Chief Justice Roberts writes the opinion, joined by Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, and Breyer dissents, joined by Kagan and (in part) Sotomayor. Sotomayor has a separate dissenting opinion.
This is what I expected based on the Court's recent history with cases like this, but I'm eager to read it and will update this post.
Maine has enacted a program of tuition assistance for parents who live in school districts that do not operate a secondary school of their own. Under the program, parents designate the secondary school they would like their child to attend—public or private—and the school district transmits payments to that school to help defray the costs of tuition. Most private schools are eligible to receive the payments, so long as they are “nonsectarian.” The question presented is whether this restriction violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.Maine is very sparsely populated, and of its "260 school administrative units (SAUs), fewer than half operate a public secondary school of their own." The question is whether Maine can choose to give private school tuition support and exclude schools that are not "nonsectarian."
The Department has stated that, in administering this re-quirement, it “considers a sectarian school to be one that is associated with a particular faith or belief system and which, in addition to teaching academic subjects, promotes the faith or belief system with which it is associated and/or presents the material taught through the lens of this faith.”...
JUSTICE BREYER stresses the importance of “government neutrality” when it comes to religious matters... but there is nothing neutral about Maine’s program. The State pays tuition for certain students at private schools— so long as the schools are not religious. That is discrimination against religion. A State’s antiestablishment interest does not justify enactments that exclude some members of the community from an otherwise generally available pub-lic benefit because of their religious exercise.
MORE: From Roberts:
Maine and the dissents invoke Locke v. Davey, 540 U. S. 712 (2004), in support of the argument that the State may preclude parents from designating a religious school to receive tuition assistance payments. In that case, Washington had established a scholarship fund to assist academically gifted students with postsecondary education expenses. But the program excluded one particular use of the scholarship funds: the “essentially religious endeavor” of pursuing a degree designed to “train[] a minister to lead a congregation.” Id., at 721; Espinoza, 591 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 13). We upheld that restriction against a free exer-cise challenge, reasoning that the State had “merely chosen not to fund a distinct category of instruction.” Locke, 540 U. S., at 721.
Our opinions in Trinity Lutheran and Espinoza, however, have already explained why Locke can be of no help to Maine here. Both precedents emphasized, as did Locke itself, that the funding in Locke was intended to be used “to prepare for the ministry.” Trinity Lutheran, 582 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 12); see also Espinoza, 591 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 13); Locke, 540 U. S., at 725. Funds could be and were used for theology courses; only pursuing a “vocational religious” degree was excluded....
Locke’s reasoning expressly turned on what it identified as the “historic and substantial state interest” against using “taxpayer funds to support church leaders.” 540 U. S., at 722, 725....
Breyer's dissenting opinion stresses a role for the legislature in the so-called "play in the joints" between the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause.
The first Clause, the Establishment Clause, seems to bar all government “sponsorship, financial support, [or] active involvement . . . in religious activity,” while the second Clause, the Free Exercise Clause, seems to bar all “governmental restraint on religious practice.” Id., at 668, 670. The apparently absolutist nature of these two prohibitions means that either Clause, “if expanded to a logical extreme, would tend to clash with the other.” Id., at 668–669. Because of this, we have said, the two Clauses “are frequently in tension,” Locke v. Davey, 540 U. S. 712, 718 (2004), and “often exert conflicting pressures” on government action, Cutter v. Wilkinson, 544 U. S. 709, 719 (2005).
Instead of deciding that the 2 clauses mean that everything having to do with religion is either forbidden (by the Establishment Clause) or required (by the Free Exercise Clause), Breyer wants to preserve a greater space for democratic choice by saying that there are things that are neither forbidden nor required:
We have [in past cases] concluded that a State may, consistent with the Establishment Clause, provide funding to religious schools through a general public funding program if the “government aid . . . reach[es] religious institutions only by way of the deliberate choices of . . . individual [aid] recipients.”
But the key word is “may.” We have never previously held what the Court holds today, namely, that a State must (not may) use state funds to pay for religious education as part of a tuition program designed to ensure the provision of free statewide public school education.
