implies or protest by leaving and thereby risk appropriate from their peers and their school administrators if the students are paying the same position there's really no basis for saying that a student of the board meeting is entitled to less protections than a student attending a public voluntary football game if there's no work there's no requirement that the students give a prayer or an invocation and there is no requirement that a student attend a football game either and in fact there is no real requirement a student attend their graduation but the supreme court in both of those cases recognize the difficult decision it is for a student to have to choose between attending a school event and ostracizing themselves just to avoid a religious practice the school has created an opportunity for students here to come before the board and deliver a pledge and an invocation it's no answer to that student that wants to deliver the pledge for instance that you're going to have to be willing to subject yourself to a prayer because of the school program that's a possibility and i think that's the main distinction between this but there's another distinction too between a town a town hall and a school board meeting and that is what the board has authoritarian position over the students in the authority to discipline them and that's not a fact that's present in a legislature or a town compounding this course of pressures for students to conform and participate in the prayer also is the fact that the school fishel as the principal the superintendent and the board are all actively participating in prayer with students the legislative session has never extended to allow principals or teachers to participate in pairs students when they're acting in their official capacity yet these board meetings somehow now under the district courts rul they are immunize by this shield of legislative prayer exception to say well once we walk into this room for this meeting we can all stand here and pray alongside our students but when we're out of the basketball court we can't do that it seems to me the school boards are damned if it does damned if it doesn't get it made this revision i presume to avoid litigation so if the revision as it is would have been on a route before that would have been the original policy would you students it's no consolation to them that the another meeting didn't have a prayer they're still put in not uncomfortable position of having to say do i participate or do a leave to a risk you know everyone knowing that i don't like this plan or putting the students and not position is what makes the  enough uncertainty to the question you may ultimately think that you'll prevail but that's what qualified immunity is for and you know how specific the supreme court has required existing law to be  established law so in a lot of all that it seems to me that your argument against qualified immunity is absolutely frivolous half what was clearly established as a matter of law as to these facts for a kennedy went out of his way to distinguish students and to make clear that the legislative exception is limited to mature adults who actually are free to come and go as they please for any number of reasons in and out of meetings with out having their absence be noted but students  meetings are not free to come and go as they please in fact students generally don't have the same maturity and that same lack of fear of kill peer pressure to remain that adults doing the entire pinion distinguishes adults from students so i full time job by any means it's an insignificant amount of money if they get paid anything to come to these meetings and they try to make an honest decision balancing decisions and they have time to grease that comes along th intervenes after after other circuits but not this one have decided how is that possibly fair to say that they should have to personally pay damages if ultimately we decide well this is more like a high school say basically whatever we want we have in the record that they're going to want to call the board jerks they can disparage the board so they actually took this practice and take it further away from time varies so i don't think the tone increase again gives them that immunity but this whole case is really about injun and about making sure that the practices don't continue as far as the damages go in the amount that we're looking for really is is a symbolic nominal damage type of remedy just to make clear that this is not an acceptable practice and the problem that we saw here is that the board for many many years was inviting students to deliver indications only and the case law is very clear there's never been an exception carved out for school board meetings to allow students to be subjected to this practice for students to give written the implications organization out of the pockets of the individuals group board members as a matter of law i believe i'm not sure for instance if it's the court you know i don't know what the their insurance policy is or if the board would be liable for all these years versus the school district but again i think that's really for the trial court to decide the amount based on how you know how much damages or how much you know the school was actually live on this but i think again the point is just requires students to make a difficult decision to participate in a prayer with all that it implies to protest and that's exactly the problem here not only are school officials actively participating but that situation where you have a principal or superintendent participating in a p with students independently violates the establishment clause under duncanville as well as margins and can be versus train those are well settled authorities and no court has ever carved out an exception for legislative prayer for school officials to participate and since the district court completely ignored this issue or in the fairly soon provided the court a sufficient analysis to explain why he was extending the legislative pear exception to allow principals or superintendent to participate and per student at the very least we have the court remand that i would like to point out first there was no evidence in