FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 14, 2000

Federal Judge Continues Hold on CTContributions to Boy Scouts

At a hearing yesterday in Bridgeport, Connecticut, United States District Judge Warren Eginton ordered that funds from the Connecticut State Employee Charitable Campaign (“the Campaign”) intended for the Boy Scouts of America (“BSA”) be continued held in an escrow account.  In a matter in which New England-based Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (“GLAD”) sought to intervene, the judge denied BSA’s request to order the Campaign to distribute the funds.

  “This matter is not over yet,” remarked GLAD staff attorney Jennifer Levi, who along with New Haven attorney Maureen Murphy also represented GLAD, the Connecticut Coalition for Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender Civil Rights and the Connecticut Women’s Educational and Legal Fund.  “The judge indicated that he wanted to give the state a chance to review this matter in light of the recent Supreme Court decision, Dale v. Boy Scouts.  Although we are confident that Connecticut will not force its state employees to work in an environment that allows an explicitly anti-gay organization to solicit charitable contributions, we will continue to watch this matter closely.”

  In Dale, the Supreme Court only said that New Jersey’s public accommodations law cannot trump the BSA’s choices as to membership.  However, that does not mean that any state is free to discriminate or to foster discrimination when it is faced with including BSA in something like an employee campaign or when deciding whether a school, police force, or other public entity can sponsor a troop.  In such circumstances, a state’s refusal to accommodate BSA is consistent with the state’s obligation to treat all citizens equally while in no way infringing BSA’s membership decisions.

  BSA’s suit against the Connecticut Comptroller and State Employee Campaign Committee arose when the Campaign announced in May that the BSA could not be included in the upcoming campaign and would not receive funds from the 1999 campaign.  The Campaign’s decision to exclude the Boy Scouts followed a notification from the Connecticut Rivers Council of the BSA that it could not comply with the nondiscrimination requirement imposed on all participants in the charitable campaign because of the BSA’s anti-gay policy.  After the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities (“CHRO”) ruled in May that including the Boy Scouts in the Campaign violates Connecticut’s Gay Rights Law, the Campaign took the action which is the subject of the Boy Scouts’ suit.

    Before issuing its ruling, the CHRO heard testimony from state employees involved with the campaign.  “The CHRO heard from gay and lesbian state employees who explained the great harm done to them by the inclusion of an anti-gay group in the Campaign.  Their voices must be heard and respected,” commented New Haven attorney Maureen Murphy.

    Judge Eginton agreed to hold on to the case while the CHRO decides a renewed request from the Campaign to rule on whether the Dale v. Boy Scouts decision changes its earlier ruling.  The renewed request comes despite that the earlier ruling explicitly stated that Dale had no bearing on the outcome.  In its earlier ruling, the CHRO explained that even if including a gay scout had an impact on the expressive association rights of an organization, exclusion from a state campaign did not have the same impact on the group’s First Amendment rights.