What happens once “may” becomes “must”? Does that transformation mean that a school district that pays for public schools must pay equivalent funds to parents who wish to send their children to religious schools? Does it mean that school districts that give vouchers for use at charter schools must pay equivalent funds to parents who wish to give their children a religious education? What other social benefits are there the State’s provision of which means—under the majority’s interpretation of the Free Exercise Clause—that the State must pay parents for the religious equivalent of the secular benefit provided? The concept of “play in the joints” means that courts need not, and should not, answer with “must” these questions that can more appropriately be answered with “may.”...
In the majority’s view, the fact that private individuals, not Maine itself, choose to spend the State’s money on religious education saves Maine’s program from Establishment Clause condemnation. But that fact, as I have said, simply permits Maine to route funds to religious schools. See, e.g., Zelman, 536 U. S., at 652. It does not require Maine to spend its money in that way. That is because, as explained above, this Court has long followed a legal doctrine that gives States flexibility to navigate the tension between the two Religion Clauses. Supra, at 4. This doctrine “recognize[s] that there is ‘play in the joints’ between what the Establishment Clause permits and the Free Exercise Clause compels.” Trinity Lutheran, 582 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 6) (quoting Locke, 540 U. S., at 718). This wiggle-room means that “[t]he course of constitutional neutrality in this area cannot be an absolutely straight line.” Walz, 397 U. S., at 669.
Posts
72 comments:
Seems like a stretch for the godless lefties to dissent. Obviously they can make a case. Equally obviously it would be a case for limiting, as opposed to promoting, freedom.
non·sec·tar·i·an (adj) not involving or relating to a specific religious sect or political group.
Under that definition, it'd be a problem for woke and unionized schools as well.
"Breyer dissents, joined by Kagan and (in part) Sotomayor. Sotomayor has a separate dissenting opinion"
"Round Up The Usual Suspects!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtSmfws0_To
Cue the howls of establishing a theocracy. Seems like the actual result is stopping Maine from excluding certain schools.
If Maine truly stuck to it's "nonsectarian" approach, it would increasingly need to defund the public schools.
The law was probably in response to some other supreme court ruling too.
why not directly give $$$$ to child being educated ?
why does it have to be between state and school?
such deep misunderstanding of Individualist principle!
So how long before the USSC rules that not letting parents direct tax dollars to their children's sectarian schools instead of public schools is a violation of freedom of religion?
Perhaps a Twilight faith. Take a knee to mortal gods and goddesses (e.g. "experts"). Religion is a behavioral philosophy: morality in a universal frame, its relativistic sibling "ethics", and its politically consensual cousin "law".
“Maine is the most rural State in the Union” says Chief Justice Roberts.
Narayanan said...
why not directly give $$$$ to child being educated ?
Cities like Chicago spend more than a quarter of a MILLION dollars, on Each K-12 student.
The MAJORITY of those students Never learn to read at a junior high level.
HOW would it not be Better, for those students.. To Just GIVE THEM THE MONEY??
Oh, That's Right; the Constitutionally required "education" of students is NOT about the students, it's about providing lush incomes for school teachers, and administrators
I think the anti-religious left mis-understands the separation of church and state in the original meaning and want it to be defined as "any money that once passed through the fingers of the government cannot in any way, shape or form, land in the coffers of any religious institution." Breyer's dissent about how the ruling gives room much attention to the second part of the clause (free exercise) and not enough to the first, (establish) is wrong. If the state is to be neutral, then it cannot choose which institutions warrant funds related to education and which do not solely based on religious content. If they chose to support only one religious school to the exclusion of all other secular or religious schools, that would be establishment. If they choose everything BUT religious schools, regardless of type, it would be prohibiting free exercise because they would be providing a benefit, normally allowed to all citizens equally and telling some that they cannot choose freely how to apply that benefit due to religious belief. Just because the money passed through the government's hand first does not make it's use government supported or sanctioned. It is a benefit equally available to all citizens who then choose what to do with it. It would be like saying you cannot give part of your social security check to your church as a tithe.
The Department has stated that, in administering this re-quirement, it “considers a sectarian school to be one that is associated with a particular faith or belief system and which, in addition to teaching academic subjects, promotes the faith or belief system with which it is associated and/or presents the material taught through the lens of this faith.”...
