Teacher objecting to use of trans names can make case to jury, appeals panel rules
Ruling is one of first since top court clarified law on religious accommodations
Was an Indiana schoolteacher entitled to a religious accommodation so that he could keep his job even though he refused to follow a policy requiring him to use the preferred names of trans students? The answer remains unclear and could end up being decided by a jury after a federal appeals court last week ruled that some questions raised in a lawsuit filed by the teacher should be resolved by a trial court, potentially with the help of a jury.
The teacher, John Kluge, lost his job as a music teacher at Brownsburg (Ind.) High School at the end of the 2017-18 school year.1 During that year, Kluge had taught under a signed accommodation allowing him to call students by using their last names — much like some sports coaches do — instead of following the policy that required teachers to call students by the names listed on what was called a PowerSchool list. That list included parent-approved feminine names for some trans girls that Kluge believed to be boys, and vice versa.
Kluge had received the accommodation after telling school administrators that using what he considered to be wrongly gendered names violated his religious beliefs as a Christian. Although Kluge claimed his accommodation had worked out well for both him and students, administrators decided, based in part on complaints that trans students were being stigmatized, that Kluge’s religious practices relating to student names could no longer be accommodated.
Kluge later sued the school district, and the lawsuit so far has followed a somewhat convoluted course. After making a claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which requires most U.S. employers to accommodate the religious beliefs or practices of employees as long as the accommodations don’t cause an “undue hardship” on the employer, Kluge first lost at the trial court level. He appealed to the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which agreed with the trial court. But later, the U.S. Supreme Court defined the religious-accommodations law in Groff v. DeJoy, the unanimous 2023 decision siding with a postal worker who sought a religious accommodation so he wouldn’t have to work on Sundays.2 The Supreme Court’s clarification of what an “undue hardship” is forced the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to vacate its ruling in the Kluge case, sending the dispute back to the trial court. But that court again sided with the school district, leading to the appeal that was decided last week.
The appeals court’s ruling in Kluge v. Brownsburg Community School Corp. was made on a 2-1 vote, the majority being two judges appointed by Donald Trump: Michael Brennan and Amy St. Eve. Senior Circuit Judge Ilana Rovner dissented, siding with the school district. She was appointed by George H.W. Bush.
In sending the case back to the trial court, Brennan, writing for the majority, said the factual record needs to be expanded:
Yet whether the accommodation caused the harm is unclear at this point in the litigation. The only fact the parties agree on is that Kluge called students by their last names. There is conflicting evidence whether that act in isolation caused the alleged emotional distress [of the students].
Rovner disagreed. She found no evidence that the school district had acted in bad faith in determining that Kluge’s teaching style with regard to student names helped keep the school district from fulfilling its mission. To bring full details of the teachers job performance to trial would have the effect of turning trial courts into something like “super-personnel department[s]”, she wrote.
The school district has not indicated whether it will appeal. It could allow the case to return to the trial court, or it could appeal to a full panel (rather than three members) of the appeals court or, less likely, to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Technically, the teacher resigned from his position after he was denied the ability to renew an agreement providing the religious accommodation. He later sought to withdraw his resignation, but the resignation had already been implemented.
Although the postal worker persuaded the high court to set a standard for religious accommodations that was more generous to employees than some courts had been using, the postal worker still has to show a trial court that his circumstances meet the new standard.