High Court Says States Can't
Be Forced to Fund Religious Education

The Supreme Court has emphatically rejected efforts by voucher proponents to force unwilling states to fund private religious education with public money.  

In a 7-2 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court held that Washington state’s prohibition against state funding for a degree in theology does not violate the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The ruling was issued on Feb. 25, 2004.  

Speaking for the Court, Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote that a state constitution may draw a more stringent line than the federal constitution in order to maintain separation of church and state.    

The High Court upheld a clause of the Washington State constitution prohibiting government aid for religious institutions, including "religious instruction." An adverse decision by the Court would have severely weakened similar provisions that have been adopted by most of the 50 states.    

Voucher supporters had petitioned the Court to consider the so-called Blaine Amendment to the Washington Constitution, which reads, in pertinent part, "No public money or property shall be appropriated for or applied to any religious worship, exercise or instruction or support for any religious establishment," and overrule interpretations of it that call for a higher wall of separation between church and state than the one recognized by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.    

Such a ruling would have severely weakened similar provisions that have been adopted by most of the 50 states.    

The Court, however, did not need to address that provision to reach its decision, and therefore did not rule on it. Its decision clears the way for NEA and other public school advocates to launch state constitutional challenges to other state voucher programs that might be enacted in the future.     

You can read the Supreme Court’s decision in Locke v. Davey 
( PDF, 388 KB, 27 pages) and visit the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life for additional briefs and resources on this case.

October 2004