| Pierce v. Society of Sisters | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued March 16–17, 1925 Decided June 1, 1925 | |
| Full case name | Pierce v. Society of Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary |
| Citations | 268U.S.510 (more) |
| Case history | |
| Prior | 296 F. 928 (D. Ore. 1924) |
| Holding | |
| TheOregon Compulsory Education Act that required attendance at public schools, forbidding private school attendance, was held unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinion | |
| Majority | McReynolds, joined byunanimous |
| Laws applied | |
| Compulsory Education Act (Act), 1922 Or. Laws § 5259;U.S. Const. amend. XIV. | |
Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510 (1925), was alandmark decision of theUnited States Supreme Court striking down an Oregon statute thatrequired all children to attend public school.[1] The decision significantly expanded coverage of theDue Process Clause in theFourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution to recognize personal civil liberties. The case has been cited as a precedent in more than 100 Supreme Court cases, includingRoe v. Wade, and in more than 70 cases in thecourts of appeals.
After World War I, some states concerned about the influence of immigrants and foreign values looked to public schools for help. The states drafted laws designed to use schools to promote a common American culture.[2]
On November 7, 1922, underOregon GovernorWalter M. Pierce, the voters ofOregon passed aninitiative amendingOregon Law Section 5259: theCompulsory Education Act. The citizens' initiative was primarily aimed at eliminatingparochial schools, including Catholic schools.[3][4][5]
The Compulsory Education Act, before amendment, had required Oregon children between eight and sixteen years of age to attendpublic school. There were several exceptions incorporated into this Act:
The Act was amended by the 1922 initiative,[6] which would have taken effect on September 1, 1926; this eliminated the exception for attendees of private schools. Private schools viewed this as an attack on their right to enroll students and do business in the state of Oregon. The act was promoted by groups such as theKnights of Pythias, the Federation of Patriotic Societies, and the Oregon Good Government League. Among the strongest backers of the Act were theKu Klux Klan, theOrange Order and other anti-Catholic organizations seeking to capitalize on the wave of anti-Catholicism sweeping the nation.[7]
Two sorts of opposition to the law emerged. One was fromnonsectarian private schools, such as theHill Military Academy, which were primarily concerned with the loss of theirrevenue. This loss was felt almost immediately, as parents began withdrawing their children from private schools in the belief that these would soon cease to exist. The other was fromreligious private schools, such as those run by theSociety of Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary, which were concerned about the right of parents to send their children to parochial schools.ACLU Associate DirectorRoger Nash Baldwin, a personal friend ofLuke E. Hart, the then–Supreme Advocate and futureSupreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus, offered to join forces with the Knights to challenge the law. The Knights of Columbus pledged an immediate $10,000 to fight the law and any additional funds necessary to defeat it.[8]
The Sisters of the Holy Names and Hill Military Academy separately suedWalter Pierce, thegovernor of Oregon, along withIsaac H. Van Winkle, thestate attorney general, and Stanley Myers,district attorney ofMultnomah County (of whichPortland is thecounty seat, and where both the Sisters and the Academy were headquartered). The two cases, heard and decided together, were slanted along slightly different lines. The Sisters' case alleged that "the enactment conflicts with the right of parents to choose schools where their children will receive appropriate mental and religious training, the right of the child to influence the parents' choice of a school, the right of schools and teachers therein to engage in a useful business or profession." (268 U.S. 510, 532).
The Sisters' case rested only secondarily on the assertion that their business would suffer based on the law. That is, its primary allegation was that the State ofOregon was violating specificFirst Amendment rights (such as the right to freely practice one'sreligion). Their case alleged only secondarily that the law infringed onFourteenth Amendment rights regarding protection of property (namely, the school'scontracts with the families).
The Hill Military Academy, on the other hand, proposed this as their onlyallegation:
Appellee Hill Military Academy .... owns considerable real and personal property, some useful only for school purposes. The business and incident good will are very valuable. In order to conduct its affairs, long time contracts must be made for supplies, equipment, teachers, and pupils. Appellants, law officers of the state and county, have publicly announced that the Act of November 7, 1922, is valid and have declared their intention to enforce it. By reason of the statute and threat of enforcement appellee's business is being destroyed and its property depreciated .... The Academy's bill states the foregoing facts and then alleges that the challenged act contravenes the corporation's rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.
