KARLSRUHE, Germany, 25 September 2003 — Germany’s highest court ruled yesterday that a regional state was wrong in banning a teacher from wearing a Muslim headscarf in the classroom, but said individual states may pass new laws to outlaw religious dress in public schools. In a long-awaited decision on freedom of expression and religious neutrality in public schools, the constitutional court overturned a lower court’s ruling that the conservative southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg was justified in refusing to hire a Muslim teacher who insisted on wearing a headscarf.
The teacher, Fereshta Ludin, an Afghan who was naturalized as a German citizen in 1995, had fought her way to the highest tribunal to win the right to work in public schools with her head covered according to her religious beliefs. Baden-Wuerttemberg had argued that a teacher with a headscarf violated “the strict neutrality of public schools in religious issues” and could have undue influence on impressionable young children. But the court based in the western city of Karlsruhe ruled five-to-three that states must find “arrangement acceptable for everyone” in striking a balance between religious freedom and neutrality in schools. “The state legislatures are now free to provide the legal basis (for a headscarf ban) that has been missing until now,” the court said. It said states were within their rights to determine that headscarves and other religious symbols should be outlawed in the classroom. But it said the issue was too contentious to be decided on an ad hoc basis and required a legal framework.
The court said it was possible, although not scientifically proven, that children could be influenced by the religious dress of their teachers, provoking conflicts with parents. The Central Council of Muslims in Germany blasted the decision as opening the door for states to issue blanket bans on teachers wearing headscarves in schools.
“That would be a severe action against Muslims,” council chairman Nadim Elias told Deutschlandfunk radio, adding that women wearing headscarves had become part of “everyday life” in Germany.
Ludin today works at an Islamic school in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg, which has a large Turkish Muslim population. She argued in the case that her religious beliefs posed no threat to Western values .
“I consider religion part of my identity,” the 31-year-old told the court at the first hearing in June.
“So are democratic values,” she added.
Marieluise Beck, the federal government’s point woman on immigration, refugees and integration, had been a vocal supporter of Ludin’s case.
“The headscarf worn by some Muslim women has long been considered normal in Germany,” she said in a statement.
“In the debate on the Muslim headscarf, this piece of cloth is often a surface on which to project fear and generalizations.”
