Copyright 1997 The Denver Post 
All Rights Reserved  
The Denver Post
August 15, 1997 Friday 2D EDITION
SECTION: DENVER & THE WEST; Pg. B-07

LENGTH: 755 words

HEADLINE: Hasidic Jews again pose difficult First Amendment issue

BYLINE: Susan Estrich

BODY:
Round 3 has begun and ended in the battle between the Hasidic Jews and the U.S. Constitution.

Twice before, the New York Legislature has attempted to create a separate school district for the 12,000 residents of Kiryas Joel. The district would educate the handicapped children of the village in separate public schools funded by taxpayers. But the United States Supreme Court and the New York Court of Appeals, the state's highest court, held the attempts unconstitutional, in clear violation of the separation of church and state required by the First Amendment.

Nonetheless, the Legislature sent a new version of the appeal to Gov. George Pataki, and he has signed it, making it law.

Most of the children of Kiryas Joel go to private, religious day schools. But the schools do not have the resources to provide special education for handicapped children of the community. There is a nearby public school district that is open to the handicapped children, and for a brief period, many of them attended public school.

But the school district refused to provide a separate facility for the Hasidic children, as their parents believed necessary, and that refusal was upheld by the courts in 1988. Until now, the community has been fighting for a separate school district.

The village of Kiryas Joel follows traditions from the Old World, but its politics are strictly Chicago. The men and women of Kiryas Joel all turn out to vote, and they vote as a bloc, which may explain the Legislature's determination.

No one begrudges a handicapped child the education he or she needs; the village of Kiryas Joel is made up of taxpayers whose children have as much right to an education as any American. Last term, the Supreme Court loosened the strings on sending public teachers into private schools, and it may well be possible, and constitutional, for the local school district to send specialists in on a part-time basis to the religious school. But the creation of an entirely separate school district drawn along religious lines and intended to provide religious education is clearly an establishment of religion, which is precisely what the Constitution prohibits.

Meanwhile, the same thing is happening in my neighborhood.

I live in an old neighborhood of Los Angeles that, until the 1950s, was so restricted that Nat King Cole was the first black to buy a home here. In the years since, it has become far more diverse, and today, it is home to many Orthodox Jews who walk to the nearby synagogues.

The problem is that one of those nearby synagogues happens to be a house in the neighborhood, which is zoned for single-family houses, not synagogues. The neighbors complained, and the synagogue's members filed for a variance from the code. The members lost, appealed and lost again, and now they are appealing once more.

Meanwhile, the Hasidim continue to hold services in the house. The committee representing the neighborhood association is lead by some of our most prominent secular Jews, which did not stop famed defense lawyer Leslie Abramson, another neighbor, from comparing the tactics of the association to Nazi Germany in a detailed, single-spaced letter slipped under our doors.

I asked an older man down the block what he thought. He was on the side of the neighborhood association. If we allow a synagogue today, what will it be tomorrow, and can we ever say no? That was the argument that did it for him. "But Leslie is right about one thing," he told me. "People don't like the Orthodox."

It's true. It's not because they're Jewish - but because so many of them don't allow their children to play with our children, don't smile or exchange pleasantries when they see us, and don't come to our "new neighbor welcome" parties. They live on our street, but they have chosen not to be our neighbors, which is their right.

The families of Kiryas Joel have a First Amendment right to withdraw from the larger community. But they have no claim on the larger population to support their secession. The public schools transmit the civic values of American culture; the separation of church and state makes possible, albeit not easy, the evolution of this common culture.

If parents don't want their children exposed, that's their choice. What makes us Americans is both that we allow any individual to make such a choice - and that most of us don't. Susan Estrich is a law professor and contributing editor of the Los Angeles Times. She was national campaign manager for Dukakis for President in 1988.

LOAD-DATE: August 15, 1997