Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
It's been a while since we had news on the lawsuit between the Association of Christian Schools International and the University of California system. The judge last week dismissed some of the case and allowed other parts to continue (see ruling here). It's an unusual situation. Basically, the court ruled the university's admissions process is prima facie constitutional but that there was still some dispute over whether it might be called unconstitutional as applied to some of the specific courses they rejected.
The UC system decided not to give admissions credit to a handful of courses offered at some Christian schools because those courses failed to meet their criteria for academic rigor and, the university determined, did not adequately prepare students for the coursework they would encounter at a UC school.
There are two kinds of such challenges: a facial challenge and an as-applied challenge. In this case, the ACSI filed both types of challenges. A facial challenge argues that the policy, on its face, is unconstitutional, meaning that regardless of how evenly it's applied the policy is unconstitutional by its very nature. An as-applied challenge says that even if the policy is constitutional by itself, it's being applied in a discriminatory manner.
There were opposing motions for summary judgment. The plaintiffs asked the judge to grant summary judgment on both the facial and as-applied challenges; the defendants asked the judge to grant summary judgment in their favor on the facial challenge, but not the as-applied challenge. In both cases, the judge ruled for the defendants, dismissing the facial challenge from the university but not granting summary judgment for the plaintiffs on the as-applied challenge. That means the case goes forward only as an as-applied challenge.
First of all, the judge rejected the claim by ACSI that UC has a policy to reject courses that have religious content. The judge noted that UC had approved many courses from religious schools; in fact, most of the courses offered in ACSI schools are approved by the UC. That argument was clearly false from the start and the court recognized so.
Second, the judge rejected the plaintiffs' argument that the case required strict scrutiny, noting that where there is a clear nexus between the policy and a compelling state interest only the rational basis test is required. In this case, the court clearly recognized that the school has a compelling interest in making sure that students are adequately prepared to do the course work necessary when attending that school as part of the admissions process.
ACSI continually argued that the UC guidelines are the result of animus against religion, but the judge rightly rejected this argument because the evidence flatly contradicts it. If that was the case, why did they approve so many other courses from religious schools, including all but a handful of courses offered at ACSI schools? No, the reason these courses were specifically rejected was because they were substandard courses that would not prepare students for college course work.
The ruling is very long, mostly because the plaintiffs were literally throwing crap at the wall to see what sticks. The sheer number of different arguments they made against the UC's policy is incredible, but most of them are so transparently ridiculous that you can almost hear the judge's frustration in having to address them over and over again.
Comments
Posted by: Squiddhartha | April 1, 2008 10:17 AM
I think that's a standard tactic of the loony right: keep on throwing as much sheer nonsense into any argument or dispute as they can make up, in the (not always vain) hope that everyone else will just give up trying to control the brown flood. Also, if a judge rules against them, they can go back to their supporters and cry "We had HUGE amounts of evidence and arguments and logic and stuff and those evil secularists ignored it all! We're being persecuted! IT'S NOT FAAAAAIIIIR!!!"
Posted by: Raging Bee | April 1, 2008 11:14 AM
"I think that's a standard tactic of the loony right: keep on throwing as much sheer nonsense into any argument or dispute as they can make up, in the (not always vain) hope that everyone else will just give up trying to control the brown flood. Also, if a judge rules against them, they can go back to their supporters and cry "We had HUGE amounts of evidence and arguments and logic and stuff and those evil secularists ignored it all! We're being persecuted! IT'S NOT FAAAAAIIIIR!!!"
Chief fundraising strategy of the Religious Right. I have gotten the phone calls. Very rarely is the whole story told by the way. Blanket statements are made and the whole Moral Majority vs. Secular Humanist framing of the debate is used. This brings in un-told amounts of money. That is what I have been saying here as far as controlling the more fringe elements of your group who do more harm than good. In that, they are used to raise money to keep fighting this stuff.
If the Christian kids want a secular education they need to go get one. Most Christian schools and Bible colleges are not up to par as far as secular standards and these classes should not be taken. This is a frivolous law suit.
It actually will hurt these kids. They get to be about 27 and want to find a real job and cannot because all their education is in Bible. It is the whole monk strategy of I am going to seperate myself from the evil culture around me so I am not polluted. It ruins their own kids. They have no idea how to relate in the real world.
Posted by: King of Ireland | April 1, 2008 11:41 AM
One of the usual suspects from the Loony Tunes brigade was there: Michael Behe got $20,000 for writing some stuff saying that the lousy christian textbooks met the standards of the University of California. Nice to see these good folk supporting each other. Couldn't they find a real scientist to assess the books?
