Student’s stand: not to stand

Devon Smith, a Spring Valley High School sophomore, said what he did Monday morning was no different from what he's done since the eighth grade -- he neither recited the Pledge of Allegiance with other students nor did he stand silently while classmates took part in the recitation.

What was different, the 16-year-old said, was teacher Susan Rheinwald's reaction to his lack of participation.

He got kicked out of class.

"I wasn't being disruptive," he said Monday afternoon while sitting with his mother on the couch in their Spring Valley home. "I don't believe we are 'one nation under God' as the Pledge says. I don't believe in God. So I was just sitting there. That is my right."

In 1943 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a case involving Jehovah's Witnesses that public school students may not be compelled to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, finding that the First Amendment of the Constitution protects a student's right not to engage in certain speech.

In 1973 and 1978, the 2nd and 3rd U.S. circuit courts of appeals, respectively, also ruled that public school students could not be forced to stand silently while others recited the pledge. "It can no more be required than the pledge itself," the 2nd Circuit ruled.

Though Rheinwald was unavailable for comment, Spring Valley Principal Bob Gerye said Smith was not booted from class because he wouldn't recite the pledge. "A student has that constitutional right," Gerye said.

"There's more to it," he said, declining to say what prompted the discipline. He did not say Smith was disruptive.

Gerye said he did not know whether Rheinwald told Smith to leave because he refused to stand during the pledge.

"I'll have to look into that," he said.

Further attempts to reach Gerye late Monday were unsuccessful.

"After I told her (Rheinwald) that I don't recite the pledge, she said I didn't have to say it but that I had to stand while others did," Smith said. "When I told her 'I don't do that,' she told me to get my stuff and go to the dean's office."

Gary Peck, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, said this is far from the first time that the ACLU has heard about "unwarranted" discipline being handed out in connection with student involvement in the Pledge of Allegiance.

"It is troubling to me," said Peck, "that we have to deal with this issue over and over again with the (Clark County) school district. I want to be fair to the teacher. I feel the teacher is unclear as to a what a student's rights are in this situation. It's more of a district problem than an individual teacher problem or even an individual principal problem. It is incumbent on the school district to educate their people on what the rights of students are.

"This is an issue of fundamental constitutional rights. As long as the student isn't being disruptive, it is his right to sit silently," Peck said.

Though Smith was told to go to the dean's office by Rheinwald, he phoned his mother, Donna Pearson, who told him to come home.

"I felt it best that we wait a day before discussing this," Pearson said. "I was upset."

Like her son, Pearson does not believe in God. She is a member of the Wiccan faith, though her son says he is not.

Wiccans worship the earth and believe they must give to the community. Some consider themselves "white" or good witches, pagans or neo-pagans.

"I never say the pledge either, so my son may have got that from me," she said. "But I don't know whether I would have the courage at his age to stand up for what he believes in. That took guts. I'm proud of him."

Pearson thinks teachers could feel threatened by a student who refuses -- no matter how respectfully -- to do what is asked.

After he has declined to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in other classrooms, some irritated teachers suggest that "they wish I had to go fight in Iraq," Smith said.

Peck said he can't "crawl into the heads" of teachers but said "when you're dealing with free expression, it is incumbent to respect that right."

He said Smith's teacher could have used Smith's situation as "a teaching tool" to let students know how rights of Americans are protected under the Constitution.

Smith has been at Spring Valley High School for only a couple of weeks. He said he was expelled from Durango High School for writing on a restroom wall. His mother said a juvenile court ordered community service for the tagging and made him pay a fine.

After spending nearly two months at an alternative school where he won a "Star of the Week" award for being the best behaved student, he entered Spring Valley.

"I learned my lesson," said Smith, largely a "B" and "C" student.

"He lost his privileges for two months, we didn't let him get his driver's license," said Pearson. "He won't do that again."

Pearson said she just wishes teachers would learn their lesson about the Pledge of Allegiance.

"There are some students who don't believe in God. And there are others who don't want to pledge allegiance to a flag that stands for a country where there is not enough justice and liberty," she said.

Contact reporter Paul Harasim at pharasim@reviewjournal.com or (702) 387-2908.