So how does this not describe CAGW?
I love it. People are supposed to be able to choose their sex, block their puberty, have surgery on their genitals; all paid for by the taxpayer. But you cannot use your own education taxpayer dollars to help you go to the school of your choice, unless it is a democrat party approved school.
Vouchers dammit.
I do not see why this case had to go to the Supreme Court, but then I'm not an edu-cratic myrmidon bent on destroying private schools for the lower orders. In my state, tuition support for private religious schools is lawful if religious instruction is voluntary for the student and non-academic, that is, high marks in religion class don't count for honor roll consideration.
Readering writes, "So how long before the USSC rules that not letting parents direct tax dollars to their children's sectarian schools instead of public schools is a violation of freedom of religion?"
So how long before, a common rhetorical phrase that usually precedes some genuine mind rot thrown out in desperation by the loser.
So how long? Long enough for Readering to be well past knowing or caring. BTW, the Amish precedent has been set for a long time.
I take it this case could signal how much of a threat the Supremes see from religious organizations to civil liberties?
The ancient sentence said, Let us be silent, for so are the gods. Silence is a solvent that destroys personality, and gives us leave to be great and universal. Every man's progress is through a succession of teachers, each of whom seems at the time to have a superlative influence, but it at last gives place to a new.
If they start asking kids to face Mecca while drinking their floor sealant, then, the Supremes can always revisit the issue.
"A State’s antiestablishment interest does not justify enactments that exclude some members of the community from an otherwise generally available pub-lic benefit because of their religious exercise."
Amen.
My religion is true, your religion is a belief system.
The tricky bit is that "religion" is like saying pro-choice or pro-life, it seems to be a big category, but people only really mean "Christianity" and if they're expansive they mean a theistic orienting philosophy.
But religion can encompass a much broader expression and non-theistic foundation. At the core, it is an expressed faith in a certain perspective on what it means to be human.
Any school that goes beyond teaching the most objective skills of reading, writing, 'rithmatic, has already ventured into expressing belief systems of some kind, though historically the belief system was one shared by the community so there wasn't conflict. Now we have poly-religious communities where there are very distinct and often contradictory beliefs about what it means to be human and who the priests are that will guide the believers toward enlightenment.
But we all have a belief system and most folks are pretty consistent about trying to impose it on others, otherwise it isn't actually our core belief system.
Wince.
No joke
One more religion case for the term: may school district restrict football coach from conducting a "voluntary" (right!) prayer session in middle of field following a game. Kavanaugh seen as key swing vote.
"So how long before the USSC rules that not letting parents direct tax dollars to their children's sectarian schools instead of public schools is a violation of freedom of religion?
See all the voucher comments above. The money should be directed by the parents, and the schools should have to convince the parents to send their children to them along with those funds. Problem solved.
Vouchers, people. The problem would go away.
Of course that’s why we can’t have vouchers. Because that would break so very many rice bowls.
why not directly give $$$$ to child being educated ?
why does it have to be between state and school?
Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world. If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children.
Vouchers, people. The problem would go away.
Good idea, but only if the vouchers are capped at the amount the parents have actually paid in taxes to their local school district
Cities like Chicago spend more than a quarter of a MILLION dollars, on Each K-12 student.
======
is that each year or for all 12/14 schooling years total?
This gives rise in me to two thoughts:
1) "Maine is very sparsely populated...." AND YET IT STILL GETS 2 SENATORS!!!!!!
2) Why does a decision in this very sparsely populated state have any effect on other states?
Now, I know the answers to these two thoughts, but I expect to hear this presented somehow as an argument ad ignoramus.
The only requirement should be that the "school" actually has to be a school and not purely an institution for religious teachings. I will, however, be willing to wager that the religious schools in Maine generally out-perform the public schools with respect to the 3Rs (to say nothing of history, civics, etc.) - which we will no doubt be told is strictly due to race and class.
Cities like Chicago spend more than a quarter of a MILLION dollars, on Each K-12 student.
