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As some of you know, I
have rather strong political views. Yet I have argued in my constitutional
law classes that it would be perfectly constitutional (and perhaps desirable to
boot) if a condition of my employment were that I could not wear campaign
buttons in my classes or otherwise make clearly political statements.
(Indeed, I do not wear such buttons and I do not recall ever making statements
of support for, or against, candidates, in class.) Even more to the point,
it is clearly the case that I cannot come in one morning and say, "Don't all of
your realize that the most important question is whether you have achieved
eternal salvation? Therefore, we're devoting the rest of our time together
to exploring how best to achieve that state." I can be fired for not
adhering to the job description that says I'm to talk about constitutional
law.
A chaplain, obviously,
has a certain freedom to engage in overt religious activity, including telling
those who show up voluntarily at services how lucky they are to be on the road
to eternal life while everyone else is on the road to eternal damnation.
[The memorial service is a close case. Ultimately, I think that the desire
of the military to protect unit cohesion takes precedence over the chaplain's
freedom to make invidious comparisons of the deceased's religious choices as
against thoseo who do not share his faith, but I can see the argument for the
other side.] In any event, the chaplain can clearly be told that
there are limits to his/her evangelism with regard to those who are not
voluntary attenders of what might be called "regular" services, just as there
are certainly limits to my evangelizing, either politically or religiously, in
my classroom. The FE Clause is no stronger than the Free Speech Clause in
such circumstances.
sandy
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