Lawsuit Over Islam In Chatham Curriculum Heading To Court

CHATHAM, NJ — A lawsuit accusing the School District of the Chathams of violating First Amendment rights by including Islam in the school curriculum will be allowed to proceed, a judge ruled in federal court Wednesday.

Judge Kevin McNulty denied the school district's request to have the case thrown out, saying that the "untested" case warrants a look from the courts.

"There will be opportunity enough to consider the substantive issues when evidence has been developed in discovery and the facts have been developed," McNulty wrote in his opinion. He also instructed both sides to look at parring down the number of defendants.

Libby Hilsenrath, the mother of a Chatham Middle School student, sued the school district in January over the inclusion of Islam in the curriculum of the seventh-grade Word Geography and Cultures class, alleging that the unit focused on the Middle East and North Africa violates the First Amendment by promoting Islam while ignoring Christianity and Judaism.

• Read More: Chatham Mom Suing Schools Over Islam In Curriculum

Superintendent Michael LaSusa, who is named as a defendant, has previously defended the inclusion of Islam in the curriculum, saying, "As we have discussed before and as we stated at our March 6 Board of Education meeting, our school district meets and exceeds the New Jersey Student Learning Standards in all areas. As part of the school district's social studies program, students are exposed to the tenets of all major world religions, including Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and more."

The school board has previous denied to comment, but has denied the allegations through their attorney.

“This ruling comes as no surprise. The motion to dismiss was a further attempt by the school district to bully and silence Mrs. Hilsenrath. The school district ignored the legal standard and ignored the facts, attempting instead to fool the judge with a poor attempt at sophistry," Kate Oliveri, a lawyer with the Thomas More Law Center who is representing Hilsenrath, said in a statement.

• Read More: Chatham Moms Hire Lawyers Over Islam In Middle School Curriculum

The Thomas More Law Center is a Michigan-based conservative nonprofit law firm that tries to "preserve America's Judeo-Christian heritage," according to their website. The firm does not charge for its services.

In the suit, Hilsenrath says Christianity and Judaism — which both originated in the Middle East — were not addressed during the unit, nor were any Eastern religions included in a unit about East and Southeast Asia.

LaSusa has previously said the school spends three days on the tenets of Islam and that it "receives a treatment similar to the other world religions."

Hilsenrath says the videos used in the unit "affirmatively sponsor the Islamic prayer directed at the school children" and that it is a " government endorsement of Islam." You can read the suit in full here.

You can watch the videos referenced in the suit here and here.

• Read More: Chatham Moms Appear On Fox News To Talk About Islam In School Curriculum

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