Kentucky High School Coach Gets Players Baptized

This from ABC News:

Coach Scott Mooney's Actions Questioned

After Field Trip Includes Baptisms

The actions of a Kentucky high school football coach have been questioned after he took nearly two dozen players on a field trip to an evangelist church service where nearly half the kids were baptized.

Breckinridge County High School Coach Scott Mooney last month used a public school bus to transport the kids approximately 35 miles but arranged for a volunteer driver and promised to pay for the gas himself, according to Superintendent Janet Meeks, who attended the service and witnessed the baptisms of her public school students.

"It was completely voluntary," Meeks told ABCNews.com, noting that of the team's 46 players, about 20 elected to go on the trip. Of those attendees, nine were baptized.

"They didn't get anything for attending," she said. "They didn't get anything for not attending."

The mothers of one of the baptized boys has said publicly that she was upset to learn her son had been baptized without her consent on a trip sponsored by a public school employee...

The Courier-Journal reported,

[Player] Robert Coffey, said Coach Scott Mooney told him and other players that the Aug. 26 outing would include only a motivational speaker and a free steak dinner.

“He said it would bring the team together,” Robert, a sophomore, said in an interview.

Two other parents, however, said in interviews that their sons told them that Mooney had said the voluntary outing to Franklin Crossroads Baptist Church in Hardin County would include a revival.

Mooney, contacted by phone, said school district officials instructed him not to comment.But Superintendent Janet Meeks, who is a member of the church and witnessed the baptisms, said she thinks the trip was proper because attendance was not required, and another coach paid for the gas.

An attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, told C-J that the trip would appear to violate Supreme Court edicts on the separation of church and state — even if it was voluntary and the school district didn’t pay for the fuel.

“If players want to attend the coach’s church and get baptized, that’s great,” Friedman said. But a coach cannot solicit player attendance at school, he said, noting, “Coaches have great power and persuasion by virtue of their position, and they have to stay neutral.”

The Associated Press reported,

Forty-seven people at the Southern Baptist service were submerged in water, an act of obedience symbolizing one's acceptance of Jesus Christ as savior and "rebirth" in faith....

School Superintendent Janet Meeks, also a member of the church, said Tuesday in a statement on behalf of school employees that the coach's use of the school bus after school hours for an outside activity was allowed. He asked to take about 20 players to the church on the bus, the fuel cost was donated and a volunteer drove.

It is not known if the Breckinridge County Schools allow other citizens to use school buses without fees, so long as they pay for gas and provide a driver, or if this was a special privilege only afforded members of the superintendent's church.

A constitutional attorney in Kentucky said the coach and the school system broke the law.

"A school cannot promote an endorsed religion," said Edwin Kagin, a constitutional lawyer in Kentucky who focuses on religion cases with atheists. "Doesn't matter if it's poor judgment, it's a crime."

Lisa Gross, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Education, said most school districts in Kentucky have a policy that allows the use of school buses for extracurricular activities.

"There's nothing inherent in state law that would prohibit" a trip like the one the team members took aboard a school bus.

Gross said the department is aware of what happened but does not plan to investigate the trip.

Gross, went onto tell the AP that state law bans "adult-led religious activities," but only in a school setting.

More from WLKY.

H-L: Correction on 10 Commandments Case

KSN&C Backstory here.

This from the Herald-Leader with an AP tag:

Correction: Ten Commandments-Kentucky story

The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- In a Nov. 28 story about a Ten Commandments case in Grayson County, The Associated Press reported erroneously that two attorneys would split more than $44,000 in attorneys fees awarded by a judge.

U.S. District Judge Joseph H. McKinley awarded the attorney fees to the plaintiffs - Raymond Harper, Ed Meredith and the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky - who won an injunction against displaying the commandments in the county courthouse. They were represented by ACLU attorneys David Friedman and
William E. Sharp, but the judge's order did not specify the disposition of the fees.

ACLU seeks $400,000 for Ten Commandments cases

Talk about wasted money...

This from H-L:

A long legal fight over courthouse displays of the Ten Commandments could cost two Southern Kentucky counties nearly $400,000.

