Harry Potter and the Establishment Clause

December 4, 2002

Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch

On December 4, 2002 the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that "while her fifth-grade classmates at Truman Elementary School in Pacific listen to the adventures of Harry Potter, Merry Noella Skaggs chooses to sit in the library and read other books. Martha Skaggs says her daughter's teacher should not read the best-selling books in class because they teach kids about witchcraft, which she considers a religion. 'They won't give equal time to other religious books,' said Skaggs, who identified herself as Pentecostal. 'If they are going to have separation of church and state, they can't choose what church and state will be separated,' Skaggs said. She said she had not read the books."