UNC Group's Case Spurs Faith, Conscience Issues | Eastern North Carolina Now

   Publisher's note: Anthony Dent is a senior economics major at UNC-Chapel Hill and the chief executive officer of the Carolina Liberty Foundation and is the author of this contribution to the Carolina Journal, John Hood Publisher.

    Can membership groups exclude people who disagree with organization's principles?

    RALEIGH     A controversy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill involving a Christian a cappella singing group could result in faith groups having to accept members who actively oppose their views, tenets, and standards of conduct, should an appointed task force so rule.

    The singing group Psalm 100 voted a gay member out of the group last August, citing the member's views on homosexuality -- an action permissible under existing university policies. Current policies separate one's belief from one's status, allowing the group to require its members to believe homosexuality is a sin, but not allowing the group to discriminate against a member just for being gay.

    The legal foundation for the current policy is the 2006 case Alpha Iota Omega Christian Fraternity v. Moeser. In 2003, Alpha Iota Omega refused to sign a nondiscriminatory statement as ordered by the university, since the member's Christianity was the fraternity's reason for existing in the first place. The fraternity dropped the case once UNC, under then-chancellor James Moeser, relented, and allowed student groups to deny membership to those who oppose their defining beliefs.

    Critics of Psalm 100's action assert that the organization kicked the student out specifically because he was gay. If true, this would not be permitted under the school's nondiscrimination policy, as it prohibits exclusion based on personal characteristics, such as race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

    In the subsequent investigation, university administrators found that Psalm 100 did not violate the existing nondiscrimination policy. The administration's decision angered many in the university community, and the school acquiesced to their demands by establishing a task force consisting of students, administrators, faculty, and leaders of campus organizations.

    According to a student member, the task force has three options: implement an "all-comers" policy, in which belief-based groups cannot take prospective members' beliefs into account hen considering them for membership; implement a modified all-comers policy, in which a student group can take prospective members' beliefs into account, but none related to "personal characteristics"; or make no change.

    Proponents of the first two options appeared to be in the majority at the task force's first meeting on Feb. 1. They questioned question whether a separation of one's belief from one's personal characteristics is still relevant, given that one's beliefs are inextricably intertwined with who one is. Terri Phoenix, Director of the UNC LGBTQ [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer) Center, asked, "Is it harmful to disentangle belief from status?"

    If the university indeed decides to implement an all-comers policy, it could have implications for some smaller student groups. One such organization is the conservative publication Carolina Review, which has just 25 staff members.

    It has had experience with hostile actions, such as having issues stolen and magazine stands taken, with those who oppose its political views. If the current policy were to change, it would be possible for a large contingent of liberal students to join the publication and eliminate the conservative voice of the Review.

    The recent spate of mischief began with a 2010 Supreme Court case, Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. At the heart of Christian Legal Society was whether a Christian group at the University of California's Hastings Law School could continue to require that its leaders be Christians. In a 5-4 vote, the court ruled that schools can force religious and political student organizations to accept members and leaders who do not share the group's values.

    Other schools are taking advantage of that decision to impose conformity on student organizations. Vanderbilt University, for instance, is undergoing a campuswide debate after university administration implemented an "all-comers" policy.

    But Vanderbilt's Christian groups actively are challenging the administration on its new policy. The U.S. Supreme Court gave groups who oppose the policy a ray of hope in the recent case of Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC, in which the court affirmed a group's right to exclude based on beliefs.