WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court seemed to split sharply Monday on whether a law school can deny recognition to a Christian student group that won’t let gays join, a case that could determine whether nondiscrimination policies trump the rights of private organizations to determine who can belong and who can’t.
In arguments tinged with questions of religious, racial and sexual discrimination, the court heard from the Christian Legal Society, which wants recognition from the University of California’s Hastings College of the Law as an official campus organization with school financing and benefits.
The San Francisco school turned them down, saying no recognized campus groups may exclude people due to religious belief or sexual orientation.
The Christian group requires that voting members sign a statement of faith. The group also regards “unrepentant participation in or advocacy of a sexually immoral lifestyle” as being inconsistent with the statement of faith.
“CLS has all of its activities entirely open to everyone,” lawyer Michael McConnell said. “What it objects to is being run by non-Christians.”
A federal judge threw out the Christian group’s lawsuit claiming its First Amendment rights of association, free speech and free exercise had been violated, a decision that was upheld by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a two-sentence opinion in 2004.
The case could clarify nationwide whether religious-based and other private organizations that want federal funding have the right to discriminate against people who do not hold their core beliefs. The court is expected to rule this summer.
“If Hastings is correct, a student who does not even believe in the Bible is entitled to demand to lead a Christian Bible study, and if CLS does not promise to allow this, the college will bar them,” said McConnell, a former judge on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Other court action
• Police privacy: Justices listened to arguments in a case involving complaints by California police officers that their employer violated their privacy by reading text messages sent on a government-provided pager.
• Job loss: The court agreed to review the case of a fired hospital worker who claims he lost his job over his service in the U.S. Army Reserve.
• Watch costs: The court stepped into a legal fight over Omega’s effort to stop Costco from offering the Swiss maker’s watches for up to a third less than they cost elsewhere.
• Conviction: Justices left in place the conviction of a man sent to Texas death row despite the admission of an affair between his trial judge and the prosecutor. The Associated Press
