Maine(ly) State Tuition Aid Must Be 4 All

Sup Ct’s “anti-bright line” ruling that Maine must include religious schools in its tuition program, arguably leaves open whether ALL states will have to include faith-based schools in their Charter School programs as well …

Put another way, the 6-3 conservative majority is saying discrimination in the Separation of Church & State context – here, Maine wanted to subsidize private but non-religious schools where public schools in rural areas were just non-existent -- can very much be a two-way street. “Regardless of how the benefit and restriction are described the [Maine] program operates to identify and exclude otherwise eligible schools [i.e., discriminate] on the basis of their religious exercise,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the Court. The 3 dissenting liberal Justices argued the Constitution does not compel Maine or any state to subsidize religious schools that admittedly meet state academic standards simply because it subsidizes private secular schools.

As the WSJ’s Jess Bravin pointed out, “While the Maine program is [relatively] small, the case could have implications for much larger school systems. A possible future question, e.g., could be whether charter schools, which are publicly funded but managed with autonomy from the traditional school system, can include religious instruction.”

Davd Soul