Where did you get this bullshit statistic? Chicago spends about $14500 per student per year (which is $189,000 if you stretch it out over 13 years). And that amount is considerably less than most suburban district and below the average for Illinois as a whole ($15,700).
Narayanan said...
is that each year or for all 12/14 schooling years total?
It's like $28,000 a year; per student
The 1st Amendment's Establishment Clause is a curious one - it's not really a "right" like the right to free speech. It's a command that the state cannot establish a religion. I strongly support keeping the state's grubby hands off religion - the state should not be writing creeds, prayers, devotional readings, worship, etc.
The state should not Establish a religion.
Does the fact that parents use what are, effectively, vouchers to choose schooling which has a religious component - does that render it unconstitutional? Does the use of vouchers Establish a State Religion?
I still wrestle with Kiryas Joel - that case may have been correctly decided. The state of NY established a school district which was effectively the same as the Satmar religious community.
I think the fundamental question in all Establishment Clause cases is whether the state, in adopting the law, rule, or regulation, was attempting to Establish a religion. If so, then it's violative of the 1st Amendment. However, if it did not, then the practice may continue.
One additional note - as the state expands it's power and dominion, it will stray into areas that have been previously controlled by private actors, including religious persons and organizations. I think a good case of this was the recent Bladensburg cross case. There a private organization erected a memorial cross for those who died in the 1st World War. It was later turned over to a commission within Maryland. In her dissent, Justice Ginsburg seized on the fact that it is now in the middle of government erected roads and wanted to tear down the cross: "By maintaining the Peace Cross on a public highway, the Commission elevates Christianity over other faiths, and religion over nonreligion.” Am. Legion v. Am. Humanist Ass'n, No. 17-1717, 69 (U.S. Jun. 20, 2019). Rather, if there is a state violation - the state has seized something created or controlled by private parties, it is the state which must yield. If Ginsburg had prevailed, the remedy should not be the destruction of the cross, but the destruction of the public highways.
I think there is a significant Somali population in ME (significant for ME that is) so I wonder if the effort to limit the stipend has anything to do with a concern over funding the madrassa.
And yet they persist. The NIH today announced a new STEM initiative with scholarships for all students... except white and asian ones. I am always amazed at how long it takes justice to catch up to these abuses. How many children were denied the education of their choice in Maine in the meantime?
6-3, and Catholic v Public HS educated on Court also 6-3. 2 Jews PHS dissent. But PHS Alito in majority, and RCHS Sotomayor in dissent.
The cavalier ease with which the Dissent uses Jefferson's casual phrase "separation of Church & State" as a synonym for the constitution's proscription against an "establishment of religion" is embarrassing and revealing.
I find it very interesting that Breyer, Kagan, and Sotomayor all refuse to accept the result of Trinity Lutheran.
Which is to say, I find it hilarious that the same people who are going to be whining about "respect for stare decisis" in Dobbs are in Carson saying "we refuse to accept that previous decision, and will vote to overturn it as soon as we can."
Hypocrisy, thy name is Left
Freder Frederson said...
Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world. If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children.
1: Because those "brat" are going to be paying for your Social Security. Or not
2: If you can get a democratic majority together to vote to end education requirements and support through grade 12, you are more than welcome to do so.
But while it's legitimate for the State to require people to be educated, it's not legitimate to force them to do it at State run rape and murder factories.
If the State can't make the public schools good enough that people want to go to them, then the education money should follow the kid, be it honest schooling, private school, religious school, or any public school willing to take the kid
Want to test for acquisition of skills? Great! I'm all in favor of that.
Just make sure the public schools face the same testing rules that everyone else faces, with the same penalties
non·sec·tar·i·an (adj) not involving or relating to a specific religious sect or political group.
Climate Change.
Woke/Critical Race Theory.
Atheism/Evolution.
These are all "sectarian" religious sect's.
Beadle Frederson writes, "Good idea, but only if the vouchers are capped at the amount the parents have actually paid in taxes to their local school district"
Good idea, no educational choice for the poor!
Lousy poor, they how dare they ask for more gruel.
I admit, I'm not used to winning at this level. I'm used to an O'Connor or a Souter or a Kennedy or (for that matter) a Roberts twisting the knife in with a 5-4 ruling. It's nice to have a solid majority on questions like this, for the first time in my life. Thank you, President Trump.
"Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world. If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children."
Umm.
The government doesn't pick up the tab, the taxpayers do.
The taxpayers already pay for (subsidize) the education of children (brats you choose to bring into the world).
---
The obvious response is for (D) to go, our hands are tied. We must end vouchers and create more schools and hire more public employees. It breaks our hearts (WWKKKWINATTYD)
’Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world.’
At least you’re not bitter!
Freder - what about people who do not have children and they pay into their local school district.
Do they get an opt-out or a rebate?
Freder -
These brats you talk about might be less bratty is they were not forced into crappy woke government baby sitter skoolz.
Back in the 90s I got into a (usenet) argument about this. My position was : federal statutes should never use words like "church", "religion", "faith", "sect" etc. Because that requires the feds to define,legally, what all those things are. I believe that the 1st amendment should be interpreted to prohibit that.
My opponent simply denied that any such definition was required.
How can one negotiate with people like that?
Do we need to have the Supreme Court, or someone create a dictionary so that words have precise meanings? What is a religion? Many "progressives" seem to think that there has to be some god or supernatural figure. Yet Unitarianism, which delights many progressives, clearly thinks of itself as a religion, has churches and ministers, yet no belief in deities is required. I prefer to think of religion as a belief system held by faith and ardor. A nice inclusive, diverse, and equitable definition. Environmentalism, liberalism, transgenderism, etc. all strike me as religions, along with Buddhism, Juche, Islam, etc.
The definition used by some on the Court, ostensively liberal, seems rather fundamentalistic, dogmatic, and conservative.
If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children.
Works for me.
Now, go tell to your leftist, K-12 union goons the gravy train stops.
Former Justice Souter was a member of the First Circuit panel that was reversed by the Supreme Court.
Freder, I suspect you were a brat once. And educated, at least in part, at public expense.
Though certainly $250,000 per student is largely wasted funds.
O could swear this exact same decision came down about 10 years ago?
Why should my children subsidize your social security and medicare?
Somebody needs a snickers bar.
Just read Jeffery Toomer is outraged.
Maybe because Catholic schools teach masturbation is wrong.
"The dissents are wrong to say that under our decision today Maine 'must' fund religious education...Maine chose to allow some parents to direct state tuition payments to private schools; that decision was not “forced upon” it....The State retains a number of options: it could expand the reach of its public school system, increase the availability of transportation, provide some combination of tutoring, remote learning, and partial attendance, or even operate boarding schools of its own. As we held in Espinoza, a “State need not subsidize private education. But once a State decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.”
-the Court today, Carson v. Makin
Isn't this how the GI bill works. You get a subsidy from the government and you can use it to go to the school of your choice. I don't recall catholic universities being verboten. I'm sure plenty of GIs went to Marquette (we can argue later about how catholic Marquette is these days). I bet some even went to SMU - Southern Methodist University. As a Lutheran am I supposed to resent funding that religious education?
Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world. If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children.
Remember, the government mandates that the children get educated. Parents HAVE to enroll their kids in certified schools. Should there be unfunded mandates? First you have to pass laws abolishing the mandate and then you can defund the education system. I'm fine with that. I paid for all my kids' schools while also paying for other people's brats they brought into the world (In fact even my kids are brats other people brought into the world.) I am pretty much libertarian on this topic. I take full responsibility for educating the kids I placed in my family, but I don't begrudge others who rely on the public system. I am a product of said system.
The median Chicago Public School teacher base salary id $58,182 base salary. The majority of CPS students graduate high school with, at best, a sixth grade reading level.
Yes. Only those with skin in the game should be paying for public education. And only those with skin in the game should be funding teachers pensions.
Freder Frederson said...
"Why should I (who has no children) subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world. If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it, but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children."
Why should I (who has no children)
* I who "have" no children..
subsidize the brats you choose to bring into the world.
* assumes taxes he pays must all be used to benefit HIM. He might as well object to paying state taxes used to maintain roads in his town he never travels on. Or complain about the welfare payments illegals get, that he doesn't.
