Portage County Legal News

Federal suit: University threatens Christian professor to act contrary to conscience

KEITH ARNOLD
Special to the Legal News
Published: November 15, 2018

A group that advocates on behalf of individuals who wish to freely live out their faith has taken up the cause of a Shawnee State University philosophy professor who faces "corrective actions" by his employer over a transgender student's complaint.

Attorneys from Alliance Defending Freedom filed suit last week against the trustees of the public institution in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, arguing that the university illegally disciplined Nicholas Meriwether for declining the male student's demand to be addressed as a woman.

The university's decision to take disciplinary action against the professor came after Meriwether offered to refer to the student by his first or last name, instead of a title or pronoun connoting gender.

Attorneys said neither the student nor the university was willing to accept the compromise, choosing instead to force the professor to speak and act contrary to his own Christian convictions.

"Tolerance is a two-way street," said ADF Senior Counsel Travis Barham. "Universities are meant to be a marketplace of ideas, not an assembly line for one type of thought, but apparently, Shawnee State has ignored that foundational truth.

"The university refused to consider any solutions that would respect the freedoms of everyone involved. It instead chose to impose its own orthodoxy on Dr. Meriwether under threat of further punishment if he doesn't relinquish his rights protected by the First Amendment."

In January, during a political philosophy class, Meriwether responded to the male student's question by saying, "Yes, sir."

Meriwether's response was customary, his attorneys said, as he typically refers to all his students as "sir" or "ma'am" or by a title, such as mister or miss, followed by the student's last name to foster an atmosphere of seriousness and mutual respect.

The student approached Meriwether after class and stated he was transgender, demanding Meriwether refer to him as a woman, with feminine titles and pronouns.

When Meriwether did not instantly agree to the student's demand, his lawyers said, the student became belligerent, circled Meriwether in a threatening manner and told the professor, "Then I guess this means I can call you a c**t."

The student then promised to get Meriwether fired if he did not agree to the original demand.

The student's subsequent complaint to the university resulted in a formal investigation.

Meriwether offered to call the student by his first or last name only.

University officials, however, rejected the compromise or anything else that would allow him to speak according to his conscience and sincerely held religious beliefs, the suit alleged. Instead, they formally charged him, saying "he effectively created a hostile environment" for the student.

University officials later placed a written warning in his personnel file and threatened "further corrective actions" unless he articulated the university's ideological message.

"Public universities have no business compelling people to express ideological beliefs that they don't hold," said ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer, director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom. "This isn't just about a pronoun; this is about endorsing an ideology.

"The university favors certain beliefs, and it wants to force Dr. Meriwether to cry uncle and endorse them as well. That's neither legal nor constitutional, and neither was the process the university has used to get to this point.

The suit seeks a court order to compel the university to respect Meriwether's freedom to live according to his faith.

The case is cited as Meriwether v. The Trustees of Shawnee State University (1:18-cv-00753).

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