Submitted by Office of the Attorney General
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita is standing up for young people’s First Amendment rights in a brief arguing that government cannot compel students to use other people’s “preferred pronouns” in violation of their own deeply held beliefs.
Rokita and a likeminded coalition of attorneys general have taken on school administrators across the country, who the attorneys general say now use “anti-harassment” rules to force students into “navigating and conforming to the bizarre world of transanity – or face very real consequences.”
Rokita
“Exerting government force to require students to speak certain words or affirm certain beliefs is about as Orwellian as it gets,” AG Rokita said. “Many people believe that a person’s sex – either male or female – is a matter of biological fact rather than a matter of personal choice. Whether led to that conclusion by faith or science, the First Amendment protects an individual’s right to espouse such a view and to use pronouns that align with it.”
In an amicus brief, AG Rokita and 21 other attorneys general take issue with a policy adopted by a school district near Columbus, Ohio, that requires students to use preferred pronouns no matter their personal beliefs. The attorneys general argue that the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit should rehear the case after a three-judge panel from that court ruled 2-1 in the school district’s favor.
According to the attorneys general, forcing kids and parents in Ohio to disregard their personal beliefs is an issue which easily bleeds across state lines.
“The First Amendment does not allow school officials to coerce students into expressing messages inconsistent with the students’ values,” the brief argues. In fact, it’s the opposite. “The First Amendment stringently limits a State’s authority to compel a private party to express a view with which the private party disagrees.”