Loyalty Oaths and Religious Freedom

Both the LA Times and the Chronicle of Higher Education report that Cal State Fullerton fired a lecturer because she declined to sign an oath to defend the California and U.S. Constitutions "against all enemies, foreign and domestic." Wendy Gonaver, a Quaker and pacifist, refused to sign the oath, as it implied that she was willing to take up arms against America's enemies. She apparently indicated her willingness to sign the oath if she could accompany it with a written statement explaining her position, an offer the university reportedly rejected.

It is difficult to argue that this is justifiable incursion upon Gonaver's religious freedom. According to The Chronicle, the loyalty oath was added to the state constitution in 1952 to prevent communists from getting government jobs. Gonaver is not a communist; nor does the defense of California or the United States depend upon the involvement of Quaker teachers in combat.

Without question, anti-communist loyalty oaths are a product of a different era. But most of today's public universities have what amount to new loyalty oaths -- pledges not to offend others with controversial expression. The "nondiscrimination" policies most public universities apply to student groups are not really about stopping widespread invidious discrimination. Instead, these policies are about forcing dissenters to toe the line.

Universities defend the application of religion and sexual orientation nondiscrimination polices to religious groups not because they truly believe that some great injustice occurs when an a atheist or sexually active homosexual is not permitted to be the president of student groups like the Christian Legal Society. Instead, these universities simply cannot tolerate those who believe that certain religious propositions are objectively true or that homosexual conduct is sinful and immoral. The point of these policies is not so much to protect minorities, but rather to marginalize orthodox believers in an effort to reduce their influence and numbers.

Given that Gonaver is a Quaker, it is reasonable to assume that she will not commence litigation against university officials. If she did, one can imagine what the university would argue. In response to any Free Exercise Clause claim, the state would argue that the oath requirement is a "facially neutral and generally applicable rule," and thus immune to scrutiny under the Clause. Thanks in large part to the secular and religious Left, which bailed out on efforts to restore "strict scrutiny" to free exercise claims out of fear that such a restoration would undermine the homosexual "rights" agenda, Gonaver would have a tough time making a winning free exercise claim.

A claim under the California free exercise provision might not fare much better. In a case involving a Christian landlord charged with discriminating on the basis of marital status by refusing to rent an apartment to an unmarried, cohabiting couple, the California Supreme Court essentially said, "too bad -- no one forced you to be a landlord; you should go into some other line of work." One wonders whether the court would tell Gonaver to go into some line of work other than teaching.

Moral of the story: evangelicals are not the only ones hurt by the Left's subordination of religious freedom to "gay rights."