Perhaps Behe could spend some of this money on some new books on immunology and evolution, subjects which he was painfully ignorant of at the Dover trial!
The judge's exasperation comes through in the report, including his fairly unsubtle suggestions that he thought the plaintiffs were lying at some points! Lying for Jesus? Who would ever have thought it?!
Yup, it's another case of Stupid Liars for Jesus v. Sensible Truthseekers.
Posted by: Sam C | April 1, 2008 11:43 AM
Shame, shame, Ed. You've previously chided other people for misuse of the word "literaly" only to fall victim to the same hyperbole here yourself. I sentence you to thirty lashes with a wet noodle.
The following is a real conversation I had online last week:
Guy: *referring to the price of a certain science text* "Wow, they sure want an arm and a leg for that, and I mean that literally!"
Me: "Um... look, that's a pet peeve of mine. You used the word 'literally' incorrectly. If you really meant that literally, then they would actually want to take your arm and your leg as payment."
Guy: "No, I can see where you might be confused, but it's 'literally', as in 'literature' where they use a lot of metaphors. 'Literally' means 'metaphorically'. They're antonyms!"
Me: "They most certainly are antonyms."
Guy: "Well, I'm glad we got that cleared up. You really shouldn't correct people if you're not sure what you're talking about."
Posted by: Michael Suttkus, II | April 1, 2008 11:52 AM
It actually will hurt these kids. They get to be about 27 and want to find a real job and cannot because all their education is in Bible. It is the whole monk strategy of I am going to seperate myself from the evil culture around me so I am not polluted. It ruins their own kids. They have no idea how to relate in the real world.
And when they try to find a job, they'll be beaten out by Jews, Catholics, atheists, Pagans, and whoever else got a real education. So who will they blame for their misfortune? The usual scapegoats, of course -- Jews, Catholics, atheists, Pagans, and whoever else got a real education.
Posted by: Raging Bee | April 1, 2008 12:09 PM
Michael Suttkus,
And for how long after that conversation were you beating your head against the desk?!
King of Irelane, re:
I can't wholly agree. I have doubts about those that call themselves "bible colleges," but most other Christian schools are actually like most other secular schools, running the gamut from mediocre to excellent. It helps to look at who they're accredited by--if it's the same accrediting agencies that accredit the state schools, you can be assured they're meeting the same standards.Full disclosure: I work at a college affiliated with the United Methodist church. We have a chaplain--a great guy--but we're not really a Christian college. When I called Lyndon Johnson "a mean son of a bitch" in class yesterday, no-one blinked.
Posted by: James Hanley | April 1, 2008 12:21 PM
Michael Suttkus, II, Ed and others are not using the word literally incorrectly, they are using it hyperbolically. Their use of the word "literally" is only mistaken if you mistakenly take them to mean it literally.
Posted by: H.H. | April 1, 2008 12:28 PM
Michael Suttkus wrote:
Guilty as charged (and red with embarrassment). I considered changing it early this morning and pretending I didn't do it, but that would violate my policy of allowing my own mistakes to remain up for all to see. I have no excuse whatsoever. And you're right, it's one of my pet peeves too.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | April 1, 2008 12:30 PM
Michael: That was funny. I literally laughed out loud when I read it!
Posted by: Mr. Upright | April 1, 2008 1:01 PM
James Hanley,
I come from a more Pentecostal/Charasmatic movement. I tend to do the same thing I accusse so many on here of doing: Making sweeping generalizations to make a point. It is hard not to do because of the blog format. But yes I sure there are exceptions to what I said.
But of all the former missionaries I know about my age that all got disillusioned with the system and quit, I am the only one with a secualar education to fall back on. I got mine long before I converted to Christianity. I get to go back to teaching while the rest wonder what they did with their lives. Many are really disillusioned. I am hopeful. I think it has a lot to do with the difference in how we grew up. Most of them grew up in church. I did not.
Your a Christian right? Are you an evolutionist in the fullest sense? Or do you support ID? Or something in between? I cannot put a make on you.
