National Parks Traveler

Supreme Court Rulings Challenge Interpretation In The National Parks

By Jessica Andreone

Within the small patch of greenery of Christopher Park on Manhattan’s West Village, two older park regulars—a short man with a backpack and a tall woman with a platinum wig and high heels—invited a young man with a curled mustache to sing and dance to “This Will Be (An Everlasting Love)” by Natalie Cole. Not far away, tourists perused Stonewall National Monument, which encompasses Christopher Park, and canvassers in purple NARAL shirts asked passersby if they wanted to help protect the right to choose.

Just behind the park is the Stonewall Inn, its name glowing in colorful neon lights under rows of rainbow flags. On June 28, 1969, a police raid on the bar turned into a riot that catalyzed the LGBTQ civil rights movement. Established as a national monument in 2016, Stonewall is the first national park site to recognize this movement, and the park area in which it sits is still a hub for the LGBTQ community and activism.

Stonewall is one of a handful of National Park System units that interpret the country’s civil rights history. It’s a role that has drawn heightened attention in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in June to overturn Roe v. Wade, a 50-year-old ruling that legalized abortion across the United States.

The ruling, and Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion that suggested revisiting other Supreme Court rulings involving same-sex marriage and contraception, have drawn concern from some park visitors worried about the country’s civil rights landscape.

The task for park interpreters perhaps becomes more challenging as they must interpret stories of past political and civil rights movements while adhering to the Hatch Act, which bars them from getting involved in partisan political activities.

Park rangers contacted by the Traveler for this story appreciated the political tensions swirling about the country in the wake of the high court’s ruling, but said they did not affect their interpretive messaging.

“As park rangers, our job is to take the story that we care for, and people connect to—not necessarily the specifics, but those really big universal concepts that are transcendent of culture and language and political party,” said Janine Waller, the chief of interpretation and education at Women’s Rights National Historical Park in upstate New York.

“We talk about equality. We talk about freedom. We talk about family and responsibility. Those are not things that change,” she said.

Stonewall Inn nightclub raid crowd attempts to impede police, 1969

At Stonewall, interpreters also focus on the park’s history.

“Our policy and instructions to our park rangers are to politely redirect the conversation back to their interpretive talks about historic facts related to the resource, as we are unable to provide political opinions,” said Shirley McKinney, superintendent of NPS Manhattan Sites, the group of national park units that includes Stonewall.

“Rangers tell the story of the 1969 Stonewall rebellion and the LGBTQ plus civil rights history related to the site,” she added in an email. “We do not comment on SCOTUS cases or incorporate them into interpretive talks at Stonewall.”

According to Stonewall Ranger Julie Burna, in addition to the history leading up to the 1969 uprising, interpreters discuss the event’s aftermath and how that contributes to modern issues. When visitors ask how to deal with current political frustrations, the rangers point them to the historic examples of LGBTQ activists Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, who were leaders in the Gay Liberation Movement, and Gilbert Baker, who designed the rainbow flag.

Nevertheless, for some park visitors recent legal actions are creating fears that the rights they’ve gained are not rock solid.

Steven Love Menendez, a volunteer at Stonewall and an LGBTQ rights activist, said “[T]he overturning of Roe has made our community realize that the rights we have fought for relentlessly are continuing to be attacked, and the possibility of rights could be stripped away by the conservative majority in the Supreme Court.”

He added that "[S]tate legislators have introduced hundreds of anti-LGBTQ bills. States have restricted access to gender-affirming care or are currently considering laws that would do so. I feel now more than ever the importance of the Stonewall Monument stands as a crucial symbol of hope and strength for our community."

Emma Dermnsky, someone who identifies as queer and is a new visitor to Stonewall, said, “When we take away these rights we already had, for people who don’t have them right now it’s a nightmare.”

At Women’s Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, Waller guides visitors to the site's historic lessons on universal topics when addressing questions relating to politics.

"As a house that is dedicated to one of the earliest human and civil rights movements in our country, this is not a new topic for us to talk about,” said Waller. 

Waller explained that Women’s Rights rangers talk about the early temperance movement. The crusade was connected to domestic violence, which is about personal autonomy and the government protecting people from violence in their homes. She stated that there are 175 years’ worth of writing on these topics.

As a park that focuses on 19th century historic political activism, “there’s nothing about us that is apolitical,” said Waller.

That statement likely would resonate with rangers at Brown V. Board of Education National Historical Park in Topeka, Kansas.

