Supreme Court to hear Cleveland school case
More than 70 years after Thomas Jefferson's 1802 letter hailing the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution for "building a wall of separation between church and State," President Ulysses Grant echoed these sentiments.

"Leave the matter of religion to the family, the altar, the church, and the private school, supported entirely by private contributions," urged Grant.

Unlike the Civil War battles that Grant fought, the skirmish about school vouchers is bloodless. Yet, the Ohio case that will soon be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court could claim a major casualty: the First Amendment principle of church-state separation.

In the coming months, the Supreme Court will consider an appeal of last year's decision by a federal appeals court - a decision that declared the Cleveland voucher program unconstitutional. The Ohio case could deeply split the Supreme Court and may well result in a 5- to-4 decision.

Voucher supporters are likely to argue that the Ohio law does not use state aid to advance the exercise of religion. They contend that Cleveland parents have a wide range of schools to choose from and point to language in the 1995 law permitting suburban public schools to participate in the voucher program.

Yet, for parents, these are imaginary options. Suburban public schools are not required to participate, and not one suburban public school has chosen to do so.

In effect, choice is restricted to private schools, the vast majority of which are religiously affiliated. This explains why 96 percent of vouchers are routed to religious schools. By the summer of 1999, Cleveland's Catholic schools had received $3.3 million for voucher students, even though their overall enrollment continued to decline. In fact, a 1999 newspaper article noted that "the voucher program merely slowed an exodus from Cleveland's Catholic schools to the city's public schools."

As the Supreme Court examines the Ohio law, it should be guided by its 1973 Nyquist decision. This case concerned a New York State law that created a tuition-grant program - a law with the same fundamental ingredients as the Ohio law.

Of the private schools in the New York program, 85 percent were religious. In Ohio's voucher program for Cleveland, 82 percent are religious. Both the New York and Ohio laws were created to provide parents with public tax dollars, either as tuition grants or as reimbursement. Both laws were established to serve only or primarily the children of low-income families. Both laws place no restrictions on how religious schools may use these funds.

The Supreme Court declared the New York law a violation of the First Amendment, and it should rule likewise on the Ohio law. In its 1973 opinion, the Court wrote that the New York law had the effect of advancing religion, in part, because there was no way of "guaranteeing that the state aid derived from public funds will be used exclusively for secular, neutral, and nonideological purposes."

In Cleveland, no measures have been taken to guarantee that voucher schools permit children to opt out of religious instruction. As the appeals court observed, Cleveland voucher schools "incorporate religious concepts, motives, and themes into all facets of their educational planning."

The appeals court also cited examples of Cleveland voucher schools' mission statements, including one school that requires students to "pledge allegiance to the Christian flag and to the Savior for whose Kingdom it stands . . ."

Another school proclaims that "the one cardinal objective of education to which all others point is to develop devotion to God as our Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier."

To make use of the voucher program, Cleveland students must participate in religious activities even if these are contrary to their own or their families' beliefs. Since voucher parents' choices are limited largely to religious schools, state taxpayers are subsidizing religion.

Any laws, even if they are well intentioned, that merge the roles of government and religion create what James Madison called "a corrupting coalition" - potentially enabling one of these institutions to subvert the other. At a tense and challenging time when America's religious pluralism is more important than ever, we hope the Supreme Court will heed Madison's warning and reaffirm the vital separation of church and state.

* Ralph G. Neas is president of People For the American Way Foundation. The group is among those challenging the constitutionality of the voucher program.