Christian Student Group Battle Against University for Constitutional Rights
Should religious student organizations, like all other student organizations, be able to “come together around shared commitments?”
Should religious student organizations, like all other student organizations, be able to “come together around shared commitments?”
The Christian Legal Society (CLS)-- the national membership organization of Christian attorneys, judges, law professors and law students -- is battling against the Arizona State University (ASU) with the resounding answer, “yes.”
The legal battle began last November with a federal civil rights lawsuit filed against the University.
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Recently, the CLS chapter in ASU filed another motion, this time asking for a preliminary injunction to seek from the federal judge a direct order for ASU officials to grant the campus' Christian groups the status and freedom to select members and officers who agree with their “Statement of Faith.”
According to the recent CLS press release, the CLS chapter had made an allegation last September that “ASU is violating the First Amendment rights of expressive association, free speech and free exercise of religion of the CLS chapter and other campus religious groups by failing to exempt them from the “nondiscrimination” provision in the Student Code of Conduct,” which states that all campus religious groups are to accept non-Christian members and officers.
“Religious student organizations, like all other student organizations, should be able to come together around shared commitments,” stated Steven H. Aden, Chief Litigation Counsel for the Center for Law & Religious Freedom, in Annandale, Virginia. “This injunction will permit the CLS chapter to do what every other student organization at Arizona State University may do – admit members and select officers who share the organization’s beliefs and views.”
The Christian Legal Society, founded in 1961, is organized in more than 1100 cities into attorney chapters, law student chapters, and fellowships throughout the United States.
For more information on the Christian Legal Society visit http://www.clsnet.org/