At Women's Rights National Historical Park stands a collection of statues reflecting the "First Wave" of women's rights activists who gathered in 1848. Among them was Martha Wright (pictured) who later embarked on a distinguished career in human rights./NPS

Brown V. Board was closed in 2020 due to the Covid pandemic. When the doors reopened in 2021, an influx of people and groups—including sports teams, nonprofits, and corporate entities—made special trips to the site to gain a greater understanding of diversity, equity, and inclusion issues through the lens of Black civil rights history.

Many visitors referenced the police incidents that led to the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, according to park staff.

Brown v. Board of Education is the first national park site based on a Supreme Court decision. As a result, rangers at the park were prepared to engage visitors asking about the Dobbs decision since Politico leaked a draft on the case in May.

“I sat the staff down and said our ultimate job as interpreters is to create connections to the site, and visitors are going to be ultimately the ones that dictate what that connection is,” said Ranger Nick Murray. “If they feel that there’s a connection to this site to the recent Supreme Court decision or potential upcoming Supreme Court decisions, that’s great.”

A few visitors to Brown v. Board of Education have asked about Dobbs, but it didn’t have as big of an impact on the park and interpretation as much as local legislation prohibiting discussion of critical race theory—an area of study usually taught at a college or graduate level that looks into how racism is woven through laws and systems in society.

The Kansas Board of Education, in response to political candidates concerned about critical race theory being taught in schools, sent out a news release to clarify what critical race theory is and how it was never part of the state’s academic standards.

“Unfortunately, there are some who are conflating CRT with educational equity. These concepts and practices are not interchangeable. Educational equity refers to federal and state policies and requirements for measuring achievement, fairness, and opportunity in education," the release said.

Within the last year, Kansas lawmakers in the Legislature introduced bills to increase parents' visibility of educational materials and activities. Bill SB 393 would make schools publish a list of teaching materials and activities online or be penalized by the state withholding funds for that reporting school year. The Parents’ Bill of Rights and Academic Transparency Act outlines a list of rights parents have regarding the upbringing of their children, including the ability to review and object to educational materials, lessons, and activities so long as it doesn’t violate the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Neither bill was passed into law. 

Though in Kansas, where the state board of education sets standards for subject areas, the curriculum taught in schools is decided at the local school board level. Last November, five candidates who campaigned against CRT in schools won in the seven Johnson County school board elections. In August 2022, the Derby school board, located outside of Wichita, voted against a strategic plan because of its focus on diversity. Those against the proposed strategic plan viewed diversity as divisive—to highlight differences that set people apart rather than differences that should be celebrated.

“We now have teachers coming into the site that are just more worried about, ‘Can I even teach about this [Brown v. Board of Education] Supreme Court decision?’” said Murray.

A Kansas-based teacher came to the site and started to cry because she wasn’t allowed to teach about the Brown v. Board of Education case in their classroom, let alone bring their students to the park, the ranger said. While there hasn’t been any formal notice blocking the teaching of Brown v. Board, backlash from parents and local school boards make instructors feel uncomfortable teaching about the history of race in America. For instance, a principal at Derby High School showed a video to staff and the girls' basketball team about being treated differently at a store due to race and a lighter-skinned family member helping the narrator. The school board then ordered the principal to apologize because it created a hostile work environment.

At Brown v. Board of Education National Historical Park there are living history walks that feature six re-enactors portraying characters from 1854 to 1954 and linked neighborhood stories to national stories of Civil War and civil rights/NPS

Some teachers try to work around school board speculation by bringing the park rangers to their classroom to have them talk about their site-specific Supreme Court case, but only that case. According to Murray, teachers haven’t been explicitly told what they can’t say, but they feel threatened enough not to broach certain subjects.

The day after a school board election, for example, a Wichita-area principal called Murray because he wanted to show his school board the historical precedent that if the school was sued, the responsibility would fall onto the board of education, not the principal.

“Have you ever heard of Frank Wilson?” Murray asked, referrting to the principal of Sumner Elementary, the school at the center of the Brown v. Board case. “No. Nobody knows who Frank Wilson is because everybody knows the Supreme Court of Brown vs. Board of Education, because of the Topeka Board of Education.”

Murray and his fellow interpreters connect visitors to the legacy of the site by asking a single question: “Have we gotten to the promise of Brown vs. Board of Education, a Supreme Court case that happened nearly 70 years ago?”

National park sites, such as Brown v. Board National Historical Park, Women’s Rights National Historical Park, and Stonewall National Monument, carry the legacy of moments in the nation's civil rights movement. These legacies lead into contemporary issues that visitors care about, and interpreters depend on the historic lessons of the sites to connect with their guests and navigate controversial topics, even if they include the principles their park was founded on.