Student's Rights Not Infringed By Bus Driver's Lecture On Tolerance

In R.Z. v. Carmel Clay Schools, (SD IN, April 11, 2012), an Indiana federal district court granted summary judgment to defendants in a case in which parents challenged a lecture given by a public-school bus driver in 2008 to students on the bus. Her remarks were triggered by anti-gay and religious statements the parents' eighth-grade daughter had made. The bus driver (whose lengthy statements were recorded by school bus surveillance equipment) said in part:

This week we had a very historic election. Okay. It’s called diversity in this country. The diversity here – we’ve got kids on this bus who are Jewish, Catholic, I’ve had Muslims, I’ve had Buddhists, Sikhs, fine. That’s why we are what we are. I don’t care if you’re gay. I don’t care what you are. All those diverse things are what make this country what it is. I don’t care if you are evangelical. What I will not tolerate is your own personal views being espoused on this bus that you are going to go to hell if you don’t do it the way I do it. We’ve had this conversation before, we’ve had it for three years. We’re not going to have it again. If you can’t believe in tolerance towards one another, you don’t belong here. You belong in a parochial church school. I don’t want to hear one more word about anybody going to hell if they are gay or if they’re Buddhist or whatever, cause it is none of your damn business.

The court rejected claims that the student's free expression, free exercise and equal protection rights had been infringed.