By Hunter Moyler
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President Donald Trump announced Thursday that his administration would take steps to reinforce protections for students who would like to pray or practice their religion openly at public schools.
Initially reported in an NPR exclusive, Trump said that the Department of Education would mail letters to education officials across the country to remind them that neither students nor teachers could be denied their First Amendment right to practice their religion.
Further, federal funding for schools may be withheld if they do not allow students to freely practice their faiths.
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The official Twitter account of the White House posted a video clip of the announcement, in which the president discussed the importance of safeguarding the First Amendment right to freedom of religion in public schools.
"This afternoon, we're proudly announcing historic steps to protect the First Amendment right to pray in public schools," Trump said. "So, you have the right to pray, and that's a very important and powerful right. There's nothing more important than that, I would say."
The president's actions "will empower students and others to know and exercise their rights," Joe Grogan, director of the U.S. Domestic Policy Council, said on a press call, as reported by BuzzFeed News.
Trump made the announcement on National Religious Freedom Day, which commemorates the day the Virginia General Assembly adopted the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom. Written by Thomas Jefferson, the statute is considered an important milestone in guaranteeing free religious practice in America.
The move appeared to affirm the values of Trump's evangelical base, and reflected earlier statements he made about bringing prayer back to schools. As Reuters reported in January 2019, Trump said at a rally that "very soon" he would be "taking action to safeguard students and teachers' First Amendment rights to pray in our schools."
Prayer in public schools was ruled unconstitutional in the 1962 Supreme Court case Engel v. Vitale. That ruling decided that public schools could not sponsor a prayer, even if it were nondenominational or voluntary.
Both the Engel decision and Trump's announcement hinged on the first part of the First Amendment, which reads: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." In the court case, this was interpreted by the majority to mean that schools run by the government could not officially sponsor prayers—that is, "respecting" a particular religion. Trump's announcement, on the other hand, appeared to be based on the interpretation that the government would be "prohibiting the free exercise" of religion, but not assuring that students could practice their faith in school.
The issue of prayer in schools continued to be a topic in American politics in the years between the Engel decision and Trump's announcement. Some of the current president's predecessors also spoke about school prayer and tried to implement policy on it.
John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy was president when the Supreme Court handed down its decision in 1962. Not long after, he spoke in an address delivered in Washington, D.C. about the ruling. A clip of Kennedy's speech was republished on YouTube by the archive of Pathé News, known as British Pathé.
Although many would disagree with the court's decision, Kennedy said, they should all nevertheless support it to "maintain our constitutional principle." He also encouraged parents to increase the level of religious education given to children at home.
"I would think that it would be a welcome reminder to every American family that we can pray a good deal more at home, we can attend our churches with a good deal more fidelity, and we can make the true meaning of prayer much more important in the lives of all of our children," the Democratic Kennedy said.
Gerald Ford
Republican Gerald Ford ascended to the presidency after Richard Nixon resigned in 1974. He ran his own presidential campaign in 1976 but was defeated by Jimmy Carter. While on the campaign trail in February of that year, Ford held a town hall in New Hampshire during which a man asked him his opinion of the issue of school prayer. Ford responded by referencing the Engel decision, with which he said he disagreed.
"That court decision in effect said there could be no prayer in public schools in the United States," Ford said at the time. "I read that decision very carefully. I read the dissenting opinion of [Justice] Potter Stewart carefully. I ascribe to his dissenting opinion, and therefore, I disagree with the Supreme Court decision."
Jimmy Carter
A Democrat, President Jimmy Carter said that he did not support government action to alter the effects of the Engel decision. As reported by The New York Times in 1979, he publicly stated his stance on yet another constitutional amendment that would restore the right of "voluntary prayer" in public schools. The amendment would go on to pass in the Senate but die in the House of Representatives.
"But in general, I think the government ought to stay out of the prayer business and let it be between a person and God," Carter said then, "and not let it be part of a school program under any tangible constraints, either a direct order to a child to pray or an embarrassing situation where the child would feel constrained to pray."
...
Ronald Reagan
Reagan, who became president in 1981, took direct action to reintroduce prayer in schools.
The New York Times reported that on May 18, 1982, Reagan proposed an unsuccessful constitutional amendment establishing that no provision in the Constitution would be able to restrict prayer. It would also guarantee that the government would not be able to force any person to participate in prayer.
In a 1984 address to the National Religious Broadcasters Convention, Reagan said that he believed most Americans thought voluntary prayer should be allowed in school, and that "God, source of all knowledge, should never have been expelled from our children's classrooms."
Reagan continued to campaign for the allowance of voluntary prayer in schools until his second term ended in 1989.
Bill Clinton
According to the Los Angeles Times, Bill Clinton opposed a proposed constitutional amendment from then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich that would permit schools to "restore officially sponsored prayer" in classrooms. He said he was concerned that some non-religious parents or parents belonging to a different religion than the one "sponsored" by a school would be offended.
Clinton also issued guidelines on religious expression in public schools. According to government records, students were permitted to "pray in a nondisruptive manner during the school day when they are not engaged in school activities and instruction, subject to the same rules of order that apply to other student speech."
George W. Bush
As governor of Texas, George W. Bush adamantly supported an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would permit schools to formulate their own policies when it came to prayer, according to Americans United For Separation of Church and State.
During his campaign for president in 2000, Bush, who eventually won the election, said he was a proponent of students being allowed to participate in voluntary prayer in school.
"Whether Mormon, Methodist, or Muslim, students in America should be able to participate in their constitutional free exercise of religion," he said.
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