* reveals snotty hostility toward children. Not a good look. (I suspect Freder could never attract a mate---good thing, since he's telling us he hates kids.) Further assumes that people who support this SCt opinion are...bad people who raise brats.
"If public education is so awful, let's get rid of it,
* as if Our Masters are not in thrall to the Teachers Unions. Bell the cat, Freder!!!
"but don't expect the government to pick up the tab for educating your children.
* forgets that "the government" gets its money from taxpayers. (except for what it profligately borrows from the Chicoms, or prints using enough paper to populate a forest of Sequoias.)
* Further forgets that poor people who pay no taxes still get their children educated by the state. Are you angry with them too, Freder???
The left reading a hostility to religion in the Establishment Clause is utterly wrong. Certainly the people who wrote and ratified the Amendment did not harbor such animus. In fact, many states had and continued to have a state-recognized religion at the time.
Meanwhile, I'm sure the dissenters and rest of the left would have no problem in government funding of indoctrination schools that push the ideology that impressionable toddlers can and should be sexualized, etc., also known as public schools.
Our opinions in Trinity Lutheran and Espinoza, however, have already explained why Locke can be of no help to Maine here. Both precedents emphasized, as did Locke itself, that the funding in Locke was intended to be used “to prepare for the ministry.” Trinity Lutheran, 582 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 12); see also Espinoza, 591 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 13); Locke, 540 U. S., at 725. Funds could be and were used for theology courses; only pursuing a “vocational religious” degree was excluded....
Locke’s reasoning expressly turned on what it identified as the “historic and substantial state interest” against using “taxpayer funds to support church leaders.” 540 U. S., at 722, 725....
I'm gratified it will be some time before we're expected to accept the contortions of words and meanings from a majority of liberal SCOTUS justices. I just got so tired of it...
..and my composition skills wouldn't stand up to the scrutiny of the flaky twists and turns of the liberal mind but I'm certain the sentence summation of this ruling includes the noun 'petard' and the verb 'hoist'...
...see ya'll on Thursday.
Freder once again full of shit. According the Chicago Public School system, their 2022 operating budget is 7.8 billion dollars. The number of students is 341,382 (you can google both of these numbers, Freder). This comes to almost $23,000/student, and a much larger number for the ones who actually show up each day. And note, that I am not including the capital budget, just the operating budget. I imagine the capital budget is at least 50% or more than the operating budget if my own local school district is any guide.
Instead of deciding that the 2 clauses mean that everything having to do with religion is either forbidden (by the Establishment Clause) or required (by the Free Exercise Clause), Breyer wants to preserve a greater space for democratic choice by saying that there are things that are neither forbidden nor required.
Or so Breyer says. More likely he first decided what his preferred outcome was and then reasoned back from that. The Constitution was merely something to work around.
That's why nominating conservatives to the court can backfire from time to time, as they tend to be focused on the Constitution and the legal requirements and letting them guide to where it goes, occasionally managing to out-think themselves into bizarre legal theories that make some sort of logical sense. When you do not care about the process, you get more consistent ideological results.
Vouchers are about the only things I can see that has a chance to break the horrible cycle of poverty in the inner cities. Moms and dads will choose schools that won’t let Johnny and Jill screw around. They will choose schools that make them get off their arse, learn something, don’t disrupt the class or they will kick little Johnny or little jill out on their ass. And the rest of the students can get down to learning something.
Vouchers are not for wealthy parents ( although they should get them as well ), vouchers are for the kids who are forced to go to the public child abuse centers because there isn’t anyplace else.
If inner city kids are not included then I ( who are an extremely strong supporter of vouchers and home school ) would say no.
Where did you get this bullshit statistic? Chicago spends about $14500 per student per year (which is $189,000 if you stretch it out over 13 years). And that amount is considerably less than most suburban district and below the average for Illinois as a whole ($15,700).
Yeah, Freder is giving us the old leftie hide-the-pea under the walnut shell. The Chicago Public Schools annual budget substantially exceeds $9 billion with around 341,000 students in the system. This greatly exceeds a quarter of a million dollars spent to educate each child K-12. The lefties never want the taxpayers to know the true cost they bear so they exclude the costs of repairs to buildings, debt load, and pension plan payments for the gub'ment teat-suckers with tenure from the reporting and give us the Freder horseshit.
