Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-418_i425.pdf
Page Number: 72

32 

KENNEDY v. BREMERTON SCHOOL DIST. 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

themselves” were, and the Court would have found an “im-
proper effect of coercing those present” even if it “regard[ed]
every high school student’s decision to attend . . . as purely
voluntary.”  Id., at 311–312.  Kennedy’s prayers raise pre-
cisely  the  same  concerns.    His  prayers  did  not  need  to  be 
broadcast.  His  actions  spoke  louder  than  his  words.    His 
prayers  were  intentionally,  visually  demonstrative  to  an 
audience aware of their history and no less captive than the
audience in Santa Fe, with spectators watching and some
players perhaps engaged in a song, but all waiting to rejoin
their coach for a postgame talk.  Moreover, Kennedy’s pray-
ers had a greater coercive potential because they were de-
livered not by a student, but by their coach, who was still
on active duty for postgame events.

In addition, despite the direct record evidence that stu-
dents felt coerced to participate in Kennedy’s prayers, the 
Court nonetheless concludes that coercion was not present 
in any event because “Kennedy did not seek to direct any 
prayers to students or require anyone else to participate.” 
Ante, at 26; see also ante, at 30, n. 7 (contending that the
fact  that  “students  might  choose,  unprompted,  to  partici-
pate” in their coach’s on-the-field prayers does not “neces-
sarily prove them coercive”).  But nowhere does the Court 
engage with the unique coercive power of a coach’s actions
on his adolescent players.8 

In  any  event,  the  Court  makes  this  assertion  only  by
drawing a bright line between Kennedy’s yearslong practice
of  leading  student  prayers,  which  the  Court  does  not  de-

—————— 

8 Puzzlingly, the Court goes a step further and suggests that Kennedy
may  have  been  in  violation  of  the  District  policy  on  Religious-Related
Activities and Practices if he did not permit the players to join his pray-
ers  because  the  policy  prohibited  staff  from  “discourag[ing]”  student 
prayer.  Ante, at 4, 30, n. 7.  The policy, however, specifically referred to
student  prayer  of  the  student’s  “own  volition”  and  equally  prohibited
staff from “encourag[ing]” student prayer.  App. 28.