In January of 2002 a kindergartener in Saratoga Springs, NY joined hands with two friends at a snack table and said "God is good. God is great. Thank you, God, for my food." The teacher disciplined the child, the principal sent a note home to the parents saying the behavior was inappropriate and would not be permitted. The local school board then issued a press release saying the child would not be allowed to do this again. A suit was filed via a public interest law firm and the child's parents, the case was successfully settled out of court, with the school board acknowledging the child's right to prayer at school so long as it was not "disruptive", and of course refuting that they did anything wrong.
Oh, and before the outcry continues (I'll be composing a response to the last TipTup thread at some point during the Christmas break), here's a piece about the government's ability to intervene in free exercise situations (I find the compelling interest standard a good way to hold the gov's feet to the fire) -
Wiki -
Compelling interest
The Supreme Court under Earl Warren adopted an expansive view of the free exercise clause. The Court required that states have a "compelling interest" in refusing to accommodate religiously motivated conduct as it decided Sherbert v. Verner (1963). The case involved Adele Sherbert, an individual who was denied unemployment benefits by South Carolina because she refused to work on Saturdays as required by her Seventh-day Adventist faith. In Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), the Court ruled that a law that "unduly burdens the practice of religion" without a compelling interest, even though it might be "neutral on its face," would be unconstitutional.
The "compelling interest" doctrine became much narrower in 1990, when the Supreme Court held in Employment Division v. Smith that, as long as a law does not target a particular religious practice, it is constitutional insofar as the free exercise clause is concerned. In 1993, the Supreme Court revisited the free exercise clause when it decided Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah. Hialeah had passed an ordinance banning ritual slaughter, a practice central to the Santería religion, while providing exceptions for some practices such as the kosher slaughter of Judaism. Since the ordinance was not "generally applicable," the Court ruled that it was subject to the compelling interest test, which it failed to meet. The Court therefore struck down the City's ordinance.
Also in 1993, Congress passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which sought to restore the "compelling interest" standard. In City of Boerne v. Flores (1997) the Court struck down the provisions of the Act that forced state and local governments to provide more protections than required by the First Amendment, which the courts enjoy sole power to interpret. According to the court's ruling in Gonzales v. UDV (2006), RFRA remains applicable to federal statutes, which must therefore still meet the "compelling interest" standard in free exercise cases.