School Board Bars Prayers at Senior High Graduations

The Los Angeles Board of Education agreed Tuesday to prohibit prayers at high school graduations, clearing the way for dismissal of a lawsuit filed against the district by a Sherman Oaks atheist who feared that his son’s graduation would be marred by a religious gesture.

Lawyers for James Brodhead said they plan to drop the lawsuit today, after receiving a written assurance that the district will not permit “any language or other behavior that constitutes a religious observance or practice” during graduation ceremonies.

Brodhead’s son Daniel, 17, who also is an atheist, will graduate from Van Nuys High School June 18.

“Dan is, of course, just delighted he’ll have a religion-free graduation,” Brodhead said.

Decided to File

Brodhead, an actor, said he decided to file suit because there had been a prayer at his older son’s graduation at the school two years earlier and the principal declined to assure him that there would be none this year.

The lawsuit, filed May 22, sought an injunction prohibiting prayers during graduations at all district schools. A hearing had been scheduled for Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

District officials said they have in the past permitted students or other speakers to deliver invocations without restrictions at graduations.

Carol A. Sobel, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the suit for the Brodheads, said the settlement was worked out in two telephone conversations with school district lawyers.

“I think the district has been fairly reasonable,” Sobel said. “That’s why I think we were able to come up with such a quick and easy settlement. The Los Angeles school district has a really strong concern for the separation of church and state.”

A spokesman for the district confirmed that the school board reached a decision in a closed session to end the matter.

Bill Rivera, assistant to Supt. Harry Handler, said the district sent Sobel a letter drafted by Howard Friedman, assistant legal adviser for the district, which says:

“In conformity with other district policies and procedures, the district will immediately notify the defendants . . . that in an invocation or similar message at a graduation ceremony of the district schools, the district will not permit, sanction or authorize any language or other behavior that constitutes a religious observance or practice and will so inform all graduation speakers in advance.”

In an earlier opinion that Van Nuys High School Principal Jane Godfrey showed Brodhead this spring, an attorney for the district had said that because students largely plan their own graduation ceremonies and attendance is voluntary, the ceremonies are not subject to the constitutional doctrine of separation of church and state.

Rivera said the letter merely applies the district’s existing policy on religious messages at holiday programs during the school year to the graduation ceremonies.