In Geraghty v. Jackson Local School District Board of Education, (ND OH, Aug. 12, 2024) an Ohio federal district court ruled in part in favor of a middle-school English teacher's compelled speech and free exercise claims. Plaintiff resigned under pressure when a school board required her against her religious beliefs to use the preferred names and pronouns of students who were socially transitioning genders. However, the court held that certain issues remain to be decided by a jury.
The court said in part:
For the school, using the students’ preferred names and pronouns carried the message that it supported its students.... And, most importantly, for the students, using their preferred names and pronouns carried the message that the speaker respected their gender identity....
So, the question is not whether using preferred names and pronouns was part of Geraghty’s ordinary job duties, but whether it was part of her ordinary job duties to convey (or refuse to convey) the message that those names and pronouns carried. It was not. Geraghty was a middle school English Language Arts teacher.... Her job was to teach English to the appropriate state standards.... It was not her job “to teach anything with regard to LGBTQ issues.”....
Under the Pickering-Connick framework, the Court asks two questions: First, was the speech at issue “a matter of public concern?”... And second, was Geraghty’s interest in remaining silent greater than Defendants’ interest in “promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees?”...
... [W]hen Defendants compelled Geraghty to use the students’ preferred names and pronouns, they forced her to “wade[] into a matter of public concern.” ... The final question is whether Geraghty’s “interest in” remaining silent on a “matter[] of public concern” outweighs “the interest of [Defendants], as [Geraghty’s] employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees.”...
Defendants assert that they have a compelling interest that “teachers teach and do not use their position of trust and authority to impose their religious beliefs.”...
As the diametrically opposed opinions of the parties’ experts demonstrate, “the use of gender-specific titles and pronouns has produced a passionate political and social debate” in this country.... Whether use of student’s preferred names and pronouns creates a safe and supportive environment for students is a factual question a jury should decide after hearing the parties’ expert testimony.
Accordingly, while the Court concludes that Geraghty’s compelled speech was not pursuant to her ordinary job duties, it denies the parties’ Motions for Summary Judgment as to the Pickering balancing test....
Focusing on plaintiff's free exercise claim, the court said in part:
[W]hile the District’s practice might look neutral and generally applicable, it was ill defined and provided the District a discretionary “mechanism for individualized exemptions.”... Accordingly, it must survive “the most rigorous of scrutiny.”
