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EDWARDS, GOVERNOR OF LOUISIANA, ET AL. v. AGUILLARD ET AL.
                                No. 85-1513
                    SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
 482 U.S. 578; 107 S. Ct. 2573; 1987 U.S. LEXIS 2729; 96 L. Ed. 2d 510; 55
                               U.S.L.W. 4860
                         December 10, 1986, Argued
                          June 19, 1987, Decided
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The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the court of appeals, which in
turn had affirmed the District Court's decision finding the Louisiana act
unconstitutional.

The decision had Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun, Powell, Stevens, O'Connor,
and White on the majority, with Scalia and Rehnquist dissenting.
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Prior History:

Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

Disposition: 765 F.2d 1251, affirmed.

Syllabus: Louisiana's "Creationism Act" forbids the teaching of the theory
of evolution in public elementary and secondary schools unless accompanied
by instruction in the theory of "creation science." The Act does not
require the teaching of either theory unless the other is taught. It
defines the theories as "the scientific evidences for [creation or
evolution] and inferences from those scientific evidences." Appellees, who
include Louisiana parents, teachers, and religious leaders, challenged the
Act's constitutionality in Federal District Court, seeking an injunction
and declaratory relief. The District Court granted summary judgment to
appellees, holding that the Act violated the Establishment Clause of the
First Amendment. The Court of Appeals affirmed.
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                                   Held:

1. The Act is facially invalid as violative of the Establishment Clause of
the First Amendment, because it lacks a clear secular purpose. Pp. 585-594.

(a) The Act does not further its stated secular purpose of "protecting
academic freedom." It does not enhance the freedom of teachers to teach
what they choose and fails to further the goal of "teaching all of the
evidence." Forbidding the teaching of evolution when creation science is
not also taught undermines the provision of a comprehensive scientific
education. Moreover, requiring the teaching of creation science with
evolution does not give schoolteachers a flexibility that they did not
already possess to supplant the present science curriculum with the
presentation of theories, besides evolution, about the origin of life.
Furthermore, the contention that the Act furthers a "basic concept of
fairness" by requiring the teaching of all of the evidence on the subject
is without merit. Indeed, the Act evinces a discriminatory preference for
the teaching of creation science and against the teaching of evolution by
requiring that curriculum guides be developed and resource services
supplied for teaching creationism but not for teaching evolution, by
limiting membership on the resource services panel to "creation
scientists," and by forbidding school boards to discriminate against anyone
who "chooses to be a creation-scientist" or to teach creation science,
while failing to protect those who choose to teach other theories or who
refuse to teach creation science. A law intended to maximize the
comprehensiveness and effectiveness of science instruction would encourage
the teaching of all scientific theories about human origins. Instead, this
Act has the distinctly different purpose of discrediting evolution by
counterbalancing its teaching at every turn with the teaching of
creationism. Pp. 586-589.

(b) The Act impermissibly endorses religion by advancing the religious
belief that a supernatural being created humankind. The legislative history
demonstrates that the term "creation science," as contemplated by the state
legislature, embraces this religious teaching. The Act's primary purpose
was to change the public school science curriculum to provide persuasive
advantage to a particular religious doctrine that rejects the factual basis
of evolution in its entirety. Thus, the Act is designed either to promote
the theory of creation science that embodies a particular religious tenet
or to prohibit the teaching of a scientific theory disfavored by certain
religious sects. In either case, the Act violates the First Amendment. Pp.
589-594. 2. The District Court did not err in granting summary judgment
upon a finding that appellants had failed to raise a genuine issue of
material fact. Appellants relied on the "uncontroverted" affidavits of
scientists, theologians, and an education administrator defining creation
science as "origin through abrupt appearance in complex form" and alleging
that such a viewpoint constitutes a true scientific theory. The District
Court, in its discretion, properly concluded that the postenactment
testimony of these experts concerning the possible technical meanings of
the Act's terms would not illuminate the contemporaneous purpose of the
state legislature when it passed the Act. None of the persons making the
affidavits produced by appellants participated in or contributed to the
enactment of the law. Pp. 594-596.
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COUNSEL: Wendell R. Bird, Special Assistant Attorney General of Georgia,
argued the cause for appellants. With him on the briefs were A. Morgan
Brian, Jr., and Thomas T. Anderson, Special Assistant Attorneys General,
Kendall L. Vick, and Patricia Nalley Bowers, Assistant Attorney General of
Louisiana.

Jay Topkis argued the cause for appellees. With him on the brief was John
DiGiulio, Samuel I. Rosenberg, Allen Blumstein, Gerard E. Harper, Jack D.
Novik, Burt Neuborne, Norman Dorsen, John Sexton, and Ron Wilson. *

* Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the Catholic League
for Religious and Civil Rights by Steven Frederick McDowell; for the
Christian Legal Society et al. by Michael J. Woodruff, Kimberlee W. Colby,
Samuel E. Ericsson, and Forest D. Montgomery; and for Concerned Women for
America by Michael P. Farris and Jordan W. Lorence.

Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the State of New
York et al. by Robert Abrams, Attorney General of New York, O. Peter
Sherwood, Solicitor General, Paul M. Glickman, Jane Levine, Suzanne Lynn,
and Marla Tepper, Assistant Attorneys General, and Neil F. Hartigan,
Attorney General of Illinois; for the American Association of University
Professors et al. by Ann H. Franke, Jacqueline W. Mintz, and Sheldon E.
Steinbach; for the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, by Bruce A.
Miller and Stuart M. Israel; for the American Jewish Congress et al. by
Marvin E. Frankel, Marc D. Stern, and Ronald A. Krauss; for Americans
United for Separation of Church and State et al. by Lee Boothby, Samuel
Rabinove, Richard T. Foltin, and James M. Parker; for the Anti-Defamation
League of B'nai B'rith et al. by Ruti G. Teitel, Justin J. Finger, Jeffrey
P. Sinensky, and Steven M. Freeman; for the National Academy of Sciences by
Barry H. Garfinkel and Mark Herlihy; for the New York Committee for Public

Education and Religious Liberty by Leo Pfeffer; for People for the American
Way et al. by Timothy B. Dyk, A. Douglas Melamed, and Kerry W. Kircher; for
the Spartacist League et al. by Rachel H. Wolkenstein; and for 72 Nobel
Laureates et al. by Walter B. Slocombe.

Briefs of amici curiae were filed for the Rabbinical Alliance of America et
al. by John W. Whitehead and Larry L. Crain; and for Reverend Bill McLean
et al. by Philip E. Kaplan.

JUDGES: Brennan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Marshall,
Blackmun, Powell, and Stevens, JJ., joined, and in all but Part II of which
O'Connor, J., joined. Powell, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which
O'Connor, J., joined, post, p. 597. White, J., filed an opinion concurring
in the judgment, post, p. 608. Scalia, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in
which Rehnquist, C. J., joined, post, p. 610.
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