- Krumhorn
(my preferred adjectives: brilliant/awesome)
---One more religion case for the term: may school district restrict football coach from conducting a "voluntary" (right!) prayer session in middle of field following a game. Kavanaugh seen as key swing vote. [Readering]
So slight tangent to this post topic follows. A perfect analogue to that situation was the catalyst for the plot of Tom Perrotta's 2007 novel The Abstinence Teacher. It was soccer, not football, in the novel. Althouse posted just the other day about some new work from Perrotta, or another movie production, don't recall. In this one, the characters are pretty well done, and the tensions between the born-again ex-alcoholic divorced soccer coach dad, and a very anti-religious sex-ed teacher from the middle school whose daughter plays on the team, were explored convincingly. Until the final resolutions, which pandered to Perrotta's presumably suburban liberal book buyers.
In the novel, the children of the anti-religious like what they hear of Jesus Christ and a few start going to church with their Korean-American friends, who are naturally much more religious. It was a bit frustrating to get drawn into these current conflicts and then have the book avoid them, but what was good about the book was still pretty good. It was an Almost.
In rural areas, there may be no other alternative to get your kids an education.
When my adopted Hispanic son was being bullied at public school, (where they would not stop the racist bullying because freedom of speech), my only alternatives were Church schools: Catholic or an evangelical school. Luckily I could afford the tuition, but what about other kids who don't fit in? every time I read about a kid killing himself because of bullying, I wonder why the parents didn't try to move their kids to another school.
Mike Petrik said...
The cavalier ease with which the Dissent uses Jefferson's casual phrase "separation of Church & State" as a synonym for the constitution's proscription against an "establishment of religion" is embarrassing and revealing.
=========
does quoting Jefferson = obeisance to originalist intent ?
My interest was captured by the fact that there are (apparently three) states which don't oblige school districts to maintain secondary schools; an example of a private school that supplies the need in such districts is Pinkerton Academy [https://www.pinkertonacademy.org/]. Glory to the Braves! (or whatever they are called now) but I'd have been out of my public high school in a flash if Pinkerton were an alternative.
Freder : this Song need new words - please provide from you
Yes, you could send a kid to the University of Illinois (with no scholarships) for the same price as sending them to a Chicago grade school. How pitiful.
Yancey Ward and Krummhorn's arithmetic reminds me of something my late parents told me ~30 years ago:
After they retired, they used to swap houses with people in other states and in Canada for a month or two at a time - kind of a reciprocal proto-AirBnB. When they were living in a smallish town in Ontario for a month or two, the huge scandal in the local paper the whole time they were there was about teacher salaries. The teachers' union had been negotiating a salary scale for decades in which pay was divided into 15 classes, from quite low in level 1 to quite high at level 15, and the school board happily signed off on it. After ~30 years of this, an interested parent thought to divide the total amount of the teacher salary line in the budget by the total number of teachers, and discovered that the actual average pay was far higher than level 8 or 9 (as one would expect) or even 10: it was higher than level 14. It turned out that levels 1-13 were all for show and had never had anyone in them! All new hires started at level 14 and after not very many years moved up to level 15. I don't know how much of the uproar was anger at the greed and fraud of the union, and how much was humiliation at the fact that it took so long for anyone to think to do the simple arithmetic that revealed the fraud.
I wonder how many American school districts have similar arrangements. More than zero, I suspect.
Last comment - the result is more in line with the Brennan-Marshall line of cases following Sherbert v. Verner, 374 U.S. 398 (1963). The dissenters are following the Scalia Employment Div. v Smith cases.
In the earlier days, a general Protestant establishment was the norm and the outliers were seeking accommodation. Now, as many have noted, a non-theistic progressive religious establishment rules education and the Christians have aligned with the Jews and Muslims to attain a degree of parity. See, for example the amicus brief filed by Nicole Stelle Garnett on behalf of, inter alia, the Council of Islamic Schools in North America and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.
@Narayanan --
No. Jefferson was in France at the time of the Constitutional Convention.
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