November 26, 2001
ERLC brief favors Cleveland vouchers
___WASHINGTON (BP)--The Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission has signed on to a brief for the U.S. Supreme Court defending an education-choice program that permits vouchers to be used at religious schools.
___The friend-of-the-court brief says the Cleveland, Ohio, program is neutral and therefore does not violate the First Amendment's ban on government establishment of religion. Because the recipients, rather than the government, choose where to redeem the vouchers, the program is constitutional, even though a large majority of parents have directed the benefits to be used at religious schools, the brief argues.
___Other religious liberty groups, including the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, have opposed the Cleveland program as unconstitutional. Passing government money through parents who send their children to parochial schools does not diminish the fact that the government still is funding religious education, the BJC and other groups contend.
___The Supreme Court announced in late September it would rule on the Cleveland voucher program. A favorable ruling for the Cleveland plan could clear the way for the spread of voucher programs in other school districts.
___Oral arguments in the case, Zelman vs. Simmons-Harris, have not been scheduled but will be held in February at the earliest. A ruling is expected before the court concludes its term next summer.
___The Cleveland Scholarship and Tutoring Program, which was established by the Ohio legislature, allows a family to use a voucher of $2,250 in state funds for tuition cost at the private or public school of its choice. Priority is given to low-income families. More than 4,000 students use the vouchers in more than 50 private schools, most of them religious ones.
___Last December, a panel of the Sixth Circuit voted 2-1 to affirm a federal judge's opinion the program violates the constitutional mandate of separation of church and state, because most of the schools in which vouchers are used are religious ones. In February, the full appeals court declined to reconsider the panel's ruling but later allowed the program to continue while the opinion was appealed to the Supreme Court.
___Lawyers for the Christian Legal Society wrote the brief joined in by the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. The Family Research Council and National Association of Evangelicals also signed on to the brief.
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