Have parents lost an important protection?
Texas Supreme Court’s decision means private schools with a religious affiliation may be exempt from lawsuits
With back-to-school season upon us, many parents are scrambling to buy school supplies, new clothes, and uniforms for their children. But families with children attending private religious schools in Texas have a much more serious thing to worry about — losing their right to protect their children from abuse — as a result of a recent Texas Supreme Court decision.
In John Doe vs. Episcopal School of Dallas, the justices of the high court refused to consider a harmful ruling issued by the 5thCourt of Appeals in Dallas. The 2014 case involves a lawsuit filed by a father whose son attended ESD. The father claims ESD violated the school’s contract and policies concerning the education and care to be provided to students and caused his son significant trauma through a series of abusive behaviors that culminated in the son’s expulsion. Doe says ESD wrongly expelled his son. The school accused him of smoking marijuana off campus even though a drug test conducted by ESD was negative. Furthermore, ESD’s enrollment agreement stated that a first offense of this type would not be grounds for expulsion.
The case was eventually heard by the 5th Texas District Court of Appeals that ruled that the father did not have the right to sue ESD for any of its decisions and actions because ESD identifies itself as a religious school. The court, which seemed to ignore all exculpatory facts of the case, came to this conclusion based on its interpretation of what’s known as the “ecclesiastical abstention doctrine” of the First Amendment. On June 22, the Texas Supreme Court refused to hear the case. Two days later, John Doe filed a motion for a rehearing with the Texas Supreme Court, asking it to reconsider its decision.
The crux of the problem resides in how courts have interpreted the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine. Before the ESD case was heard, the doctrine had been applied in cases in which church doctrine was at the heart of a dispute, such as when a seminary or divinity school was challenged by a terminated employee. But in the ESD case, the appeals court applied the doctrine so broadly as to allow ESD to ignore written contracts it had with parents and evade liability for harmful conduct — all because ESD claimed it was a faith-based institution.
My nonprofit organization, the ChildFriendly Faith Project, tracks cases in which courts decide that the rights of religious organizations supersede the rights of children. We are alarmed that the ESD case is likely to be one of many to come. In fact, we have seen a similar case play out in Texas earlier this year. On March 26, a Galveston County district court judge dismissed a lawsuit against Galveston’s Trinity Episcopal School that stated that a mother couldn’t sue on her son’s behalf under the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine. In that case, according to plaintiffs, an African-American boy in middle school suffered long-term emotional harm after he was relentlessly bullied by classmates in the predominantly white school. In one incident, bullies gave the child an origami-style piece of paper with “KKK” written on it, as if to resemble hoods worn by members of the Ku Klux Klan.
In the wake of the Trinity and ESD cases, Texas private schools that purport
If Texas parents are denied the right to sue faith-based schools, they should think seriously about whether to enroll their children in those institutions.
to have a religious affiliation can now cite those rulings and claim that they are exempt from a jury’s or judge’s review of any decision that directly impacts the lives of students. This includes cases in which schools have engaged in egregious conduct, such as using abusive discipline or failing to fire a staff member who has sexually abused a student.
John Doe, the father in the ESD case, sees the frightening ramifications of what could unfold if the Texas Supreme Court refuses to grant his case a rehearing. “This case could morph from abuse and mistreatment of my child to broad disregard of the rights and dignity of children across our state,” he told me.
If the Texas Supreme Court refuses to grant a rehearing on the ESD case, it will be sending parents a dangerous message: It’s acceptable for faith-based schools in Texas to operate virtually free of accountability. If Texas parents are denied the right to sue faith-based schools, they should think seriously about whether to enroll their children in those institutions.