University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Chancellor James Moeser has responded to FIRE's letter advising him that his school violated the constitutional rights of a Christian men's fraternity when it "de-recognized" the group for requiring that its members be Christian. And FIRE has fired back. The media and a North Carolina congressman are taking notice of this increasingly public showdown between UNC's interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment and FIRE's interpretation of the First Amendment. It should be an interesting fight--not only because Moeser has reversed his position from the one he took when FIRE approached him about an analogous issue two years ago, but also because in doing so he is backing an administrator who has more than once abused his position to engage in vigilante politics at conservative and religious students' expense (Jonathan Curtis has not only repeatedly threatened to derecognize campus Christian groups, but has also facilitated the theft by liberal students of conservative student publications--scroll down here for more).

Erin,

I am usually on FIRE's side of things, but this case looks complicated to me, and FIRE's recent letter looks too simplistic.

UNC's response says that organizations may require members to have sincerely held religious beliefs or interests but not any particular religious "status". FIRE's answer says that the University "conflates" status and belief, and that the distinction is meaningless in this case -- two statements that seem incompatible to me. FIRE also adds the assumption that a status must be "immutable". But I don't see why. Religions have such procedures as conversion, confirmation, and excommunication, in which a person is received into or expelled from the body of a church. Hence there is a meaningful distinction between, say, believing the tenets of Catholicism and being a Catholic, even though the latter status is not immutable. Similarly, you (Erin) might believe the tenets of Judaism without formally converting to Judaism, and hence have the beliefs but not the status; or you might convert to Judaism -- which shows that your status as a non-Jew is not immutable. (For me, being a Jew *is* immutable, however, so the whole topic is very complex.)

According to the letter from the University, AIO was offered the option of requiring belief and interest rather than status, and AIO declined to take that option. If that claim is true -- and, of course, I have no way of telling whether it is -- then much of FIRE's letter is beside the point. The letter argues as if the University would forbid AIO from requiring its members to have particular beliefs and interests, whereas (according to the University's letter) it explicitly offered AIO that very option and was rebuffed.

As I've said, I'm usually on FIRE's side of things, but the UNC letter strikes me as an honest effort to find a path through this minefield.

One final comment. The real problem in so many of these cases is the system of collecting student fees and distributing them to "recognized" student organizations. I've never thought that the supposed benefits of that system are worth the inevitable problems.

According to the letter from the University, AIO was offered the option of requiring belief and interest rather than status, and AIO declined to take that option.

Two things:

First, what does being "Christian" mean, if not belief and interest in Christianity?

Second, the "minefield" you describe does not exist. Discrimination on the basis of religion is allowable by non-government groups; indeed, the government has limits on the kinds of things it can tell religious groups to do, including what kind of people it must associate with. Thus, even his statement that "Baptist student groups are open to Presbyterian students", if construed as an unwanted imposition by UNC on the Baptist group, is incorrect.

This may be the source of your confusion regarding the FIRE letter, as it forms the core of their argument against this action by UNC.

David,

While I think your point may carry the day for the rank and file members of the organization, the stipulation is that the leaders of the organization must be Christian. This makes eminent sense to me. Why would I want to belong to an organization where the leaders of that organization do not believe in the organization's basic philosophy. What you are suggesting is the height of hypocrisy. It is analogous to Kerry saying he supports the troops, votes not to fund their equipment, then blames the president for not having enough equipment for the troops. That is why I support FIRE on this case.

what does being "Christian" mean, if not belief and interest in Christianity?

Well, as I pointed out in my initially comment, it may mean having been confirmed in a Christian denomination or being a member of a Christian congregation, whether or not one believes in Christian tenets. It may also entail not being of Jewish descent, unless one has converted to a denomination of Christianity -- say, by being baptised and confirmed.

Suppose that I showed up at a meeting of a Christian organization, with my obviously Jewish face and name. I say, "All of my ancestors were Jewish, of course, but I believe in the teachings of Jesus Christ" and so on. Suppose that I can even pass an objective test on the contents of Christian doctrine (the UNC letter mentions this possibility). But the other members ask, "What church do you belong to? When were you baptised? In which denomination were you confirmed?" At that point, they're asking about my status rather than my beliefs and interests.

the "minefield" you describe does not exist

Maybe I didn't make myself clear. Universities that levy "student activity" fees are continually embroiled in disputes about which organizations should or should not receive those fees. These disputes are a fact of university life, and I was suggesting that this method of funding extra-curricular organization may be more trouble than it is worth.

the stipulation is that the leaders of the organization must be Christian.

As I read the UNC letter, the university is willing to allow the organization to stipulate that its leaders must be Christian, provided that they are also willing to specify that to "be Christian" is a matter of what one believes and cares about. The university is not willing to allow the stipulation that the leaders be Christian in a sense that requires more than beliefs and interests.

As I suggested in my earlier response, one way to think about the difference is to ask yourself what it would take for me to be Christian, given that I was born a Jew. Would it be enough for me to know the New Testament, believe what it says, and be committed to spreading that belief? Or would I have to undergo some change of status, by joining a congregation, being baptised, being confirmed, taking communion, and so on?

Again, I may have misunderstood the UNC letter, but it seems to say that the University offered tot allow the organization to require Christianity in the first sense but not the second, and the organization declined the offer.

Full disclosure: I am not only not a Christian but have no use whatsoever for Christianity (or any other religion.) Nonetheless- it's clear to me that the university's "beliefs and interests" formulation is nothing more than a ruse, blatantly violating the rights of campus Christian groups by forcing them to replace their perfectly legitimate membership requirements with meaningless verbiage. I hope FIRE takes them to court.

As to David Velleman's other point about the undesirability of a system that forces all students to subsidize whatever groups the administration and student government choose to recognize, I heartily agree.