Should schools be able to compel speech against a teacher’s conscience?

Compelled speech is not the same thing as free speech. Furthermore, forcing someone to speak something often comes at the expense of one’s conscience – a thought that ought to send shudders down anyone’s spine.

With this in mind, should an educator – such as a foreign language teacher – be forced to exercise speech in violation of his or her conscience? We’re not talking about classroom curriculum pertinent to the course’s subject matter, either.

Take the case of Vlaming v. West Point School Board, where high school French teacher Peter Vlaming is suing his West Point, Virginia school board for firing him. Why? Passionate about language and its precise meanings, Vlaming declined to refer to a female student with male pronouns. He would use the students’ preferred name instead of the given name, but that wasn’t enough. The foreign language teacher was compelled to use male pronouns – even when the student wasn’t present – or else.

Vlaming couldn’t do it because doing so would strongly violate his conscience – so the district chose “or else.” He was “placed on leave and eventually terminated because of what he could not say. The school board demanded that Peter refer to a female student by male pronouns or face consequences.”

Consequently, Vlaming sued in court in September 2019 over compelled speech, which violates both state law and the First Amendment. Two years later, after the Circuit Court of the County of King William dismissed his case, he petitioned Virginia’s Supreme Court to hear the case. The court agreed.

“Peter could not in good conscience speak messages that he does not believe to be true,” explain Vlaming’s attorneys, who are with the organization Alliance Defending Freedom.

“Peter went above and beyond to treat this student with respect, including using the student’s preferred name and avoiding pronoun usage in the student’s presence,” they add. “This was never about anything Peter said. It is about a school demanding total conformity in utter disregard of Peter’s efforts and his freedoms under Virginia law.”

In Vlaming’s case, the fundamental issue is whether the government is permitted to compel individuals – whether they are employees of the government or otherwise – to speak ideas and use language contrary to their deeply held personal beliefs. In his classroom, the teacher was not expressing anything harmful. In fact, it wasn’t anything he said that was at issue. It’s what he didn’t say – what he couldn’t say.

As mentioned before, Vlaming would respectfully address his student using the student’s preferred name; he simply could not use preferred pronoun to represent the student’s stated, alternate gender preference.

Should a school district employee be forced to violate his conscience and his understanding of language simply to keep his or her job? No: As an agent of the state, a school cannot compel an employee’s speech. Parents and teachers alike in Virginia and across the country ought to hope that the state’s Supreme Court affirms Vlaming’s rights in a case that promises to have lasting implications – implications that will likely send ripples across the country.