In a motion filed this week, attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky requested fees of $390,588 for representing people who challenged the displays in the halls of the Pulaski and McCreary County courthouses, plus $8,133 in expenses.

The request comes after the ACLU won its request for an injunction barring the displays. Congress approved rules decades ago under which the losers in civil-rights cases must pay the legal fees of the winners.

The goal was to make it possible for citizens and attorneys to pursue potentially expensive lawsuits to defend civil rights and uphold constitutional principles when government doesn't do the right thing, said David A. Friedman, the lead attorney for the ACLU on the case.

"It's a core economic principle for how everyone's civil rights and civil liberties can be protected and defended when government acts in a lawless way," Friedman said...

Court reverses decision on anti-harassment training

LOUISVILLE - An eastern Kentucky school district's anti-harassment policy constituted a "chill" on a student's free speech rights, so the student should be able to pursue nominal damages, the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday.

The three-judge panel of the Cincinnati-based court, in a 2-1 vote, decided that the Boyd County school district's policy effectively barred Timothy Allen Morrison's ability to profess his Christian beliefs and opposition to homosexuality. The ruling sends the case back to U.S. District Judge David Bunning for a trial on damages.

Judge Karen Nelson Moore, joined by Judge John R. Adams, wrote that the allegation of a policy stifling free speech is enough to allow Morrison to seek damages. To make his case, the judges said, Morrison must show that the policy would "deter a person of ordinary firmness" from exercising free speech.

Joel Oster, an attorney for the Alliance Defense Fund, a Scottsdale, Ariz., Christian law group that represented Morrison, said the ruling left him "ecstatic."

Sharon McGowan, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, who represented gay and transgender students in the case, applauded the ruling. McGowan said the ruling recognizes that schools can't violate anyone's free-speech rights.

"Our students have always been about promoting dialogue," McGowan said. "They have never been looking to suppress other people's views."

A message left Friday afternoon at the Boyd County Board of Education was not immediately returned.

Morrison, a senior at Boyd County High School, sued the Boyd County school district over the anti-harassment training, claiming the policy threatened him with punishment for expressing religious beliefs in opposition to homosexuality.

Morrison was never punished under the policy, a fact noted in Judge Deborah Cook's dissenting opinion. She said Morrison suffered no actual harm from the policy.

This from the Cincinnati Post.

Ten Commandments cases have varied results

Harlan display allowed; 2 other counties blocked

A federal judge has rejected a bid by two Eastern Kentucky counties to revive displays of historical documents that included the Ten Commandments that were ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court.

But U.S. District Court Judge Jennifer B. Coffman did refuse to issue a permanent injunction against displays by McCreary and Pulaski counties, which had posted the displays in their courthouses.

She also granted a victory to Harlan County Public Schools, which wants to restore similar displays in school buildings, dismissing a lawsuit over the displays because the student who filed it eight years ago no is longer enrolled in the school system...

..."It's a prayer answered, for not just Harlan County but for America," said Johnnie Turner, an attorney for Harlan County Public Schools.

He maintained the display was purely educational. "Let history be history," he said. "That's all we ask."

He said he'd discuss the case with other lawyers and officials involved before any decision is made on whether to put the exhibits back up.

All of the displays at issue involve an exhibit called "Foundations of American Law and Government," which displays the Ten Commandments along with other historic documents, including the Magna Carta and the lyrics to "The Star-Spangled Banner."

The Supreme Court ruled the displays in McCreary and Pulaski counties were unconstitutional in 2005, saying the county governments were improperly sponsoring religion, as county officials had stated in official resolutions their intent to honor Jesus Christ as the "Prince of Ethics."

They also erected the Foundations of American Law and Government display only after court rulings against earlier displays of the Ten Commandments on their own, or grouped with other explicitly religious documents.

But the Supreme Court's ruling only upheld a preliminary injunction against the displays. The court said the counties' actions didn't "forever taint any effort" to post the Ten Commandments if officials could prove they had "purged" themselves of their original religious intent and were now trying to display the commandments strictly for secular, educational purposes.

Because of that possibility, Coffman denied the bid for a permanent injunction on the displays, sought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, which brought the lawsuits against the counties...

This from the Courier-Journal.