The New York Civil Liberties Union is threatening to sue the Northport school district over an elective class they offer during night school called “What is Creation Science?”. The class which is offered as part of a continuing education program for adults has received several complaints from Northport residents claiming a violation of the “establishment clause”.

“This kind of thing is dangerous,” countered Seth Muraskin, the executive director of the N.Y.C.L.U.’s Suffolk office. This month he notified the Northport school board by letter and in person that he might sue if it continues to offer Mr. Harrison’s course.

“If he was out on a street corner expressing his views,” Mr. Muraskin says, “I’d be the first person to fight for his right to do just that, but …”

According to Mr. Muraskin, holding the class at a public school violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment. “If they were teaching it to kids during the day,” he says, “there would be yelling and screaming all over the place.”

Well for starters Mr. Muraskin, if the class was being taught during the day to school children, the reason there would be yelling and screaming (most of which would come from your organization), would be because the class was part of the required curriculum. Offering the course as an elective to adults who are presumably intelligent enough to understand the course is not offered as an endorsement of religion by the school district. The NYCLU, along with their national counterpart the ACLU, have continually threatened school districts with lawsuits anytime the subject of religion creeps into their hallways. Ironically, the school also offers an elective called “Problem Solving Through Buddhism”, which has yet to receive any such threats from the NYCLU or others.

In prior cases where some from of religion was taught to school children as required curriculum, the ACLU would always be able to find at least one parent who objected to it, in order to file a lawsuit against the district. In this instance, a lawsuit would be frivolous, because there is no standing. Jordan Lorence wrote an excellent article not long ago on Townhall.com illustrating the issue of “standing”:

The obscure doctrine of “standing” means that federal courts cannot hear a lawsuit unless the person bringing it has suffered some concrete injury by the hand of the government, and the federal courts can do something to remedy that harm. The Constitution itself in Article III imposes these standing requirements on everyone bringing a lawsuit in federal court.

The federal courts do not allow lawsuits by “offended observers” or “taxpayers” in any other area of law. Someone offended by government signs stating “Support the War In Iraq,” “Say No To Drugs,” or “Pay Taxes Here” cannot go to court for an order censoring those signs. The fact that they may have paid taxes to make those signs does not mean they have suffered a “concrete injury” that gets them into the federal courthouse.

There was no “concrete injury” in this case, as those who were offended by the idea of creationism simply did not take the course (maybe they chose the Buddhist course instead). Simply being offended that an idea being taught on public property which does not agree with your own belief structure does not offer one standing in a federal court. My guess is, the district will allow the course to continue, and the NYCLU will have there inevitable lawsuit thrown out by the courts.

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