Curran v. Mount Diablo Council of the Boy Scouts of America

The California Supreme Court's decision that the Boy Scouts of America was not a business, allows the 5.8 million-member organization to deny admission to homosexuals, agnostics, and atheists in California. The decision clarified some of the legal parameters that separate a business from a private organization.

Timothy Curran, now a television documentary producer in Miami, was a 19-year-old Eagle Scout in 1981 when the Boy Scouts refused to allow him to become an assistant scoutmaster because of his homosexuality. Curran belonged to a Contra Costa County Boy Scout troop from 1976 until 1980. He applied to become an assistant scoutmaster. When an Oakland, California newspaper featured Curran in an article about "growing up gay," the national office of the Boy Scouts sent him a letter stating that he had been banned from the organization.

Curran sued the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) in 1981, seeking an injunction that would prohibit the BSA from rejecting his application. After years of debate and pretrial motions, the first phase of the trial began on 20 September 1990. On 6 November 1990 the Los Angeles Superior Court ruled that the BSA was a business under the state's civil rights law. On 25 July 1991, the same court ruled that the BSA was entitled to exclude homosexuals from its organization under the First Amendment, which includes the right of expressive association. The court also ruled that excluding homosexuals from the BSA was not a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. On 29 March 1994, the court of appeals ruled that the BSA was not a business and may deny membership to homosexuals in its efforts to form an intimate and expressive association.