ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, November 5, 1996 TAG: 9611050069
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
The Supreme Court, dodging a grenade in the battle over school prayer, on Monday rejected Mississippi's bid to let students lead group prayers in public school classrooms and at assemblies and sports events.
But confusion still reigns over just what the Constitution allows, and school officials nationwide remain caught in the middle of what the National School Boards Association calls ``religious warfare.''
The justices, acting without comment, let stand rulings that declared a 1994 Mississippi law a violation of the constitutionally required separation of church and state.
The invalidated Mississippi law would have allowed ``invocations, benedictions or nonsectarian, non-proselytizing student-initiated voluntary prayer'' at ``school-related student events.''
Hunt Cole Jr., the special assistant attorney general who had filed the state's spurned high court appeal, said: ``Our arguments on constitutional issues are over. There's nothing more we can do.''
Monday's action could be a setback for those outside Mississippi who argue that student-initiated prayers are constitutional in various public school settings.
``I hope lower courts won't read into the court's action any disapproval of legitimate student-initiated prayer and worship, such as prayer clubs,'' said Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice.
``The way the [Mississippi] statute was worded was problematic at the outset,'' Sekulow said. ``Official sanction was all over it.''
Republican leaders in Congress have proposed amending the Constitution to allow more opportunities for prayer in public schools. President Clinton says an amendment is unnecessary. Republican candidate Bob Dole supports it.
Since a 1962 Supreme Court ruling, organized school prayers have been barred from public schools, but that landmark case involved prayer sessions sponsored and led by school officials, not students.
The court never has banned individual prayer from public schools. Students remain free to pray before lunch, before tests or even during class, if they do so in an unobtrusive way.
In 1992, the justices strengthened the ban on officially sponsored worship in public schools by prohibiting clergy-led prayers at public school graduation ceremonies.
But the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals - in a decision that still is binding law in Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas - subsequently ruled that the 1992 decision did not apply to graduation prayers planned and led by graduating seniors.
The Supreme Court silently left that ruling intact in 1993. But another federal appeals court has declared such student-led graduation prayers unlawful.
The National School Boards Association last year told the justices in another dispute that the nation's public schools ``are currently the site of religious warfare'' and ``school boards are caught in the middle and do not know which way to turn.''
Contacted Monday, NSBA Executive Director Anne Bryant said ``a lack of clarity from the courts'' was ``forcing school boards to be judges and juries - not a good place for them to be.''
``What school boards across the nation would love is to have the Supreme Court give us some guidance,'' she said. ``The murky area still haunts us, especially at graduation time.''
The Mississippi law, designed to go beyond graduation ceremonies, was enacted shortly after a widely publicized incident in which a Jackson high school principal was disciplined for allowing students to recite prayers over the school public address system while students were required to be in their classrooms.
David Ingebretsen, executive director of the state American Civil Liberties Union, and his daughter were among 14 people who sued to block the law from taking effect. U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate ruled the law was unconstitutional except when applied to graduation ceremonies.
A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit upheld his ruling, and the entire appeals court voted 9-6 not to reconsider that ruling.
Also Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court:
* Refused to hear the appeal of millionaire equestrian George Lindemann Jr., convicted of insurance fraud in the 1990 electrocution of one of his horses. The court let stand Lindemann's conviction and 33-month prison sentence, which he began serving in February.
* Made it easier for federal courts to uphold criminal convictions by ruling that some state court trial errors were harmless. In an unsigned opinion, the justices reinstated a California man's murder conviction and told a federal appeals court to reconsider whether the use of a flawed jury instruction during his trial should be considered a harmless error.
LENGTH: Medium: 89 linesby CNB