— Pierce, Governor of Oregon, et al. v. Hill Military Academy,companion case, (268 U.S. 510, 532–533)
The schools won their case before a three-judge panel of the Oregon District Court, which granted aninjunction against the Act. The defendants appealed their case directly to theSupreme Court of the United States. The Court heard the case on 16 and 17 March 1925.
Theappellants' lawyers, Willis S. Moore for the state anddistrict attorneys, and George E. Chamberlain and Albert H. Putney, for the governor, argued that the state had an overriding interest to oversee and control the providers ofeducation to the children of Oregon. One of them even went so far as to call Oregonian students "the State's children". They contended that the State's interest in overseeing the education of citizens and future voters was so great that it overrode the parents' right to choose a provider of education for their child, and the right of the child to influence the parent in this decision. With respect to the appellees' claims that their loss of business infringed onFourteenth Amendment rights, the appellants' lawyers countered that sinceappellees werecorporations, notindividuals, the Fourteenth Amendment did not directly apply to them. In addition, they asserted, therevenues of a corporation were notproperty, and thus did not fall under the Due Process Clause of theFourteenth Amendment. Finally, they argued that since thelaw was not scheduled to take effect until September of the following year, thesuits were brought prematurely — to protect against a possible coming danger, not to rectify a current problem.
Theappellees, represented byHall S. Lusk, replied that they were not contesting the right of the state to monitor their children'seducation, only its right to absolute control of their choice ofeducational system:
"No question is raised concerning the power of the state reasonably to regulate all schools, to inspect, supervise and examine them, their teachers and pupils; to require that all children of proper age attend some school, that teachers shall be of good moral character and patriotic disposition, that certain studies plainly essential to good citizenship must be taught, and that nothing be taught which is manifestly inimical to the public welfare." (268 U.S. 510, 534)
Further, they replied that although the state had a powerful interest in their children's education, the interest was not so strong as to require the state'smandate of an educational choice of this sort. Barring a great emergency, they claimed, the state had no right to require their children to attend, or not to attend, any particular sort of school.
The Court deliberated for about 10 weeks before issuing its decision on June 1, 1925. The Court unanimously upheld the lower court's decision and the injunction against the amended Act.
Associate JusticeJames Clark McReynolds wrote the opinion of the Court. He stated that children were not "the mere creature[s] of the state" (268 U.S. 510, 535), and that, by its very nature, the traditional American understanding of the termliberty prevented the state from forcing students to accept instruction only frompublic schools. He stated that thisresponsibility belonged to the child's parents orguardians, and that the ability to make such a choice was a "liberty" protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.
With respect to the discussion of whether the schools' contracts with parents constituted property protected by the Fourteenth Amendment, McReynolds agreed that since the schools were corporations, they were not technically entitled to such protections. However, he continued, "they have business and property for which they claim protection. These are threatened with destruction through the unwarranted compulsion which appellants are exercising over present and prospective patrons of their schools. And this court has gone very far to protect against loss threatened by such action." (268 U.S. 510, 535)
McReynolds also agreed that businesses are not generally entitled to protection against loss of business subsequent to "exercise of proper power of the state" (268 U.S. 510, 535). However, citing a number of relevantbusiness andproperty law cases, he concluded that the enactment of the revised Act was not "proper power" in this sense, and constituted unlawful interference with the freedom of both schools and families.
In response to the claims by theappellants that the suits were premature, attempting to prevent rather than to rectify a problem, Justice McReynolds simply referred them to theevidence provided by the appellees showing that the schools were already suffering falling enrollments.
This decision marked the start of theSupreme Court's recognition thatdue process protected individual liberties; specifically, the Court recognized that theFourteenth Amendment applies to entities other than individuals and that the scope of liberties or rights which it protects include personal civil liberties. Over the course of the next half century, that list would come to include the right to marry, to have children, and to marital privacy.
Because the statutePierce v. Society of Sisters struck down was primarily intended to eliminateparochial schools, Justice Anthony Kennedy has suggested that the case could have been decided on First Amendment grounds.[9] Indeed, as mentioned, that was the primary argument the lawyers representing the Sisters advanced. Seven days later, inGitlow v. New York, the Supreme Court confirmed that the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment applies against the states.
The right of parents to control their children's education without state interference became a "cause célèbre" following the case, and religious groups proactively defended this right from state encroachment.R. Scott Appleby wrote in theAmerican Journal of Education that this led to a "remarkably liberal" education policy wherein religious schools are not subjected to state accreditation but only to "minimal state health and safety" laws.[10]
