An Illinois school district is facing a federal lawsuit alleging that it unfairly restricted access for Christian Good News Clubs compared to secular student organizations.
The legal complaint, filed Tuesday in the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois, Rock Island Division, accuses the Moline-Coal Valley School District of unlawfully excluding the religious clubs from equal participation in school-related activities.
According to court documents, district officials are alleged to have implemented “discriminatory policies” targeting Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) and its Good News Clubs.
The lawsuit claims the district required the clubs to “pay discriminatory facility use fees, prevent them from distributing literature to students to take home to their parents, and bar them from Backpack Nights.”
“Defendants have unconstitutionally relegated CEF to constitutional orphan status and discriminatory treatment in all forums available for similarly situated organizations in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution,” reads the complaint.
The filing states that Dawn Wassell, local director of CEF West Central Illinois, met with Superintendent Rachel Savage to raise concerns about the alleged unequal treatment. During that meeting, Savage reportedly said that “she had no choice but to enforce the School Board’s policies.”
The suit further contends that religious viewpoint discrimination is at the heart of the dispute. “Defendants’ sole justification for treating CEF less favorably than other similarly situated nonreligious organizations is one thing: CEF’s religious viewpoint,” the complaint states.
“That is unconstitutional and unlawful, and this Court must issue a preliminary injunction pending trial and a permanent injunction upon final judgment enjoining this grossly unconstitutional treatment of CEF.”
CEF is being represented by Liberty Counsel, a Florida-based legal advocacy group that has previously litigated cases involving access for Good News Clubs in public schools.
The lawsuit references the landmark 2001 Supreme Court decision in Good News Club v. Milford Central School, in which the justices ruled 6-3 that public schools may not deny a Christian student club access to school property after hours solely because of its religious nature.