that case that the board deliberately made its meaning meetings meaningful to students nor was there any evidence of other student participation like the the bands that come in or the may meetings where you have students being delivered awards there is no evidence in that case so even if i case was a closer one this is not that the second is again there was no faculty participation there is no participation with principals and students participating in prayer in that case and the third distinction is that this or the pool of participants to student council student leadership and has said that it is an opportunity for students to hone their public speaking skills and exercise their free speech rights that's not an internal act to saunas meetings that is a public act for students to engage in and again that was very different than tangipahoa and lastly in this case this board actually opens its closed session meetings with a prayer and then reopens the meeting about an hour or two meeting where the board possesses an inherently authoritarian position over students it also carries all that your marks of any other school that a student gets out of school board meeting would not be able to decide decipher that a school board member is any different than a principal or superintendent they don't know that they're a deliberative body or not tom cruise rests on the assumption that adults are understanding of the legislative their history exception and while there was a confluence between congress and the first congress and having prayer that a student can't be presumed to have knowledge a ten year old student i still it bring a prayer before the board doesn't understand the nature of the purpose of this historical practice nor can that student really be you know presume to be able to come and go as they please but i think it's important to mention that the student would have no means of knowing you know the basis for the exception to begin with and also quickly like to address the free speech argument if this court recognizes that students are put in the position of having to choose between participating in a prayer with all that implies or protesting and thereby risk appropriate from their peers a faculty just like in the in santa fe then even if the court assumes argue window that a limited public forum has been created  as well as hall and other school cases involving prayers over and over in a calm systems in the morning recognize that even if those messages are of the student's own unrestricted choosing and they're part of a public forum or limited public forum they're still coercive as to certain students are subjected to them and therefore unconstitutional even if a so called limited public forum is being created here unlike in santa fe the prayers are even more endors the idea that the person santa fe were endorsed because of majority or an election is not actually supported by the case for this court case in fact this court made a point to say that even if prayers were not delivered by a vote spontaneously initiated at  school sponsored meeting there would be unconstitutional or school sponsored event where school officials are present and have the authority to stop the prayer from being delivered because at a school controlled event where the student is using the school sound system and subjecting the audience to a prayer an audience that's assembled because the government invited them that prayer is stand for the school seal of approval and in this case that's even more so because of the fact that the student gets a certificate from the board poses for a picture with the poor and has a principal announcing them saying that they are representing the school all of these things are putting the school stamp of approval on those person facts that were not even present in santa fe where they would be completely you know the students own choosing with no outcomes the first is that under the district court's ruling a young elementary student can be subjected to a proselytizing and even degrading prayer when she's standing up at the podium delivering the pledges but if that s delivered at an informal completely voluntary football game where adults are present and where community members are present that there would be unconstitutionally courses you should proselytizing and degrading yes or nothing in the school board students or her team before recital or before a team event but yet that same teacher can participate in a prayer with her students at a more formal school sponsored meeting just because it's a board meeting and so too could the principal and super intended but that's completely  in which either coaches or students were referring to one of the girls on the team is that little atheist that's that's a completely different situation i don't know how you can draw any kind of support from that case i believe that was one fact in th case but the case turned on the fact that the coach was participating in the purchase so when you went to the analysis of what was found unconstitutional it was the school official participating in the pros but merging is also supports not as well as can be where this court struck down a practice of allowing teachers to lead and points below would like to turn this case into a clear case about classroom like angle vs the towel they would like to turn it into a basketball game like dough versus duncanville but the case is very clearly about a government of the liberty body for statements that were proselytizing and degrading and i had asked her the question is there anything in the policy to keep that from happening i think i thought there was to be no overt proselytizing and  your honor i didn't put the whole policy in in during my argument but the town of greece recognize that what was recognized to be a legitimate constitutional practice could fall by the wayside if in fact that occurred but there is no indication in the record that that has occurred in fact the so per that is that is clearly within the record is the one that i read to you that's the one that mr smith were witnessed himself there's no question if anything that is just pure legislative prayer no proselytizing i would argue nonsectarian is as well makes