Kitzmiller V. Dover Area School District

Kitzmiller V. Dover Area School District

Tammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al. (400 F. Supp. 2d 707, Docket no. 4cv2688) was the first direct challenge brought in the United States federal courts testing a public school district policy that required the teaching of intelligent design. In October 2004 the Dover Area School District changed its biology teaching curriculum to require that intelligent design be presented as an alternative to evolution theory, and that Of Pandas and People was to be used as a reference book. The plaintiffs successfully argued that intelligent design is a form of creationism, and that the school board policy violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. The judge's decision sparked considerable response from both supporters and critics.

Eleven parents of students in Dover, York County, Pennsylvania, near the city of York, sued the Dover Area School District over the school board requirement that a statement presenting intelligent design as "an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin's view" was to be read aloud in ninth-grade science classes when evolution was taught. The plaintiffs were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU) and Pepper Hamilton LLP. The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) acted as consultants for the plaintiffs. The defendants were represented by the Thomas More Law Center (TMLC). The Foundation for Thought and Ethics, publisher of Of Pandas and People, a textbook advocating intelligent design and whose prominence within the trial was such that it is sometimes referred to as the Dover Panda Trial, tried to join the lawsuit late as a defendant but was denied for multiple reasons.

The suit was brought in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania seeking declaratory and injunctive relief. Since it sought an equitable remedy, by the Seventh Amendment, right to a jury trial did not apply. It was tried in a bench trial from September 26, 2005 to November 4, 2005, before Judge John E. Jones III, a conservative Republican appointed in 2002 by George W. Bush. On December 20, 2005, Jones issued his 139-page findings of fact and decision ruling that the Dover mandate requiring the statement to be read in class was unconstitutional. The ruling concluded that intelligent design is not science, and permanently barred the board from "maintaining the ID Policy in any school within the Dover Area School District, from requiring teachers to denigrate or disparage the scientific theory of evolution, and from requiring teachers to refer to a religious, alternative theory known as ID." The eight Dover school board members who voted for the intelligent design requirement were all defeated in a November 8, 2005 election by challengers who opposed the teaching of intelligent design in a science class, and the school board president stated that the board did not intend to appeal the ruling.