Posted by: King of Ireland | April 1, 2008 1:21 PM
I am an American expat who has lived in Europe for nearly 20 years now, and I sometimes have trouble finding the right words to express the dismayed shock that I feel when I look at what the "religious right" have done to America's educational system (which, let us be frank, was in many cases not all that great to begin with). The idea that Jesus Christ's goal in life was to make people as ignorant as possible is offensive to me, as a practicing Christian. The University of California is absolutely right not to accept anyone who has spent his or her entire life believing that the world is 6,542 years old, that there was no such thing as evolution, that there were dinosaurs on Noah's Ark, that within 20 generations or so in the past people lived to be 800 or 900 years old, etc. -- and more particularly that it is "Christian" to ignore the massive and vast amount of scientifically discovered, double-blind-tested, repeatedly verified evidence which disproves all of that nonsense. Of course, the truly upright home-schooling fan would never dream of sending his or her offspring to a Commie pinko institution such as the University of California anyway. That's why the loony right have an entire educational system in place, from preschool to grad school. The amount of blinded self-delusion that exists in that system is quite remarkable, but America has now come to the point where fully three candidates for the presidency of the country truly claim to believe (although I very much doubt that truly believe) that God created the Earth from whole cloth the aforementioned 6,542 years ago and left old-looking dinosaur bones in the ground as sort of a teenage prank. I have been told by a correspondent in Virgina on these matters that if geologists can't decide whether the Earth is seven or twelve or fourteen billion years old, then how can I be so certain that ... well, let me say again -- the ripping down of all possible reason is a raison d'etre for these people. Of course, if it's either seven or fourteen billion, then it must be equally possible that it's 6,542. Sure. To summarize, I hope that the judge sends the loony tunes packing. And goodness, but I hope that America wakes up to the horrible danger which the loony tunes present. I mean, after all -- we have a "born again" in the White House right now, don't we? A clueless, mendacious, hypocritical "born again". Woe to thee, America! Woe to thee!
Posted by: Karl | April 1, 2008 1:25 PM
Thanks for the update, I read about this stuff happening in Florida and Texas and it's alien, but in California I definitely have a vested interest in it.
And I have to agree with James Hanley, at least when it comes to universities. I got my undergrad degree in biology from a school affiliated with the United Methodist Church, went there because of the huge financial aid package and loved the smaller atmosphere, and it wasn't a religious sort of place at all, I got a great education. Have no idea about religious high schools though, but the thought makes me shudder a bit for some reason.
Posted by: paul | April 1, 2008 2:05 PM
King of Ireland (and I still want to know what the heck that means),
I grew up in a conservative protestant church. Now I'm a semi-regular church-goer. Agnostic, not atheist. "Full evolutionist," who thinks ID folks believe in a very small God whom they desperately need to fit into their tiny little box (God had to have done it this way, not that way!). I know enough about what's in the Bible, and theology, to feel comfortable claiming that the right-wingers have a deeply perverted vision of Christianity.
I'm not anti-Christian, because I know some mighty good Christian folk. But I'm as skeptical of Christianity and Christians as I am of just about everything else.
Posted by: James Hanley | April 1, 2008 3:02 PM
King of Ireland is in salute the the King of Ireland as portrayed in Brave Heart. Why? Most Christians would today would have dismissed him because he cussed and was crude at times without even thinking about his claims that the almighty sent him. He was all about freedom. So am I.
Posted by: King of Ireland | April 1, 2008 3:22 PM
...Braveheart was about William Wallace, who was, last I checked, Scottish.
Unless you're referring to a different Brave Heart?
I am happy that UC (my current establishment no less) is winning. I would hate to see "science" classes that have about as much to do with actual science and the scientific method as literature class being equated as proper preparation for college level biology.
Posted by: Shar | April 1, 2008 3:43 PM
I think he's referring to the Irish character in Braveheart who refers to Ireland as "My Island" and claimed God spoke with him directly.
Posted by: DaveL | April 1, 2008 3:51 PM
King of Ireland I believe is referencing Stephen, the lunatic Irishman who fights alongside Wallace (and has probably six of the best ten lines in the movie, including "In order to find his equal, an Irishman is forced to talk to God").
Posted by: chancelikely | April 1, 2008 3:56 PM
It seems like this case has been going on a very long time.
Now that the summary judgments are out of the way, when should we expect them to seriously tackle the question of whether UC behaved correctly with respect to the specific classes?
Posted by: Coin | April 1, 2008 4:52 PM
"King of Ireland I believe is referencing Stephen, the lunatic Irishman who fights alongside Wallace (and has probably six of the best ten lines in the movie, including "In order to find his equal, an Irishman is forced to talk to God")."
Thats the dude. I just think that a man of God is different than most Christians would think. Which means that God may be different than what most non-believers are lead to believe by Christians. I think Jesus was more like the Irish dude than the evil king who ruled by "Divine Right".