reference only to a heavenly raise takes care of the sectarian nonsectarian distinction it does it does take care sector non tax sectarian and so this is not a situation where we are talking about students again it's meeting of adult bodies the plainest want to talk about the fact about the location the ownership of the microphone that's going to be true in a city council meeting it's going to be true in the legislature as well it's government property it's the it's the facilities utilized by the so there's no that's no basis the distinction here the one of the things that i do think is interesting is the issue of their participation and so the court clearly recognizes that if this if a student  in some instances students will like not to but if a student does elect to engage in legislative where the board members get to participate it would be very strange you all have seen the painting of the first congress when they bring in their hired clergyman and some of them have almost prostrated themselves on the ground there on their hands and knees i think it would sort of seem very unusual to them to say it is permissible for members of a legislative body to have a legislative prayer and that somehow we would judge the trustees of the burble independent school district apparently by the elevation of their chin because if their head happens to blow below perpendicular that they are participating because they bowed their heads and the court has looked at this in some other situations decided in our brief but that's the kind of actions that i don't think that the court needs to parse out is if a if a trustee bows their head in town of it's very clear from the facts there that the trustees not only bowed their heads but many of them made the sign of the cross and said amen that's just part of the legislative prayer i think the court has already recognized the fact that  qualified immunity obviously there were splits in opinion in co and the indian river obviously there was a split in opinion on town of greece but it is far from clear the trustees i will add your honor you said that they might receive some compensation the trustees that govern the public school districts of texas serve with out compensation so you are asking people who devote significant periods of their time to come out of pocket because apparently they did not read town of greece the same way miller did and i think that if anything the standard to lose you qualified immunity is that no reasonable trustee could have reached the conclusion that this was constitutional i think based upon a reading of town of that not only could a trustee but obviously the lower federal court in this instance reach that conclusion and so i think it's an important that that that the court recognize that that qualified immunity continues to apply  thousand things as far as the back to the question about participation by or mandatory attendance there's mandatory attendance for students to go to the legislature that you see legislative classes i mean you see civics classes who are required to go to the legislature witnessed what goes on there to other types of city council meetings perhaps that was present in town agrees there were clearly the lower court clearly recognized that there were boy scout groups i school groups other groups who were present and so we say i have just two things one with respect to the participation of students attending school board meetings are different than students going on a field trip to go see a town meeting because when they're doing that they're not participants they're just outside observers and the person not being directed up and nor are they the main component of the practice like him second is the participation issue with respect to school officials participating in edwards in margins the supreme court recognized that because of students i mean school officials as role coercive for those teachers in the school officials to participate in pair with students and those are the dynamics that are present at town councils or at school you know in a congress setting because you don't have teachers or administrators you have lawmakers and students can not tell the difference between their superintendent sitting in a school board meeting participating in parent them from sitting at a basketball game of football game participating in a prayer with a two student is probably the same thing the second is that if the court finds that students are not free to come and go as they please at these meetings for instance the student at the podium or the team that's being presented no word then the person or unconstitutionally coercive under lea grease the grease court said the peers will contravene the establishment clause if they if somehow their course of it's encouraging level that's higher than lead because the whole exception is premised on the idea that mature adults are being subject to the practice but even as to adults that's exactly what we have here not with respect to adult constituents but even the younger student constituents who deserve protections under the establishment clause so the dynamic here would even fail if the court were to apply grease or  marsh in those instances i want to go back to the idea that not only are these students but these are mostly elementary students even in morgan versus swanson and other supreme court cases this court as well as other cases have recognize that elementary students because they are so impressionable and this obsession susceptible to religious indoctrination they deserve the most protections under the establishment clause in texas optional for circuit case the fourth circuit even said that in a case involving a true free speech not of issue here but true for free speech it would be impermissible in an elementary setting but not in a high school setting because own interests and cannot discern subtle nuances between genuine private speech and government sponsored speech in this case that's even more true because the officials the pressures that they would feel to conform are just so much more heightened in the situation because of the formal setting that the students are and i just really don't have anything more to address so i'll just