FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ADF attorney available to media regarding school’s ban on ‘Christmasy’ items
ADF represents parents who plan to speak at school committee meeting to object to ban on donations of Christmas items for gift saleMonday, November 23, 2009
WHO: ADF Senior Counsel Jordan Lorence
WHAT: Available for media interviews following Byam School Committee meeting
WHEN: Tuesday, Nov. 24, immediately after hearing, which begins at 7:30 p.m. EST
WHERE: Chelmsford High School Performing Arts Center, 200 Richardson Rd., North Chelmsford
CHELMSFORD, Mass. — Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Jordan Lorence will be available for media interviews Tuesday following a school committee meeting where he and two parents represented by ADF plan to speak in objection to a ban on Christmas items at the school’s annual gift sale. Byam Elementary School’s policy for its “Gift Room 2009” sale bans donations of candy canes, stockings, and Santas, as well as Christmas, Hanukkah, and other “religious items.”
“Ignoring the 95 percent of Americans who celebrate Christmas is not tolerance. It’s also not necessary because the idea that gifts related to Christmas would be unconstitutional at this sale is patently false,” said Lorence. “There is no justifiable legal reason to exclude Christmas, Hanukkah, and other ‘religious items’ from this event. The urban legend that Christmas poses a constitutional problem has come about because of the larger war waged by the secular Left to erase any trace of the religious traditions and beliefs that are part of the history and cultural fabric of our nation.”
For more than a decade, Byam Elementary School has opened its “Gift Room” fundraiser as a way for parents to donate and students to purchase gifts. On Nov. 12, Kathryn McMillan and Kathleen Cullen, who are both mothers of students attending Byam, met with the school’s Parent-Teacher Organization, asking them to reconsider the restrictive policy, but school officials refused the request. McMillan claims that red and green tissue wrapping paper was also banned from the event, to be held Dec. 1-4, because it looks too “Christmasy.”
The superintendent over Byam, Donald Yeoman, stated that the school’s PTO has “taken a conservative approach to separation of church and state..., and I commend them.”
“That understanding of the First Amendment is 100 percent false,” Lorence explained. “The Constitution does not prohibit Santa Claus and candy canes from being sold at a school gift sale, nor does it prohibit the donation of religious items to such an event. We would gladly defend the school free of charge if it agreed to accept such items and was later sued.”
CHELMSFORD, Mass. — Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Jordan Lorence will be available for media interviews Tuesday following a school committee meeting where he and two parents represented by ADF plan to speak in objection to a ban on Christmas items at the school’s annual gift sale. Byam Elementary School’s policy for its “Gift Room 2009” sale bans donations of candy canes, stockings, and Santas, as well as Christmas, Hanukkah, and other “religious items.”
“Ignoring the 95 percent of Americans who celebrate Christmas is not tolerance. It’s also not necessary because the idea that gifts related to Christmas would be unconstitutional at this sale is patently false,” said Lorence. “There is no justifiable legal reason to exclude Christmas, Hanukkah, and other ‘religious items’ from this event. The urban legend that Christmas poses a constitutional problem has come about because of the larger war waged by the secular Left to erase any trace of the religious traditions and beliefs that are part of the history and cultural fabric of our nation.”
For more than a decade, Byam Elementary School has opened its “Gift Room” fundraiser as a way for parents to donate and students to purchase gifts. On Nov. 12, Kathryn McMillan and Kathleen Cullen, who are both mothers of students attending Byam, met with the school’s Parent-Teacher Organization, asking them to reconsider the restrictive policy, but school officials refused the request. McMillan claims that red and green tissue wrapping paper was also banned from the event, to be held Dec. 1-4, because it looks too “Christmasy.”
The superintendent over Byam, Donald Yeoman, stated that the school’s PTO has “taken a conservative approach to separation of church and state..., and I commend them.”
“That understanding of the First Amendment is 100 percent false,” Lorence explained. “The Constitution does not prohibit Santa Claus and candy canes from being sold at a school gift sale, nor does it prohibit the donation of religious items to such an event. We would gladly defend the school free of charge if it agreed to accept such items and was later sued.”
ADF is a legal alliance of Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations defending the right of people to freely live out their faith. Launched in 1994, ADF employs a unique combination of strategy, training, funding, and litigation to protect and preserve religious liberty, the sanctity of life, marriage, and the family.
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ABOUT Jordan Lorence
Jordan Lorence serves as senior counsel and senior vice-president of the Office of Strategic Initiatives for the Alliance Defense Fund at its Washington, D.C., Regional Service Center. He has litigated religious liberty, free speech, and marriage cases across the nation since 1984. Lorence earned a J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School in 1980. He is admitted to the bar in three states, the U.S. Supreme Court, and multiple federal courts.