Seymour Flops
Diamond Member
Held: Maine’s “nonsectarian” requirement for otherwise generally available tuition assistance payments violates the Free Exercise Clause
The court's reasoning:
The principles applied in Trinity Lutheran and Espinoza suffice to resolve this case. Maine offers its citizens a benefit: tuition assistance payments for any family whose school district does not provide a public secondary school. Just like the wide range of nonprofit organizations eligible to receive playground resurfacing grants in Trinity Lutheran, a wide range of private schools are eligible to receive Maine tuition assistance payments here. And like the daycare center in Trinity Lutheran, the religious schools in this case are disqualified from this generally available benefit “solely because of their religious character.” 582 U. S., at ___.
Likewise, in Espinoza, as here, the Court considered a state benefit program that provided public funds to support tuition payments at private schools and specifically carved out private religious schools from those eligible to receive such funds. Both that program and this one disqualify certain private schools from public funding “solely because they are religious.” 591 U. S., at ___. A law that operates in that manner must be subjected to “the strictest scrutiny.” Id., at ___–___. Maine’s program cannot survive strict scrutiny. A neutral benefit program in which public funds flow to religious organizations through the independent choices of private benefit recipients does not offend the Establishment Clause.
I disagree with the idea of taxing "everyone" so that "everyone's" kids can be educated. It's a wrongheaded idea in the first place, and it never works out in practice that everyone pays and that everyone gets the education. But, if we are going to use tax dollars for public education, some kind of vouchers are the best way to go among the many bad options. Obviously, Maine feels that they best way to provide under-served secondary students is to offer them vouchers, but for whatever reason, it decided to disallow religious school students this benefit.
That has been corrected, now.
The court's reasoning:
The principles applied in Trinity Lutheran and Espinoza suffice to resolve this case. Maine offers its citizens a benefit: tuition assistance payments for any family whose school district does not provide a public secondary school. Just like the wide range of nonprofit organizations eligible to receive playground resurfacing grants in Trinity Lutheran, a wide range of private schools are eligible to receive Maine tuition assistance payments here. And like the daycare center in Trinity Lutheran, the religious schools in this case are disqualified from this generally available benefit “solely because of their religious character.” 582 U. S., at ___.
Likewise, in Espinoza, as here, the Court considered a state benefit program that provided public funds to support tuition payments at private schools and specifically carved out private religious schools from those eligible to receive such funds. Both that program and this one disqualify certain private schools from public funding “solely because they are religious.” 591 U. S., at ___. A law that operates in that manner must be subjected to “the strictest scrutiny.” Id., at ___–___. Maine’s program cannot survive strict scrutiny. A neutral benefit program in which public funds flow to religious organizations through the independent choices of private benefit recipients does not offend the Establishment Clause.
I disagree with the idea of taxing "everyone" so that "everyone's" kids can be educated. It's a wrongheaded idea in the first place, and it never works out in practice that everyone pays and that everyone gets the education. But, if we are going to use tax dollars for public education, some kind of vouchers are the best way to go among the many bad options. Obviously, Maine feels that they best way to provide under-served secondary students is to offer them vouchers, but for whatever reason, it decided to disallow religious school students this benefit.
That has been corrected, now.
