British Law on Sex Education

Wed Feb 24 07:43:52 PST 2010

I happen to be in London and noticed in yesterday's Evening Standard that the proposed law is likely to be amended, making it look more like what Marc suggested might be permitted in the U.S. - I haven't seen the language, but it seems that religious schools still would be required to teach sex education, perhaps as the government directs, but they also would be permitted to teach their religiously informed understandings of the morality of such practices as homosexual conduct, contraception, etc.  The newspaper quotes Children's Secretary Ed Balls:  "Catholic schools can say to their pupils that, as a religion, we believe contraception is wrong, but what they can't do is therefore say they are not going to teach about contraception."

Here's a link to the story -

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23808956-ed-balls-to-let-faith-schools-teach-homosexuality-is-wrong.do

Dan Conkle

________________________________
From: religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu [mailto:religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Marc Stern
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 3:04 PM
To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics
Subject: RE:

I think the case is more complicated than Tom describes.In Board of Education v. Allen,the textbook loan case,the Court pointed out that the Meyer- Pierce line of cases should not be read to deny states very substantial authority over what is taught in private religious schools. Since then, the lower courts have struggled to divine how broad that power is, and how to reconcile it with the teachings of Pierce,Meyers and Barnette (No official,high or petty,etc).The results are  a jumble,although courts (in the 1980's.in the burst of litigation accompanying the growth of Christian schools) did resist allowing states to impose the public school curriculum wholesale on religious schools.
With this in view, its appears at least possible that a state might be able to insist on its own version of sex education, but could not -for the reasons Tom laid out as well as Barnette-stop schools from expressing their own contrary views. What is troubling about the British fight  is that many want to deny schools that right.
 Paul's comment suggesting that forcing knowledge on people is no violation of their religious liberty is in fact reflective of the results courts reach, holding such exposure is no burden on liberty.They so held even before Smith..I do not understand why such exposure cannot be a burden on religious liberty, albeit one that might in some circumstances be justified by a compelling interest.
Marc

________________________________
From: religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu [mailto:religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Paul Finkelman
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2010 7:43 PM
To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics
Subject: Re:
The result?  Our teen pregnancy rate might drop; the STD rate among teens would drop; the HIV/AIDS rate would drop; and the abortion rate would drop.  Presumably, all of these are things religious conservatives favor.  However,  some they would complain that by forcing knowledge on students the government was somehow violating their religious beliefs.

----
Paul Finkelman
President William McKinley Distinguished Professor of Law
Albany Law School
80 New Scotland Avenue
Albany, NY 12208

518-445-3386 (p)
518-445-3363 (f)

paul.finkelman at albanylaw.edu

www.paulfinkelman.com

--- On Tue, 2/23/10, Marc Stern <mstern at ajcongress.org> wrote:

From: Marc Stern <mstern at ajcongress.org>
Subject:
To: religionlaw at lists.ucla.edu
Date: Tuesday, February 23, 2010, 7:24 PM
Here is a link to a fight in england over a bill requiring sex ed in all schools including religious ones. Under the bill as reported here,schools could not teach premarital sex was wrong
What result if passed here in us?
Marc stern
http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/feb/23/sexually-confused-sex-education-faith-schools&ct=ga&cd=yVg0Ek2Zmiw&usg=AFQjCNFc-vZ5I1oIJnw3T__bLEs-xZYl7w

----- Original Message -----
From: religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu <religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu>
To: 'Law & Religion issues for Law Academics' <religionlaw at lists.ucla.edu>
Sent: Mon Feb 01 16:21:57 2010
Subject: Comments on Jim Ryan's "Smith and the Religious Freedom RestorationAct: An Iconoclastic Assessment," 78 Va. L. Rev. 1407 (1992)?

Folks:  I'm working on the Fourth Edition of my Academic Legal Writing textbook, and I wanted to add a chapter that contains an entire highly successful student Note - minus most footnotes - coupled with running commentary on why each section of the Note works (and, in some instances, how it might have been improved).  I figured that I already give students plenty of examples of bad writing, but they needed an example of excellent writing, together with an analysis of what makes it excellent.

The Note that I chose is Jim Ryan's Smith and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act: An Iconoclastic Assessment, 78 Va. L. Rev. 1407 (1992).  I like it a lot myself; I've heard good things about it from others; and I see that it has been cited over 120 times by law reviews articles.

But I'd also like to include some anonymous quotes from scholars in the field, who briefly explain why they think this article is good.  This, I think, will dovetail nicely with my own explanation of what I think the article does very well.  (Quotes pointing to some weaknesses in the article would also be fine; I will mostly praise the article, but I'll probably include some thoughts on how it could have been made still better.)  If you recall the article, and have something to say about the article, could you e-mail me?  My student readers and I will thank you for it.  Many thanks,

Eugene

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