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Dr. Michael Jacobs of Aurora writes:

I was rather amazed to read that a lawsuit is being brought on behalf of one of the valedictorians at the Lewis-Palmer High School graduation ceremony last spring; Miss Erica Corder who invoked the name of God and (her) Lord Jesus Christ in her address to the graduating class.? On the basis of the facts as presented in the article, I would like to recommend that the faculty and staff of the school be seriously reprimanded and disciplined...not for their response to Miss Corder’s actions, but rather because of their failure to provide her with the education she should have received that would have helped her know, appreciate and understand that her actions, and her words, were inappropriate and, in fact, unconstitutional under current law, policy, and practice?in this country.
Miss Corder should have known that the Founding Fathers and authors of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights anticipated such attempts by individuals such as her to try to impose, in some form or fashion, their narrow beliefs on others...in the name of God,?Jesus Christ,?and other deities.? They (the Founding Fathers) took rather specific steps to separate?church and state, promoting and ensuring the political instituion of democracy not theocracy.
While Miss Corder defended her actions by saying she didn’t have a choice, “I really felt God calling to me to do this,” and, “My top priority is obeying God,” then using her line of thinking, I wonder if she would?have been?willing to allow one of her fellow valedictorians to also invoke the name of God as defined by Muslims, Jews, Hindus, or any other group of orthodox believers.? I recommend that Miss Corder read Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris to help her remediate the education she obviously did not receive which attending Lewis-Palmer High School.

This letter has not been edited.

READER COMMENTS

Dr. Jacobs - The 1st admendment guarntees an individuals right of free speech. I as long as she was expousing her personnel opinion and not the opinion of the school - whats the problem? It sould like you what to censure personel speech

The school district went overboard in denying this valedictorian her diploma unless she apologized, but I find the hoo-ha being generated by some, not all, Christians to be self-righteous hypocrisy. All those people screaming "free speech!" and "freedom of religion!" would be the first to complain loudly if a valedictorian of Muslim background had urged the assembled people to renounce false religion and find true meaning in Allah and His prophet Mohammed. That's a direct parallel. My understanding is that she urged people to come to Jesus.
She was not at a religious event, she was not in an open forum. She had a captive audience, and she took advantage of it.

Frank:

You should return to school to review how to properly construct a sentence, how to spell and how to punctuate. That's a personal opinion. At this point, I think, perhaps, your writing should be censored and you should be censured.

I really felt the Flying Spaghetting Monster calling to me to reply to this.

I don’t understand why this is a controversy, it was not a matter of religion or free speech, but of contractual breech.

Students speaking at school events agree ahead of time to rules for the speeches, and there are usually consequences outlined ahead of time as well for breaking those rules. Generally, these rules include no use of profanity, no crude comments or behavior, adhering to a dress code, abstaining from active politicking and abstaining from making personal religious comments. There is no free speech issue here, because the woman in question agreed to a set of rules (a contract) and consequences beforehand. In this case, the school also required her to use a speech that they had previously approved. She was punished because she broke the agreed upon rules. Because the school made no attempt to keep her from speaking her views at other venues (for example she could have gotten a permit to speak on public property outside the graduation before and after), there is no free speech issue here.

This is a normal occurrence in day to day life. To place it in a different context, if I were to have used her same words, in an email at my workplace, I could potentially be fired, because when I accepted employment, I agreed not to use the work email for non-business purposes. I entered into a contract with my employer about all kinds of conduct, I adhere to a dress code, I do not use profanity, I do not discuss politics or religion at work. Yet my freedom of speech has not been curtailed, because I am free to curse and politic all I want to outside of work. If my company attempted to legislate my religious or political speech outside of work, then there would be a free speech issue.

This woman broke the rules, and the school district enforced the consequences for those actions. I’m sure they would have done the same had she stood on the stage and repeated four letter words for her speech, or gave a speech endorsing a candidate, or even decided to just read from the dictionary the whole time.

Let all the graduates declare for their personal Gods, but let the audience have ripe tomatoes.

If the speakers do a good job, great, if not, let fly.

I think her Earthly father put her up to this.

She'd be hard pressed to show how she was damaged by this...? What is she suing for? Loss of income? Pain and suffering?

Darn litigious Christians, just trying to line the trial lawyers pockets. As I pointed out before.

We need tort reform.

Don't believe anything from Aurora Public Schools!

So my daughter, in third grade, was givin class work from the media teacher in all spanish. When my daughter tells the teacher she does not speak spanish he instructs her to get help from a spanish speaking class mate. Well my daughter tried to do so but still didn't get much help. At the end of the class those students who returned the work completed get a sticker, well my daughter didn't complete her work as well as many other students (who don't speak both english and spanish) so they all, including my daughter got to watch these kids get there stickers and she didn't get one. I am trying to learn spanish and teach my children spanish, I believe if the schools teach english they should also teach spanish as I think we are a bi-lingual state. BUT........that was so not fair. I think all of us can agree, change is change ,just be friggin' fair about it.
APS SUCKS!!!!!!!!!1

I always thought that the vals speach was to note thier own personal experiances. How they achieved the honor of being the number one student in thier class. A trip down thier academic trail. I did not realize that thier speach is to be a p.c. for p.r. on the school and the curriculum being served up.

I remember the vals at my grasduation. One mentioned how God was an influance to thier path to success, and another mentioned how certain teachers influenced thier study habits.

I guess in 20 years if you are not part of the system and politically correct, you can not speak your mind and are nothing but a radical because you have free thought.

As usual. The Je$u$ Bu$ine$$ kooks, cranks, freaks, and weirdos loudly cry , snivel, and whine about having their "freedoms trampled on", whenever THEY bring up the Constitutional matter of freedom OF religion.

Never mind the fact that they want to trample all over the equal right of freedom FROM their religious damnfoolery that belongs to all the rest of us as Americans.

Get religion OUT of government! Keep religion OUT of government, and tax paid for public services and events!

One reason for keeping your religion private is that is reduces the chance of having it ridiculed in public.

If Ms. Corder had simply thanked her god for whatever, I doubt there would be any controversy.

As it was, she knowingly deceived her principle by showing/previewing a speech she KNEW she was going to change. She has admitted to leaving out the jesus part when she discussed her speech with the principal because she "knew" it would be a problem.

Yet, for some reason, Ms. Corder is not willing to accept the consequences of her deceit.

That's nothing to sue over.

Damn liberals, always suing over something.

"God made me do it" is about as defensible an excuse for one's actions as "The devil made me do it."

I think we'd all be relieved to hear a class valedictorian announce "I'd like to thank the person most responsible for my being here in front of you all right now: ME! I'm the one who did all that studying, and I worked my little tail off, staying home from parties and even while working a part-time job. This wasn't handed to me on a tray; I jolly well earned it. But thanks for applauding."

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