A charter-school network in California has been sued for blacklisting a family art-education company because of its declarations of Christian faith.
The company, Our Peculiar Family, run by four sisters, states on its website, “We believe the world around us reflects the beauty and glory of its Creator.”
The sisters, Elisabeth, Hannah, Melissa and Christiana Macy of Rosamond, California, allege violations of First Amendment protections for free speech and religious liberty in their complaint against Inspire Charter Schools.
Inspire’s vendor director, Caleb Jones, confirmed that the decision not to accept the company was “based upon the content included on your website.”
“All services and content on websites must be secular in nature for a vendor to be eligible for enrichment funds,” he told the company.
The non-profit Freedom X, which is defending the sisters, said the lawsuit alleges that the charter school network violated the First Amendment Establishment Clause by exhibiting hostility toward their religious expression and the California Unruh Civil Rights Act, which bars businesses from discriminating on the basis of religion.
The name of the company is derived from 1 Peter 2:9, “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”
After applying to provide art instruction, Inspire notified the Macys they would not be approved because services “appear to be religious in nature or have religious inclinations.”
“Services that contain religious content of any kind are not considered enrichment eligible and cannot be covered with our students’ general education instructional funds.”
“Imagine losing a contract over a gay rainbow image on your website, or because you’re an African-American operated business,” said Freedom X president Bill Becker. “It is doubtful they would be told to remove references to their identities before Inspire would be willing to contract with them. Openly acknowledging your religious faith is no different.”
He argued federal courts “have made it clear that conditions placed on public benefits cannot purposefully inhibit or deter the exercise of First Amendment freedoms.”
The complaint states: “This lawsuit challenges the indiscriminate abuse of discretionary power exercised by a charter school’s vendor department in rejecting – solely on the basis of the religious content and/or viewpoint expressed on a vendor’s website – the application of a Christian vendor to provide art instruction services to students enrolled in defendants’ charter schools.”
The suit seeks preliminary and permanent injunctions preventing the charter school from barring the sisters and others from contracting for services.
The sisters, the complaint argues, “do not proselytize as part of the art lessons they offer.” But they acknowledge “their artistic talents derive from God and that their faith informs the manner in which they promote their services.”
While the schools “have created a public forum for vendors to provide various educational services,” the complaint says, they also censor what the vendors can say or do.
The school network’s site states, “All student orders using instructional funds must be secular and are approved by the student’s teacher and our enrichment department before they orders are placed by the school.”
Inspire told the sisters their application only could be approved if they removed Bible verses and other references from their website.
“Defendants have censored plaintiffs’ speech, based upon its content and viewpoint. And have prohibited plaintiff from expressing the religious messages with no compelling state interest that would justify such censorship,” the complaint says.
