Two new court cases will test the limits of the First Amendment as the Supreme Court decides just how far religion can permeate public schools.
At issue are two cases the court recently agreed to hear: in the first, the six Republican appointees and three Democratic appointees will consider whether to permit the country’s first publicly funded religious charter school in Oklahoma; and in the second, the court will hear an appeal from parents in Maryland who want the right to keep their children from reading books having to do with LGBTQ subjects.
The American Civil Liberties Union condemned the court’s decision to take the Oklahoma case, saying in a statement: “The law is clear: Charter schools are public schools and must be secular and open to all students.” The statement continued, “Oklahoma taxpayers…should not be forced to fund a religious public school that plans to discriminate against students and staff and indoctrinate students into one religion. Converting public schools into Sunday schools would be a dangerous sea change for our democracy.”
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As it stands, the Constitution provides for the separation of church and state, thanks to the establishment clause of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” According to the Freedom Forum, “the establishment clause is understood by the courts as separating church from state on every level of government,” including taxpayer-funded public schools.
Legal writer Jordan Rubin stated in a piece for MSNBC.com, “Of course, the Dobbs case and other recent appeals have shown that a majority of the court can change how the law is interpreted if it chooses to.” By giving states increased rights to limit or outlaw abortions, the Supreme Court did away with nearly 50 years of a constitutional right to abortion in the United States.
There’s nothing to preclude the court from reinterpreting the Establishment Clause in these upcoming cases that could further blur the lines between church and state. As Rubin wrote, “Once again, we wait to see what the court will do.”