About this Case
A Christian sorority and a Christian fraternity at San Diego State University were denied official status because they required members to profess faith in Christ. The district court ruled against the sorority and fraternity. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit agreed that the university’s general non-discrimination policy was generally constitutional, but that it may have been applied against these groups in an unconstitutional manner. The Ninth Circuit sent the case back to the district court.
Summary of NLF's Brief
Our brief argued that university’s policy required the sorority and fraternity to give up its constitutional right of free assembly in order to gain all the benefits of official recognition. In other words, they could not limit their membership to professing Christians, if they wanted the same benefits available to all other officially recognized student organizations.