Opinion ID: 719595
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Equal Access Act: Generally

Text: 44 Enacted in 1984, the Equal Access Act (Act), 20 U.S.C. §§ 4071-4074, guarantees the right of public school students to form extracurricular groups that engage in religious, philosophical, or political discourse. Section 4071(a) creates this statutory free speech right 6 : 45 It shall be unlawful for any public secondary school which receives Federal financial assistance and which has a limited open forum to deny equal access or a fair opportunity to, or discriminate against, any students who wish to conduct a meeting within that limited open forum on the basis of the religious, political, philosophical, or other content of the speech at such meetings. 46 There is no doubt that Roslyn High School is a public secondary school that has a limited open forum 7 and receives federal funds. Thus, the Hsus' claim turns on whether the School denied them equal access ... on the basis of the religious ... content of the speech that would have taken place at their meetings. 8 47 There is scant authority to guide us in our effort to interpret these statutory terms. The legislative history of the Act 9 indicates that its authors sought to end discrimination against religious extracurricular groups in public schools by mandating a policy of neutrality. See 130 Cong. Rec. 19,224 (1984) (statement of Sen. Hatfield). To the Act's authors, equal access meant that secondary school students engaging in religious speech have the same rights to associate together and to speak as do students who wish to meet to discuss chess, politics, or philosophy. Id. at 19,216 (Sen. Denton) (emphasis added). 48 Supporting and opposing members of Congress worried that this grant of protection for student speech was too broad and the intrusion on school autonomy too great; specifically, they expressed concern that a law intended to ensure that after-school prayer groups could meet would leave a school powerless to bar the Ku Klux Klan, cults, or intrusive proselytizers. 10 Though Senator Hatfield, the Senate's primary sponsor, thought this concern was overstated, arguing that the Act still allowed schools to outlaw groups that would be disruptive to the purpose of [the] school ... [, including a group like] the American Nazi Party ... that is dedicated to the purpose of dividing people, on grounds of race or religion, id. at 19,224, he admitted that we are [not] going to be able to anticipate every possible instance that will arise under this expansion of rights.... Id. at 19,225. 11 Indeed, the members of Congress do not appear to have anticipated the situation that confronts us: there is no discussion in the legislative history about whether equal access allows an after-school religious club to limit its leaders to those of a particular religious faith. Nor did members of Congress discuss whether the term speech at [the] meetings includes a leadership eligibility requirement that is intended to guarantee that the speech at the club meetings will have a particular content. 49 Though the Supreme Court interpreted the Equal Access Act in Board of Educ. v. Mergens, 496 U.S. 226, 110 S.Ct. 2356, 110 L.Ed.2d 191 (1990), that case also provides only limited guidance about how to interpret the statutory terms that concern us. In Mergens, students at a Nebraska public high school wanted to form an after-school Christian club, open to students of all religions, for prayer and Bible discussion. Id. at 232, 110 S.Ct. at 2362-63. The students sought the school's official recognition, which would have given the club access to the school newspaper, bulletin boards, the public address system, and the annual Club Fair. Id. at 247, 110 S.Ct. at 2370. The students' proposal contemplated that there would be no faculty adviser. Id. at 232, 110 S.Ct. at 2362-63. See 20 U.S.C. §§ 4071(c)(2) & 4072(2). The school denied recognition on the grounds that every recognized club needed a faculty sponsor, and that recognition of a religious club would violate the Establishment Clause. Mergens, 496 U.S. at 232-33, 110 S.Ct. at 2362-63. 50 The Supreme Court held that the Equal Access Act required recognition of the club, and that the Act on its face and as applied did not violate the Establishment Clause. (We address the Establishment Clause aspect of the Court's decision in section IV, infra.) In discussing whether the school's refusal to recognize the Bible club fell within the terms of the statute, the Court concerned itself almost exclusively with the meaning of the term noncurriculum related student groups, a concept not at issue in our case. 12 The final paragraph of the Court's statutory interpretation section briefly discussed the term equal access, holding simply that to deny the Bible Club official recognition (including denial of access to the school newspaper, bulletin boards, and public address system) was to deny it equal access. Id. at 247, 110 S.Ct. at 2370. 51 This Court has had no occasion to consider the Equal Access Act. Two other circuits have interpreted the Act, see Ceniceros v. Board of Trustees, 66 F.3d 1535 (9th Cir.1995); Garnett v. Renton School Dist. No. 403, 987 F.2d 641 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 72, 126 L.Ed.2d 41 (1993); Pope v. East Brunswick Bd. of Educ., 12 F.3d 1244 (3d Cir.1993); Student Coalition for Peace v. Lower Merion School Dist., 776 F.2d 431 (3d Cir.1985), but none of these cases addresses the situation presented here or construes the wordings that concern us. In interpreting the Act, we therefore rely on the common meanings of the words themselves, the logic and architecture of the Act, the congressional purpose of providing religious clubs with the same rights as other clubs, the Supreme Court's direction in Mergens that the Act is to be interpreted broadly, 496 U.S. at 239, 110 S.Ct. at 2366, and Supreme Court cases from analogous areas of the law. 52