West Virginia Father Sues Officials Claiming Evolution is a Religion

By Alison Lesley --
04 Jun 2015 --

Kenneth Smith is suing education officials because he feels that learning about the theory of evolution violates his daughter’s First Amendment rights.

A West Virginia father is suing educational policy makers in West Virginia and beyond for teaching his daughter about evolution. Kenneth Smith, whose daughter wants to be a veterinarian, claims that evolution is a “religious faith,” and says he has the math and science to prove it.

Smith is suing local, state, and federal officials for violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by ignoring his “accurate scientific mathematical system of genetic variations that proves evolution is a religion.” The lawsuit claims that the future wage earning potential of Smith’s daughter is adversely affected by her educators’ actions during this past school year.
Smith is familiar with these kinds of lawsuits as he has filed two of them back in 2007 and 2010. He has also self-published a book in 2013 titled The True Origin of Man. In it, Smith claims to report “DNA mathematical and scientific facts” that reveal the truth of man’s origins.

In his promotional video for his book, Smith also said that people with any kind of “bias” would find the work contentious, but otherwise it should appeal to both a Christian or scientific audience, providing them with something they can “take to the laboratory and test for themselves.”

The lawsuit, in which Smith is seeking a trial by jury, lists National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan as defendants. The complaint does not mention the age of Smith’s daughter, and also fails to mention relevant federal and Supreme Court cases, the National Center for Science Education says. In 1987, the Supreme Court ruled that the “belief in a divine creator” is a “religious belief,” yet the theory of evolution is not.