Everyone knows the slogan “Don’t Mess With Texas.” A Texas public school district learned the hard way that the law has another slogan: “Don’t Mess With God.”
Recently, a federal court told the Mathis Independent School District in South Texas that it couldn’t run roughshod over the religious and civil rights of two high school boys, Cesar and Diego Gonzales, who were simply trying to live by their faith. Similar to Samson in the Bible, the boys have kept a promise to God since birth to keep a strand of their hair uncut.
In Mexican Catholic tradition, such a promise is commonly known as a promesa. But the government didn’t want to respect that promise.
Why did Cesar and Diego promise not to cut their hair? When Cesar was an infant, he contracted meningitis, a life-threatening illness. Fearing for his life, his parents made a promise to God: If their son recovered, they would keep a strand of his hair uncut as a sign of gratitude to God. Cesar recovered, and when his younger brother Diego was born, the family extended the same promise to him. In sixth grade, both boys adopted the promise as their own.
From kindergarten through sixth grade their hair was never an issue. Although the Mathis Independent School District has a “grooming code” requiring boys to have short hair, school officials respected the boys’ religious beliefs and allowed them to participate fully in the school community.
But in seventh grade, that changed. Cesar was singled out after football practice in front of the team and told that he couldn’t play unless he cut his braid. “All it takes is a quick snip of the scissors for you to get your football equipment,” said the coach. His younger brother Diego was pulled out of a meeting with the science team and handed a letter stating he couldn’t join any extracurricular activities unless he cut his braid. He had to return to his teammates and tell them why he was excluded.
The boys were devastated. Not only had school officials labeled them unfit to represent the school, they faced bullying from their peers and missed two years of participation in sports and clubs.
Now freshmen at Mathis High School, Cesar and Diego are fighting back in court. They sued the school district alleging that it is violating a law called the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The law prohibits the government from imposing a “substantial burden” on anyone’s religious practices unless doing so is the only way to accomplish a very important government goal.
In this case, it’s obvious that banning the boys from sports and clubs is a substantial burden on their religious faith. It tells them they’re unfit to represent the school, deprives them of valuable opportunities for growth, and undermines their future college prospects.
It’s equally obvious that the government has no good reason for punishing the boys. The boys participated in sports and clubs from kindergarten through sixth grade without any problem. The Texas Association of School Boards instructs school districts that they “must accommodate requests for [hair-style] exceptions based on a student or parent’s sincerely held religious belief.” Even Texas prisons are required by law to let prisoners have long hair. Surely if violent felons can have long hair in Texas prisons, upstanding boys can have long hair in Texas schools.
Not surprisingly, a federal court ruled against the school saying it had no good reason to punish the boys and was likely violating their religious freedom. Yet, rather than acknowledge its error and letting the boys rejoin their teams, the school is still fighting the boys in court. It claims that the hair-length policy should be enforced not because of any safety concerns, but because “it’s just been a community standard, the way … it’s always been.”
This is the height of foolishness and an egregious waste of taxpayer money. It is also a violation of the basic American understanding of religious freedom.
When parents send their children to public schools, they want their children to learn subjects such as English, math, and science. They don’t want the schools to force their children to give up their faith or to treat them like second-class students who are barely tolerated. As the federal court recognized, the law says no government can put children to such a terrible choice.
Or if you want the bumper sticker version: “Don’t Mess With God.”
Luke Goodrich is the author of Free to Believe: The Battle Over Religious Liberty in America. He is also vice president and senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.
