[Vision2020] Judge Rules Against Pa. Biology Curriculum

[TIM RIGSBY]

>From today's Idahostatesman.com

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EVOLUTION_DEBATE?SITE=IDBOI&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-12-20-14-56-48

By MARTHA RAFFAELE
Associated Press Writer

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- In one of the biggest courtroom clashes between 
faith and evolution since the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial, a federal judge 
barred a Pennsylvania public school district Tuesday from teaching 
"intelligent design" in biology class, saying the concept is creationism in 
disguise.

U.S. District Judge John E. Jones delivered a stinging attack on the Dover 
Area School Board, saying its first-in-the-nation decision in October 2004 
to insert intelligent design into the science curriculum violates the 
constitutional separation of church and state.

The ruling was a major setback to the intelligent design movement, which is 
also waging battles in Georgia and Kansas. Intelligent design holds that 
living organisms are so complex that they must have been created by some 
kind of higher force.

Jones decried the "breathtaking inanity" of the Dover policy and accused 
several board members of lying to conceal their true motive, which he said 
was to promote religion.

A six-week trial over the issue yielded "overwhelming evidence" establishing 
that intelligent design "is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of 
creationism, and not a scientific theory," said Jones, a Republican and a 
churchgoer appointed to the federal bench three years ago.

The school system said it will probably not appeal the ruling, because the 
members who backed intelligent design were ousted in November's elections 
and replaced with a new slate opposed to the policy.

During the trial, the board argued that it was trying improve science 
education by exposing students to alternatives to Charles Darwin's theory of 
evolution and natural selection.

The policy required students to hear a statement about intelligent design 
before ninth-grade lessons on evolution. The statement said Darwin's theory 
is "not a fact" and has inexplicable "gaps." It referred students to an 
intelligent-design textbook, "Of Pandas and People."

Kitzmiller says she hopes the decision begins the healing process for Dover, 
Pennsylvania.

Federal Judge Rules Against 'Intelligent Design'

But the judge said: "We find that the secular purposes claimed by the board 
amount to a pretext for the board's real purpose, which was to promote 
religion in the public school classroom."

In 1987, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states cannot require public 
schools to balance evolution lessons by teaching creationism.

Eric Rothschild, an attorney for the families who challenged the policy, 
called the ruling "a real vindication for the parents who had the courage to 
stand up and say there was something wrong in their school district."

Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center 
in Ann Arbor, Mich., which represented the school district and describes its 
mission as defending the religious freedom of Christians, said: "What this 
really looks like is an ad hominem attack on scientists who happen to 
believe in God."

It was the latest chapter in a debate over the teaching of evolution dating 
back to the Scopes trial, in which Tennessee biology teacher John T. Scopes 
was fined $100 for violating a state law against teaching evolution.

Earlier this month, a federal appeals court in Georgia heard arguments over 
whether a suburban Atlanta school district had the right to put stickers on 
biology textbooks describing evolution as a theory, not fact. A federal 
judge last January ordered the stickers removed.

In November, state education officials in Kansas adopted new classroom 
science standards that call the theory of evolution into question.

President Bush also weighed in on the issue of intelligent design recently, 
saying schools should present the concept when teaching about the origins of 
life.

In his ruling, Jones said that while intelligent design, or ID, arguments 
"may be true, a proposition on which the court takes no position, ID is not 
science." Among other things, he said intelligent design "violates the 
centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting 
supernatural causation"; it relies on "flawed and illogical" arguments; and 
its attacks on evolution "have been refuted by the scientific community."

"The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District 
deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its 
resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources," he wrote.

The judge also said: "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so 
staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would 
time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose 
behind the ID Policy."

Former school board member William Buckingham, who advanced the policy, said 
from his new home in Mt. Airy, N.C., that he still feels the board did the 
right thing.

"I'm still waiting for a judge or anyone to show me anywhere in the 
Constitution where there's a separation of church and state," he said. "We 
didn't lose; we were robbed."

The controversy divided Dover and surrounding Dover Township, a rural area 
of nearly 20,000 residents about 20 miles south of Harrisburg. It galvanized 
voters to oust eight school board members who supported the policy in the 
Nov. 8 school board election. The ninth board member was not up for 
re-election.

The new school board president, Bernadette Reinking, said the board intends 
to remove intelligent design from the science curriculum and place it in an 
elective social studies class. "As far as I can tell you, there is no intent 
to appeal," she said.

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Revolution is not a word but an application; it is not war but peace; it 
does not weaken, but strengthens. Revolution does not cause separation; it 
generates togetherness.
-John Africa, Strategic Revolution

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