Tag Archives: Topic: Colleges

WWLP.com (includes video): The Alliance Defense Fund filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh on behalf of Geneva College.

ADF President and General Counsel Alan E. Sears at the Christian Post (also on the ADF Blog) “What is ‘offensive’ is the double standard here,” says ADF Litigation Counsel Matt Sharp. “Public school officials cannot pick and choose what messages they are going to allow based on which viewpoints they prefer. ADF has litigated numerous cases similar to this one, and the law and the Constitution are clearly on the side of our client here as well.”

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: The Alliance Defense Fund, using attorneys based in Washington D.C., Georgia and Kansas, is helping Geneva pursue the case.

The Hill: The Alliance Defense Fund and Geneva College have filed a lawsuit against the health law’s birth-control coverage mandate.

Philadelphia Inquirer: The Alliance Defense Fund filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court on behalf of Geneva College. The school in Beaver Falls is associated with the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America. “At Geneva College, we only have one Lord, and he does not live in Washington, D.C.,” college

Chronicle of Higher Education: The Alliance Defense Fund filed suits on behalf of Geneva College, in Beaver Falls, Pa., which is affiliated with the Reformed Presbyterian Church, and Louisiana College, a Southern Baptist institution in Pineville, La. The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed a suit on behalf of Ave Maria University, a conservative Catholic institution near Naples, Fla.

CBS Pittsburgh: Most of the cost of the lawsuit will be taken on by the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian civil rights group in Washington DC.

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: “People of faith cannot be punished for following that faith and that is what this mandate does,” said Alliance Defense Fund attorney Greg Baylor.

National Right to Life News: The state shouldn’t punish people of faith for making decisions in accordance with their faith,” said Gregory Baylor, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), which filed the lawsuit. “Every American should know that …

News-Press.com: On the heels of Ave Maria’s filing, another lawsuit was filed Tuesday on behalf of Geneva College by the Alliance Defense Fund, a group of Christian attorneys defending religious freedom. The college, in Beaver Falls, Pa., was founded in the tradition of the Reformed Presbyterian faith.

Newsworks: On these points, ADF senior counsel Greg Baylor compares his client’s moral and financial dilemmas with what he sees as meddlesome government intrusion. “What is the state’s interest in this? Is it really necessary to provide that sort of burden on [Geneva's College's] conscience in order to save some one from spending 55 dollars on a box of Ella?” said Baylor. “The burden on conscience is not justified by the government’s alleged interest in having party ‘A’ pay for party ‘B’s’ abortion-causing drugs.”

Heritage Foundation: “People of faith shouldn’t be punished by the state for following that faith in making decisions for themselves or their organizations,” said Greg Baylor, senior counsel at ADF. “Every American should know that a government with the power …

TimesOnline (video): Geneva College already provides some contraceptive health coverage for its employees, but it is opposed to being mandated to cover birth-control methods that include embryo-killing drugs, officials at the Beaver Falls school said Tuesday. In announcing it had joined with the Alliance Defense Fund, a national coalition of about 2,000 Christian attorneys, in filing a federal lawsuit against the new national health care plan’s provisions on “preventive services,” Geneva officials said it was not about the contraceptives for them, it was about what they called “abortion-causing drugs.”

WTAE.com (includes video): “The state shouldn’t punish people of faith for making decisions in accordance with their faith,” said Gregory Baylor, senior counsel for the ADF, which filed the lawsuit. “Every American should know that a government with the power to do this to anyone can do this — and worse — to everyone.”

Washington Times: Harvard University is going to be hosting a conference entitled “One State Conference: Israel/Palestine and the One State Solution,” scheduled to take place March 3-4.

Federal lawsuit challenges Obama administration’s latest attack on religious freedom

AP: Yale University is objecting to the monitoring of Muslim student association websites by the New York Police Department . . .

TimesOnline: Matt Bowman, an ADF spokesman, predicted many more lawsuits will be filed by those “being forced to violate their core religious beliefs.” “At Geneva College, we have only one Lord, and he does not live in Washington, D.C.,” Geneva President Ken Smith said in a statement. “The First Amendment protects Americans from mandates that require us to act against our own convictions. We find the mandate to provide our faculty, staff and students with insurance that provides pills to abort babies is totally abhorrent and unacceptable.”

WorldMag: “The Obama administration has attempted to negate exiting real protections for religious freedom and it has no authority to do that,” Matt Bowman, an ADF lawyer, told me.

News from The Associated Press: The Supreme Court will once again confront the issue of race in university admissions in a case brought by a white student denied a spot at the flagship campus of the University of Texas.

Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Gregory S. Baylor will join Geneva College President Ken Smith Tuesday at a press conference to announce a new federal lawsuit against the Obama administration’s unconstitutional mandate that religious employers provide abortifacients, sterilization, and contraception to employees regardless of religious or moral objections.

Religion Clause: In McGlone v. Cheek, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18820 (ED TN, Feb. 15, 2012), a Tennessee federal district court upheld rules at the University of Tennessee that permit outside speakers on campus only if they are sponsored by a student organization

Catholic Sentinel: “Pro-life students shouldn’t have to get a permission slip to share their beliefs on campus,” says David Hacker, legal counsel of Alliance Defense Fund. “Making free speech the exception rather than the norm and then corralling it to a limited area is unconstitutional and contrary to the marketplace of ideas that a university is supposed to be.”

ADF Attorney Travis C. Barham at the Christian Post: Recently, Chancellor Nicholas Zeppos’ “message” on “nondiscrimination” announced the end of any meaningful religious freedom at Vanderbilt.

NY Daily News: The “systemic, ongoing fraud” is meant to mask the fact that “attending Brooklyn Law and forking nearly $150,000 in tuition payments is a terrible investment,” the four grads charged in a suit filed last week in Brooklyn Supreme Court

Detroit Free Press | freep.com: Julea Ward was an Eastern Michigan University student dismissed from a graduate counseling program after she refused to counsel a gay client. The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that she can have her religious discrimination lawsuit tried before a federal jury. / Gene Parunak/ALLIANCE DEFENSE FUND

HughHewitt.com Blog: It is a beautiful place with a unique “Great Books” curriculum, and it is a thoroughly tradition Roman Catholic institution. Which mens, of course, that the Thomas Aquinas College is now in direct conflict with the demands made by our anti-Catholic president. St. Thomas Aquinas’ president, Michael McClean was quoted in yesterday’s Ventura Star . . .

Inside Higher Ed: But a lawyer at the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian group working to defend religious freedom in colleges, said Forese’s bill is necessary and that discrimination against Christian academics is real.
“This type of legislation is sorely needed,” said ADF senior counsel David Cortman in an e-mail message to Inside Higher Ed. “When you compare the lopsided number of liberal professors to those who are conservative, there certainly is a crisis of one-sided views being taught to the next generation. Public universities are no longer the marketplace of ideas, but rather have become storefronts of indoctrination.”

Education News: During a talk at Florida State University, Vice President Joe Biden admitted that government intervention and federal loans that provide subsidies for students to attend college have greatly contributed to the increase in college tuition.

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco at the Online Library of Law and Liberty: In the end, the court struck at the very heart of what Julea’s lawsuit is all about: that the First Amendment prohibits public universities from demanding that students change or violate their beliefs as a condition to getting a degree. As the court said: “A university cannot compel a student to alter or violate her belief systems . . . as the price for obtaining a degree.” The Sixth Circuit is right, “Tolerance is a two-way street.” A fact that is often lost on public universities when it comes to Christian expression and belief, as Julea’s case so clearly shows.

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on the Zeb Bell Show to discuss the situation. | MP3 audio 14:07 mins

The Alabama Baptist: The Vanderbilt is just one of dozens of cases playing out on campuses all across the country, said David Cortman, senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund. “The university is supposed to be the marketplace of ideas, but it ends up being the storefront of censorship,” he said, noting the CLS v. Martinez decision does not apply to private schools.

David Cortman at the Washington Examiner: The intolerant and discriminatory exclusion of people of faith from university programs and professions has no place in a society dedicated to religious freedom and tolerance for all. Public universities, hospitals, and professional licensing boards should not force people to violate their sincere religious beliefs as the price to enter or stay in a profession. In the words of the court, “tolerance is a two-way street.”

WorldNetDaily (includes video): But this time a Christian professor is pointing out that under the same rule, Christians would be allowed to join an organization of atheists or Muslims and exert influence.

Findlaw: Even so, administrators at City University of New York Law School think some of their graduating 3Ls should. Those students are being offered an additional semester of “intensive, structured, Bar-oriented coursework” — for free!

ADF Attorney Jeff Shafer at Townhall: Granting leadership positions to those who disagree with an organization’s outlook is a most effective means to undermine it. That’s precisely why the university would never submit itself to the policy it is imposing on its religious student community—revealing that the university is fully aware of the destructive effect of that policy. The student body at Vanderbilt deserves better treatment than that.

News from The Associated Press: Students at Shippensburg University in central Pennsylvania can get the “morning-after” pill by sliding $25 into a vending machine installed at the request of the student government.

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on FRC’s Washington Watch to discuss the ruling. | MP3 audio 9:03 mins

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on the Hugh Hewitt Show to discuss the ruling. | MP3 audio 5:35 mins

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco at the Detroit Free Press (2/2): These five simple, yet profound, words come from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit’s recent opinion in a case involving Eastern Michigan University’s expulsion of Julea Ward from its graduate counseling program.

