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 Ninth Circuit throws political hot potato to Cal. SupremesDec 19, 2006 In a case challenging the right of the Boy Scouts to lease land from the City of San Diego, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asked the California Supreme Court to rule on a variety of issues, including whether the lease violates the state’s “Blaine Amendment.” Blaine Amendments are state constitutional amendments passed in the late 19th Century out of hostility to immigrants and their "sectarian" schools.
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty had filed a brief on behalf of the Boy Scouts in this case, explaining that California’s Blaine should not be read to exclude the Boy Scouts from leasing a government campground simply because the Scouts require their members to be religious. This would exclude the Scouts based on religion, violating federal constitutional guarantees against religious discrimination.
The California Supreme Court must now decide whether to address these Blaine Amendment questions from the Court of Appeals.
“The court is hesitant to rule on the Blaine Amendments, and understandably so, given the discriminatory nature of its origins,” said Hasson. “The Becket Fund has the ‘Blaines’ squarely between its crosshairs. We’re eager to place it between a court’s crosshairs as well.”
The case challenges a lease agreement by which the Boy Scouts lease Balboa Park from the City of San Diego, in exchange for adding buildings and other improvements to the Park costing over a million dollars; for operating and maintaining the Park’s campground and pool; and for nominal rent.
The plaintiffs, one lesbian couple and one agnostic couple, sued on the grounds that the Boy Scouts policies on homosexuality and religion have deterred them from using the park. Today’s opinion also decided, by a 2-1 margin, that this deterrence was enough to give the plaintiffs legal “standing” to sue.
“This is more of the jurisprudence of hurt feelings clogging up the courts of this country,” said Becket Fund founder and President Kevin J. “Seamus” Hasson. “It’s as simple as this: If you don’t let the Boy Scouts lease the land from the government because they’re a religious group, you’re defying the United States Constitution.”
The Becket Fund currently has a Blaine Amendment case before the Federal District Court of South Dakota. The case name is Pucket v. Rounds, Civ. 03-5033.
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