Geraghty v. Jackson Local School District Board of Education
Ohio school district coughs up $450K to settle free speech case with teacher
AKRON, Ohio – Two years after filing a federal lawsuit against the Jackson Local School District, an Ohio teacher reached a favorable settlement agreement Wednesday after being forced to resign after declining to personally participate in the “social transition” of students who express a gender identity inconsistent with their sex by using the students’ preferred names and pronouns. To settle the teacher’s claims in Geraghty v. Jackson Local School District Board of Education, the school district agreed to pay Vivian Geraghty, represented by Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys, $450,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees after violating her freedom of speech.
Geraghty taught English at Jackson Memorial Middle School in Massillon until district officials demanded her resignation because she wanted to refrain from speaking in a way that would violate her religious beliefs. Geraghty’s sincerely held religious beliefs and scientific understanding govern her view that a person is male or female based on sex, not personal identity, and participating in a student’s social transition violates those beliefs by forcing her to communicate messages she believes are untrue and harmful to the student.
“No school official can force a teacher to set her religious beliefs aside in order to keep her job,” said ADF Legal Counsel Logan Spena. “The school tried to force Vivian to accept and repeat the school’s viewpoint on issues that go to the foundation of morality and human identity, like what makes us male or female, by ordering her to personally participate in the social transition of her students. The First Amendment prohibits that abuse of power, and Jackson Local School District officials have learned that comes at a steep cost. Vivian resisted this unconstitutional demand and explained that her Christian faith made her unable to participate in her students’ social transition, and she has received just vindication for taking this stand.”
ADF attorneys recently favorably settled two similar cases in Virginia on behalf of teacher Peter Vlaming, who received $575,000 in his settlement, as well as teachers Deborah Figliola, Kristine Marsh, and Laura Nelson, who are receiving religious accommodations as district employees.
VIVIAN GERAGHTY V JACKSON LOCAL SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD OF EDUCATION ET AL., Case No. 5:22-cv-2237 (PAB)
“Throughout the entire United States, and much of the world, a debate rages on the very nature of human identity and existence. Medical doctors and psychiatrists, school boards and teachers, politicians and citizens, parents and children are all engaged in the debate about what makes a person a man, a woman, a boy, a girl, or even whether those categories themselves have any meaning at all. ….. The Constitution guarantees a freedom of thought that includes a freedom to differ. “But freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order.” West Va. Bd.of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 642 (1943). There are perhaps no questions that “touch the heart of the existing order” more than those concerning the nature of human existence itself……
The Constitution protects this freedom to differ, in part, by prohibiting the government from adopting and enforcing a set of approved views on these matters in America’s public schools. “If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.” Id.
Within two hours of Ms. Geraghty telling her supervisors she had reservations about agreeing to the transition of two students, they forced VG to resign.
Because no interest justifies the state’s treatment of Ms. Geraghty— indeed, the very nature of free speech, free exercise of religion, and freedom from state-enforced orthodoxy on fundamental matters condemns the state’s attempt to purge contrary views from its schools—she brings this Complaint for injunctive, declaratory, and compensatory relief.
After Ms. Geraghty explained her beliefs as set forth in paragraphs 39–47, Defendants Carter and Myers told Ms. Geraghty that “she would be required to put her beliefs aside as a public servant.” Ms. Geraghty explained that she could not put her beliefs aside, and she did not believe she could be compelled to do so as a condition of public service.
Defendant Myers told Ms. Geraghty that her unwillingness to participate in social transition in violation of her faith amounted to insubordination and that continuing to teach without violating her beliefs would “not work in a district like Jackson.”
Ms. Geraghty said that she believed forcing her to resign violated her rights under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Defendant Myers reiterated that as a public servant, Ms. Geraghty must “set [her] religious convictions aside” and that if she was unable to do so, she had no choice but to resign.
The defendants did not even ask whether it was possible for Ms. Geraghty to simply avoid pronouns or use last names.
Ohio school district coughs up $450K to settle free speech case with teacher
