FIRE's Guide to Religious Liberty on Campus (Fire's Guides to Student Rights on Campus)

College and university campuses remain one of the only forums in which the rights of students of faith are regularly curtailed. The ease with which students are denied the right to associate freely among themselves, even in matters of conscience and religion, is profoundly disturbing, as is most students’ inability to expose such denials as fundamentally unjust. FIRE’s Guide to Religious Liberty on Campus provides a history of the crusade for religious liberty and explains how the legal and moral arguments for religious liberty apply differentially on public and private campuses. This Guide also answers pertinent questions such as:

What is the modern history and current status of the United States Supreme Court’s view of the "free exercise of religion" and of "freedom of association?" How do these concepts apply to student liberty on my college or university campus?

What arguments on behalf of religious liberty and the rights of conscience pertain to a private or sectarian institution?

What legal and moral arguments may be made against the imposition of double standards by academic administrators in a variety of areas of campus life, including religious freedom?

DAVID A. FRENCH, a graduate of Harvard Law School, is also author of A Season For Justice: Defending the Rights of the Christian Home, Church and School (Broadman & Holman 2002). Mr. French has extensive experience representing religious individuals and groups and serves as Counsel for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship’s Religious Freedom Crisis Team. Mr. French has taught at Cornell Law School and is a member of the FIRE Legal Network.