Religious organizations have rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution, just like other groups and individuals, including the First Amendment rights to free exercise of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom of association.
More specifically, and has been recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court, the First Amendment allows adult-led clubs to meet at schools during any time when the school permits other clubs or groups to meet, whether during non-instructional time or during instructional time. The First Amendment’s constitutional protections are triggered whenever any public facility allows use of its facilities for certain persons or groups to conduct meetings.
A key legal precedent involves the Good News Club, which is an adult-initiated and adult-led extracurricular religious club like Crossroads Kids Club, designed to serve children from ages six through twelve years old. A public school district banned the club from meeting on campus, based on the school’s understanding that it could not permit a club meeting which engaged in religious instruction and might imply the school endorsed that religion. The Supreme Court rejected the ban as an unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination, and instead ruled that the government could not discriminate against speech within the “limited public forum” of a school. Religious clubs therefore possess the legal right to be treated neutrally and given access to speak on the same terms as other clubs. (See Good News Club v. Milford Central School, 533 U.S. 98 (2001).
