The Supreme Court will not consider whether to allow Michigan's ban on public money to go to private schools to stand and decades-old amendments to the state's constitution to remain in place.
Five families and pro-choice groups sued Michigan over a 1970 constitutional amendment that prohibited direct or indirect public funding of sectarian schools. They argue that this provision violates the equal protection guarantee of the U.S. Constitution.
Despite the Supreme Court's warning against “depriving” religious schools of equal access to public benefits, Michigan has made it clear that the amendment targets non-public schools, not just religious schools. The families argued that the amendment survived because it was “sensibly defended.”
“If the court does not act, Michigan's workaround will become a loophole for many states to discriminate against religious families and individuals,” the family's lawyers wrote in their petition to the high court. There is.
Michigan is one of 37 states with such a provision, known as the Blaine Amendment, named after former U.S. Rep. James Blaine, who tried to pass a similar federal law in the 1800s. Often, he helped spur the spread of copycat provisions across the country, although efforts to pass similar federal laws in the 1800s failed.
Family members said that at a time when there was a lot of discrimination against Catholics, it was common practice to deny public funding to religious schools. 2000 opinions In it, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote of the Blaine Amendment that it is “an open secret that 'sect' is the norm for 'Catholicism.'”
But in a brief to Michigan judges, the state's attorney general, Ann Sherman, argued that the state's constitutional amendment “is not a Blaine amendment at all.” Rather, it was a response to the lack of public funds allocated to non-public schools.
“Petitioners are trying to overcome this obstacle by linking the passage of the 1970 amendment to the Blaine Amendment nearly a century ago,” Sherman said, adding that “hostility” toward religious schools is the reason for the passage of the provision. He added that the family's suggestion that he contributed to the death was “unjust”.
The Michigan families told the judge they each have school-age children and would like to receive public assistance for tuition at the state's private religious schools. Each parent is also a member of the Parent Advocates for Choice in Education Foundation (PACE).
But the state argued that the families' complaint to the high court was merely a “general complaint” about “legitimate legislative choices” and that they had no standing to challenge it. The child was also not Catholic, not religious at all.
“Without these basic claims, it is puzzling how the petitioners can claim that they are being treated unequally based on the protected characteristics of their religion,” Sherman wrote.
