In the lawsuit Allen filed on Tuesday with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union, she claimed Lee County Probate Judge Bill English, who oversees driver’s licenses in the county, and chief clerk Becky Frayer violated her constitutional right to be treated the same as someone of a different religion would be.
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“I was devastated when they forced me to remove my headscarf to take my driver license photo”, Allen stated in an ACLU press statement.
Yvonne Allen says she wears a headscarf because she believes her Christian faith requires it.
The ACLU said several communications were sent to Probate Court officials seeking to avoid a lawsuit over Allen’s situation, but they went unanswered. Frayer said that she herself is Christian and doesn’t cover her hair.
A friend who had traveled with Allen tried to explain to the clerk that Allen “doesn’t uncover her hair ever”, but the clerk remained unfazed, insisting to Allen that: “You are not a Muslim, and Christian women don’t cover their hair”. Some Orthodox Jewish women, as well as Amish and Mennonite women, wear some sort of head covering in public.
Now Allen is suing for the right to wear her religiously sanctioned headgear in her driver’s license photo, just as Muslim women can do in Alabama.
“Alabamans of all faiths should have the right to wear religious apparel in driver’s license photos”, said CAIR-Alabama Executive Director Khaula Hadeed.
With the continued need get a new photo for her license and feeling as if she wasn’t being heard, she filed a lawsuit with the ACLU. And she says that makes her feel ashamed and like she is being “disobedient to God”. Frayer declined comment Tuesday and English had not responded to a request for comment prior to publication of this story. The complaint asks that Allen be allowed to retake the photo with her headscarf on and to receive damages and attorney fees. She bases her views on a passage in 1 Corinthians of the New Testament, according to a blog post she wrote on the ACLU’s website.
The custom “of denying non-Muslims a religion accommodation for driver licenses photos contradicts the actual policy of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency … which allows a head covering for religious and medical reasons”, the complaint continues. “During that time, it became clear to me that, to be obedient to God’s Word and show my submission to him, I had to cover my hair on a daily basis”, she said in the statement. The clerk said no, Allen claims.
Following the experience, Allen wrote three letters to a judge to consider her case.
For more on some Christians’ beliefs about head covering for women, see here and here.
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Julie Zauzmer is a religion reporter.
