Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Is it a violation of the Establishment clause for the
government to fund a school that teaches religious doctrine to its students?
The quick answer is, of course it is. Nothing, it seems,
could be a greater violation than that. Except that maybe it isn’t.
Recently, there have been a number of states that have
approved programs whereby taxpayers could earmark some of their tax dollars
toward a scholarship fund that would be distributed to parents. Who could then
apply the funds toward their financial obligations to the schools they choose
to send their children to. These states do not look at what kind of schools
those tax dollars go, as long as they comply with the educational requirements
of the state. Religious schools are deemed equally eligible for those funds,
since barring them would be a violation of the Free Exercise clause of the
First Amendment.
To me, this seems like a no-brainer. Why should any parent
be deprived of the same public funding that public school parents get simply
because they choose a school for their children whose religious teachings align
with their beliefs and practices? Would that not amount to religious
discrimination? The idea that religious values are taught in these schools is
not at the behest of the government. The government is “out of the loop,” so to
speak, on those matters. All it cares about - or should care about - is that
the mandatory core curriculum is taught.
Unfortunately, there are First Amendment “warriors” who
believe that even the most remote connection to any religious teaching at all
violates the Establishment clause.
The near universal celebration of Christmas in public
schools is something they have never adequately explained, although they seem
to accept it in the warmest and fuzziest of ways. But I digress. The point here
is that most of these warriors tend not to value religious teaching much at all
in their personal lives and would probably be happier if religion were
abolished entirely.
Or perhaps they somehow feel that the public school system
will suffer financially if any tax dollars are diverted to schools outside the
traditional public school system. What that has to do with the First Amendment
is a mystery to me. But they certainly use that argument in their opposition to
any legislation that would help parochial school parents with their
overwhelming financial burden.
And now comes Ben Gamla in Oklahoma, where something almost
happened that would surely seem to make the case for a violation of the
Establishment clause…
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