That is why I read a guy like Ed who looks into the Saudi King's face and says, "fuck you and your little god too." Minus the first word, MAYBE, and you have the message of Jesus to the Pharisees. Maybe Ed is the next John the Baptist.
Posted by: King of Ireland | April 1, 2008 5:25 PM
Speaking of Michael Behe's role in the case, he went over almost as well as he did in Dover. On the issue of UC's rejection of biology courses that used books by A Bekka and Bob Jones University as the primary text, the judge quoted Beheto the effect:
Then the judge quoted the Bob Jones book:
The judge concluded that Behe's testimony supported UC's position that those biology texts are inappropriate for use as the primary or sole text.
Way to go, Mikey!
Posted by: John Pieret | April 1, 2008 8:07 PM
Behe gets confused when people notice his hypocrisy. It doesn't seem to happen much on his lecture tours, but in those courtrooms the judges seem to zero in on it immediately.
Posted by: Wesley R. Elsberry | April 1, 2008 9:42 PM
I think we all owe Behe a round of polite applause to express our gratitude. He has helped the cause of rationality once again by means of his testimony.
Clap, clap, claptrap. Hip-hip, and hidey ho!
There goes Michael Behe, boys! Man just look at him go!
Playing both ends against his own middle,
With any old claim he'll fiddle and diddle.
Truths of all sorts turn to puddles of piddle;
Whether they're yours or even worse, mine!
To him they're the same when the check clears on time.
Clap, clap, claptrap. Hip-hip, and hidey ho!
There goes Michael Behe boys! Man just look at him go!
If you didn't know better you'd likely conclude
He tackles all notions however construed.
How seldom we're blessed with a master so shrewd;
He must be a wonderful, wonderful dude!
So tell me, how come all my rhymes come out rude?
But, seriously, folks--how 'bout a standing O for Judge James Otero of the Central District of California. Give it up!
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | April 2, 2008 12:13 AM
True. I did my graduate studies at Biola, and although it gets a lot of (mostly deserved) flak around here for its connection to the Discovery Institute, it does have secular accreditation and it's not that different from a regular liberal arts college (I went there to study linguistics, and the school has close ties to SIL). Ironically, it was there that I finally took stock of the vestiges of my creationist beliefs and rejected them as the sham they were.
I went to a private Christian high school with the BJU biology textbook, and it did do me a great disservice. Since then, I've done a lot of amateur study of biology to counteract this (even going so far as to read the Futuyma textbook). So it can and does mess people up.
Posted by: Turcano | April 2, 2008 4:46 AM
You make as any claims/arguments as you can because you cannot bring them up later. Hence they threw shit to see what stuck.
They are truly desperate. But we knew that those who teach (and support teaching) a denial of facts must be in that position to begin with...
Posted by: Andrew | April 2, 2008 5:45 AM
Behe states:
I wish I was taking Mike Behe's biochem class. That way, whenever he tried to give me a big red 'X' on something I got wrong, I'd quote the preceding passage.
"Kreb's cycle?? Hey man, you can't make me consent to that!!"
Posted by: Dave S. | April 2, 2008 8:37 AM
The judge noted that UC had approved many courses from religious schools; in fact, most of the courses offered in ACSI schools are approved by the UC.
As a (secular) homeschooler, I am surprised to see the coursework that IS being approved, as cited in the ruling. It's not just private christian schools using this stuff; you can find much of it at christian homeschool curriculum fairs, too - and it's really, really bad.
Posted by: Lynn | April 2, 2008 12:26 PM
Forgive the pedantry, but hyperbole indicates exaggeration, not contradiction. 'Literally' here functions emphatically, but the content is not exaggerated - it is actually negated. So whereas I might agree that this use isn't necessarily "incorrect" (plenty of people use it intelligibly), it most certainly is not hyperbole.
Also, Michael Suttkus, II: If that conversation really occurred (and I unfortunately have no reason to think that such a conversation couldn't plausibly happen), then that really depresses me. On the other hand, it demonstrates how a tortured etymological appeal can go wrong so easily.
Posted by: The Christian Cynic | April 2, 2008 3:00 PM
P.29, I just find this quote hilarious:
P.33, I notice that the court cites Kitzmiller. I am curious, is this something that has happened many times before or is this some kind of substantial first? Do law decisions have some kind of citebase-style tracking system for seeing how many times a decision has been cited?Posted by: Coin | April 2, 2008 8:26 PM