School district exploring motion to settle suit over Pledge of Allegiance
The Brownsville Area School District is exploring a motion to settle a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union claiming a middle school student’s right to free speech was violated when she chose to sit during the Pledge of Allegiance and was punished for it on several occasions.
The school board is contemplating settling the lawsuit for $16,000 during their regular meeting tonight.
Veterans in attendance at the meeting, as well as some school staff and other members of the public spoke out against the possible settlement.
The student, identified as N.B., is a 13-year-old student at Brownsville Area Middle School. ACLU Attorney Witold J. Walczak alleged in the filing that district officials cannot make the child stand for the pledge because it violates her First Amendment rights. The suit asks for monetary damages, and also for the district to allow N.B. her constitutional freedoms.
District solicitor James T. Davis said following the filing that the latter request had already been addressed.
The matter came to light when the teen chose to sit “quietly,” and her teacher, Jessica VanMeter, noticed it on April 17 and asked her to stand.
The girl, identified as an A student in the suit, told her teacher she would rather remain seated, the filing indicated.
VanMeter “admonished N.B. in front of the entire class, with references to her disrespect for all the soldiers dying for her overseas,” according to the suit.
The teacher allegedly told N.B. she must stand or said that she would be “written up.”
On April 18, the girl’s mother, Carolyn Raja, called principal Vincent Nesser to discuss her belief that students should not have to stand during the pledge.
Nesser told Raja that there was not a written rule about standing during the pledge, but he expected that students would stand, the suit claimed.
That same day, N.B. again refused to stand, and VanMeter gave her a lunch detention, the filing alleged. Raja called Superintendent Phillip Savini Jr. that day, and he “not only embraced and affirmed Nesser’s policy, but told Ms. Raja that if necessary he would issue a written rule making clear that it was mandatory for students to stand during the Pledge of Allegiance.”
Savini, Nesser and VanMeter are all named as defendants in the suit.
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