The Eastern Echo: Tedesco said the court recognized Ward’s rights were violated by the EMU. “The court said that the university can’t force a student to alter or violate her beliefs as a condition to getting a degree. That’s what we’ve been saying the university was up to from the beginning,” Tedesco said. “The Sixth Circuit really hit that and said, ‘That’s unacceptable. The First Amendment doesn’t allow it.’

ChicagoTribune.com: Three graduates of John Marshall Law School in Chicago sued the university Wednesday over claims that it inflated its post-graduate employment information to attract students.

New York Mag: It’s not exactly Darth Vader versus Obi-Wan Kenobi, but lawyers Jesse Strauss, David Anziska, and Frank Raimond have similarly completed the circle: Once, they were the learners; now, with a new series of lawsuits against fourteen law schools, they are threatening to take down their former masters.

MP3 audio 1 min.

FIRE – The Moral Liberal: Under the new policies, which were put into place after pressure from the Alliance Defense Fund, students may still reserve the table in the free speech zone, but may also speak elsewhere on campus spontaneously and without prior approval. The college also eliminated a speech code that banned “offensive” or “derogatory” speech.

R.R. Reno at First Things First Thoughts Blog: We seem to be in a season of judicial sanity. As Jeremy Tedesco, the lawyer who argued the case reports, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down a decision that vindicated the claims of Julea Ward.

The Hoya: Of the 78 cases brought before the Supreme Court since its term began in October, 73 had been argued beforehand — in a moot court at the Georgetown University Law Center.

The GW Hatchet: Four Supreme Court justices and three European human rights judges will visit the GW Law School in March to discuss the judicial system’s role in protecting civil and political rights.

OneNewsNow.com: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) teamed up with the liberal veterans group VoteVets.org and with anti-Christian crusader Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation to petition West Point to disinvite Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin (USA-Ret.) from the February 8 event.

The Moral Liberal: In this blog entry, I’ll cover the facts at issue and discuss the court’s holding. Later this week, I’ll focus on how the opinion could harm campus speech in the future . . . ollowing her expulsion, Ward brought suit with the assistance of the Alliance Defense Fund, alleging that the defendants, employees of a public school, had violated her rights to freedom of expression and freedom of religious exercise under the First Amendment.

Baptist Press: “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree. The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately,” said Jeremy Tedesco, legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. Tedesco argued for Ward before the court. Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, said the ruling “marks an important step in defending the religious and intellectual freedoms of Americans.”

CBN.com: “Rather than allow Julea to refer a potential client to another qualified counselor — a common, professional practice to best serve clients — EMU attacked and questioned Julea’s religious beliefs and ultimately expelled her from the program because of them,” said Alliance Defense Fund Legal Counsel Jeremy Tedesco, who argued Ward’s case last October.

World Mag: Jeremy Tedesco, the Alliance Defense Fund lawyer who argued Ward’s case, praised the court for recognizing Ward’s right to retain her religious beliefs while pursuing her education. “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree,” he said in a prepared statement. “The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately.”

Heritage Foundation Morning Bell: The President is right to highlight the rising cost of higher education. Tuition and fees continue to shoot through the roof, now exceeding $17,000 per year, rising on average 8.3 percent at public universities this year. That means medium-income Americans are struggling to send their kids to college, and graduates are leaving school with monstrous debt.

Michael Paulsen at Law and Liberty: What we think the point is of teaching Constitutional Law should, of course, greatly affect both how we teach Constitutional Law and what we teach as “Constitutional Law.” This is true not just for law school courses in the subject, but for undergraduate study of constitutional law as well.

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco at Law and Liberty: On Friday, January 27, 2011, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down an important victory for religious liberty on public university campuses in a lawsuit the Alliance Defense Fund brought against Eastern Michigan University (EMU) on behalf of Julea Ward.

Robyn Hagan Cain at Findlaw: Julea Ward, who enrolled in the EMU program in 2006 to become a high school counselor, declined to counsel a homosexual client during her school practicum because her “Christian beliefs would not allow her to affirm the client’s homosexual behavior,” according to the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), which is representing Ward.

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on the Paul Edwards Show to discuss the Julia Ward case. | MP3 audio 10:51 mins

Findlaw: And guess what? Eighty percent of respondents said they would definitely or probably do it all over again.

