July 15, 2002

Religious leaders vouch that court's ruling is abhorrent or wonderful
___By Robert Marus
___ABP Washington Bureau
___WASHINGTON (ABP)--Is the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on school vouchers the best thing for public school children since integration or the worst blow to religious freedom since Roger Williams was kicked out of the Massachusetts Bay Colony?
___Among Baptists, the answer depends on one's perspective on issues of church and state. Both views were represented as religious and political leaders reacted swiftly and loudly to the high court's June 27 decision. According to that decision, tax-supported scholarships used to pay for education at parochial schools in Cleveland do not violate the Constitution's ban on state endorsement of religion.
___"This decision is a blow to the constitutional principle that government should not advance religion," said Holly Hollman, general counsel for the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs.
___But another Baptist leader, Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, took a sunnier view.
___"This is the most significant Supreme Court decision in terms of its impact on public education since Brown vs. Board of Education," Land said in a statement, referring to the landmark 1954 case that declared racial segregation in public schools illegal. "I believe it will have a
tremendously positive effect."
___The case, Zelman vs. Simmons-Harris, originated with an Ohio program designed to provide scholarships usable at private schools to some children in under-performing Cleveland public schools.
___A 5-4 majority of the Court ruled that, though government money provided to pervasively sectarian organizations would usually be unconstitutional, the choice to spend the scholarships at religious schools versus secular schools was entirely up to the parents. Therefore, a reasonable observer could not conclude that the large transfer of money from the public treasury to the coffers of parochial schools constituted a state endorsement of religion.
___The BJC's executive director, Brent Walker, agreed with the court's minority in rejecting that argument.
___"Government has no business subsidizing religion," Walker said. "It does no less by passing vouchers through the pockets of parents."
___But Land viewed the case more in terms of providing equal opportunities for religious schools as well as secular schools.
___"This case was a religious liberty case," Land said. "Once again, the principle at stake was if the government chooses to offer a benefit to parents--in this case vouchers--should it be able to discriminate against religious institutions and say they are the only ones that cannot receive the vouchers? We believe the answer to that is an emphatic 'No.'
___"Any other decision would be to affirm the rankest kind of discrimination against religion."
___Other religious leaders and religious liberty watchdogs weighed in on the decision with equal vigor.
___Barry Lynn, director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said the only discrimination going on would be that visited on religious minorities as a result of the ruling.
___"In the Supreme Court of the United States today, apparently it's acceptable for all taxpayers to pay for religious indoctrination," said Lynn, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ.
___Lynn termed the ruling the "worst church-state decision in the last 50 years."
___He also noted that the struggle over vouchers now shifts to Congress and state courts and legislatures. "The battle against vouchers is certainly not over," Lynn said.

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