Splicetoday

On Campus
May 13, 2008, 06:40AM

Quaker Professor Refuses To Sign Loyalty Oath, Loses Her Job

Employees in the California State University system are required to sign a Cold War-era oath pledging them to defend the U.S. against its enemies. Unsurprisingly, not all the liberal professors are totally down with the idea, and when one objected on religious grounds she was fired.

"American studies lecturer Wendy Gonaver however, a Quaker and a pacifist, refused to sign the oath last August on the grounds that it violates her religious freedom and First Amendment right.

The loyalty oath, added to California's Constitution in 1952, requires employees to "'defend' the United States and California's constitutions 'against all enemies, foreign and domestic,'" according to a Los Angeles Times article.

Gonaver agreed to sign the oath if she could attach a letter expressing her personal views, but the university denied the request and fired her the day before the semester began.

The origins of the loyalty oath go back to 1940 when the University of California Regents created an anti-communist policy. On March 12, 1947, President Truman initiated a loyalty oath for all federal employees.

In February, a CSU East Bay math instructor was fired when she added the word 'nonviolently' to the oath she signed. Marianne Kearney-Brown, also a Quaker, was fired by CSU East Bay but was quickly rehired when media attention began to build.

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