Free speech now allowed campus-wide (OneNewsNow.com): ADF legal counsel David Hacker says that was reasonable . . . “Universities across the country are censoring Christian and pro-life speech on really a rapid scale,” he laments. “But we’re really pleased that Chemeketa was willing to work with us and change its policies to open up the campus to more speech.” [more]

Inside Higher Ed: The Alliance Defense Fund, which has represented both Ward and Keeton, praised Friday’s ruling. “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree. The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately,” said Jeremy Tedesco, the lawyer who has worked on Ward’s case. The group has stressed the issue of religious freedom in both the Eastern Michigan and Augusta State cases.

WorldNetDaily (includes video): “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree. The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately,” said Alliance Defense Fund Counsel Jeremy Tedesco, who argued before the court in October of last year.

Detroit Free Press | freep.com: Tolerance is a two-way street,” the judges said. Ward’s lawyer, Jeremy Tedesco of the Alliance Defense Fund, a faith-based legal group, said: “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree. “Rather than allow Julea to refer a potential client to another qualified counselor — a common, professional practice to best serve clients — EMU attacked and questioned Julea’s religious beliefs and ultimately expelled her from the program because of them.”

Student Press Law Center: eremy Tedesco of Alliance Defense Fund, one of Ward’s attorneys, said he’s unhappy with Hazelwood’s extension, even though the court’s decision ultimately went in favor of his client. “Frankly, I’m not a huge fan of Hazelwood being extended to the public university context,” Tedesco said. “I think it’s very clear, though, that student publications at the college level wouldn’t — at least shouldn’t — be governed by Hazelwood, and I don’t think the decision says that at all.”

UPI.com: Ward is being represented by lawyers from the Alliance Defense Fund, a faith-based legal group. “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree,” said Jeremy Tedesco of the ADF. Ward said she was willing to counsel gay and lesbian students on other matters but refused to counsel them with regard to sexual orientation.

Sacramento Bee: Ward’s lawyers at the Alliance Defense Fund, a faith-based legal group, hailed the decision. Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree,” said the Alliance’s Jeremy Tedesco, the lawyer who argued the case. “The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately. Rather than allow Julea to refer a potential client to another qualified counselor – a common, professional practice to best serve clients – EMU attacked and questioned Julea’s religious beliefs and ultimately expelled her from the program because of them.”

Huffington Post (includes video): “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree,” Jeremy Tedesco, the Alliance Defense Fund lawyer who argued the case, told the Free Press. “Rather than allow Julea to refer a potential client to another qualified counselor — a common, professional practice to best serve clients — EMU attacked and questioned Julea’s religious beliefs and ultimately expelled her from the program because of them.”

NewsOK.com: Ward’s lawsuit, in which she is represented by the Alliance Defense Fund, stems from an incident near the end of her time as a graduate student at EMU. “She had no problem counseling gay and lesbian clients,” the court noted, explained that “Ward [had] asked that she be allowed to refer gay and lesbian clients seeking relationship advice to another counselor,” but instead she was dismissed from the program for allegedly violating ACA code of ethics by discriminating against homosexual clients.

David French at National Review Online: I argued the case at the trial-court level (and cough lost cough) when I was at the Alliance Defense Fund and was on the appellate briefs, but the credit and congratulations go to Julea Ward, my former ADF colleagues, and my friend ADF attorney Jeremy Tedesco, who argued the case at the Sixth Circuit. Well done, Jeremy.

LifeNews.com: “Pro-life students shouldn’t have to get a permission slip to share their beliefs on campus,” said ADF Legal Counsel David Hacker. “Making free speech the exception rather than the norm and then corralling it to a limited area is unconstitutional and contrary to the ‘marketplace of ideas’ that a university is supposed to be. We appreciate the college’s efforts in working with us to revise its policies and rectify this problem.”

ADF Attorney David Hacker appeared on the Victoria Taft Show to discuss the situation at Chemeketa Community College in Oregon. | MP3 audio 5:20 mins

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit ruled Friday in favor of Julea Ward, an Eastern Michigan University graduate student represented by Alliance Defense Fund attorneys who was expelled from a counseling program for her beliefs. In a strongly worded opinion, the court reversed a district court decision in favor of the university and sent the case back for trial, saying “a reasonable jury could conclude that Ward’s professors ejected her from the counseling program because of hostility toward her speech and faith….”

Detroit Free Press | freep.com (includes video): Ward’s lawyers at the Alliance Defense Fund, a faith-based legal group, hailed the decision. “Public universities shouldn’t force students to violate their religious beliefs to get a degree,” said the Alliance’s Jeremy Tedesco. “The court rightly understood this and ruled appropriately. Rather than allow Julea to refer a potential client to another qualified counselor — a common, professional practice to best serve clients — EMU attacked and questioned Julea’s religious beliefs and ultimately expelled her from the program because of them.” | The ruling.

News from The Associated Press: President Barack Obama says colleges and universities must be held accountable for the rising cost of higher education.