Assemble & Associate

Assemble and Associate

The first amendment of the Constitution is one of the most fundamental and essential appendages to the C onstitution that statesmen could ever have made. It basically provides the way and means for any citizen of the United States to speak freely, worship freely, assemble with whomever they want, and complain to the government. One of the most important of those freedoms however, is the right of association. Association protects the rights of persons to enter into relationships with one another unhampered by intrusive governmental regulation. More specifically expressive association protects the right to associate with others in pursuit of a wide variety of political, social, economic, educational, religious, and cultural ends. The right to associate, being derived from the provisions of free speech and assembly, is fundamental to all private associations so that they might have the right to their own standards for membership and leadership.

The Boy Scouts of America has been a private organization with the mission and chartered purpose of providing character-building experiences for young people since its founding in 1910. The organization’s Oath states, “On my honor I will do my best … to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.” It is a scout’s duty to uphold this oath and live by the scout law. In April of 2000 the Boy Scouts of America’s rights to establish its own standards of membership and continue to instill the values of the Scout Oath and Law into the scouts were challenged.

An individual's position as assistant scoutmaster of a New Jersey troop was revoked after a division of the Boy Scouts learned that the individual was an avowed homosexual and gay rights activist. The assistant scoutmaster filed suit in the New Jersey Superior Court, and alleged, among other matters, that the Boy Scouts had violated a state law prohibiting discrimination in places of public accommodation on the basis of sexual orientation. The Boy Scouts held that this violated their First Amendment right of expressive association. The Boy Scouts of America believe an avowed homosexual is not a role model for the values espoused in the Scout Oath and Law.

The right of association is utterly the most important principle in the issue of the Boy Scouts of America and their right to be selective in their requirements of leadership. The Boy Scouts have the right to assemble with whomever they choose. However, do they have the right to exclude potential leaders that are avowed homosexuals just based on their sexual orientation and not their personal dexterity or aptitude. This would be another example in which the principle applies to this controversy. Are the scouts actually discriminating against homosexuals or do they just simply deny them leadership positions because they do not represent the ethics of the scouting organization?

It is the position of the Boy Scouts of America that, as stated by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, “The Boy Scouts asserts that homosexual conduct is inconsistent with the values it seeks to instill. [Requiring the Scouts to accept homosexual scoutmasters] would significantly burden the organization's right to oppose or disfavor homosexual conduct.” (Religioustolerance.org) So by that demarcation the scouts are not discriminating against homosexuals. Discrimination, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is the action of discriminating; distinguishing, making or constituting a distinction, or affording a ground for distinction. The Boy Scouts of America has not once tried to prove any kind of distinction. They purely exclude homosexuals based on their beliefs and values not because they are homosexual. A very little know fact is that the Boy Scouts of America also do not allow membership to atheists or agnostics because of the factors of reverence and religion in the scouting organization. When assimilating this issue with the issue of excluding homosexual leaders, the Boy Scouts do not exclude atheists or agnostics because they’re atheist or agnostic it’s because their beliefs and values do not match that of the organization of Scouting.

The U.S. Supreme Court overturned the earlier New Jersey Supreme Court ruling that the Boy Scouts of America is a private organization and thus may set its own moral code. Forcing it to accept gays would violate its constitutional right to freedom of association. Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist is acknowledged as stating, “This is scarcely an argument for denying First Amendment protection to those who refuse to accept these views. The First