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LEGAL BRIEF

You get an e-mail from parents requesting their child be excused from a lesson on evolution because it conflicts with their religious beliefs. How do you respond? Last June, on the final day of its term, the U.S. Supreme Court provided at least some guidance on how to manage parents鈥� religious objections to what their children are taught at school.

In Mahmoud v. Taylor, a sharply divided court addressed parents鈥� religious objections to readings from 鈥淟BGTQ+-inclusive鈥� storybooks to their elementary school-age children in the Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland. The court majority held that under the First Amendment鈥檚 free-exercise-of-religion clause, when a school district鈥檚 curricular choices interfere with parents鈥� religious upbringing of their children, the district owes a duty of reasonable accommodation 鈥� an opt-out, in this case 鈥� which cannot be denied absent a compelling justification that wasn鈥檛 shown there.

The court further ordered the district to notify the objecting parents in advance whenever one of the books or any similar book was going to be used.