Alisha Bjerragaard’s article in the last issue of Conscience (Vol. XXXV, No. 1) about the phenomenon of Tanzanian school girls being required to take pregnancy tests or face expulsion from school mentioned that something similar had taken place in Delhi, La. While the practices in Tanzania are commonplace and the Delhi case is an isolated incident, there are similarities, including the usual thread of bigotry and prejudice that accompanies discrimination across boundaries of race and sex. In both cases, archaic and pernicious stereotypes result in a belief that a girl’s pregnancy sets a “bad example” for her peers, i.e., that in having engaged in sexual activity she has transgressed acceptable norms of feminine behavior. In both instances, girls are vilified, being pregnant is viewed as a punishable offense and any “disruption” caused by others is blamed on the victim.

When we learned of the Delhi situation, the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana forwarded a letter to school administrators. We informed them that their policy violated US law by excluding students from educational programs and activities on the basis of sex. It also violated the Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution by treating female students differently than male students and by relying on impermissible stereotypes. Furthermore, it flew in the face of the right to procreate or to terminate a pregnancy. There were other concerns as well, including those related to the First Amendment. Fortunately, state officials in Louisiana quickly recognized that Delhi Charter School was operating outside the scope of the law and insisted on immediate change to the discriminatory policy that forced girls who were pregnant or thought to be pregnant to leave school.

Requiring girls to submit to pregnancy testing is a decades-old tradition in Tanzania. It didn’t last that long in Delhi, but an unfortunate few girls were forced out of school as a result of this discriminatory policy. Let’s hope that no girls anywhere in the world will face the indignity of mandatory pregnancy tests and punishment. No one should be denied an education simply because of private conduct she—or he—has engaged in outside of school.

MARJORIE R. ESMAN
Executive Director, ACLU of Louisiana
New Orleans, La.