My First Amendment screed for the day

The Supreme Court tomorrow hears arguments in Locke v. Davey, in which the state of Washington refused to grant an academically-qualified, low income student a scholarship he had earned once he stated his intent to use the money to pursue a career as a minister. The student challenged that and won at both the district and Ninth Circuit (!) level. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has an excellent synopsis of the case, as well as links to the briefs. The young man is represented by the American Center for Law & Justice, which has issued this press release on the case. For the other side, here is the quick version of the ACLU's views supporting the state, with links to their amicus brief.

This seems to me a fairly clear example of overreaching by the state. If the scholarship is available on the basis of permissible criteria, and the recipient attends a properly accredited school, the state should be unable to block religious studies, for several reasons:

1 - It would require an active hostility to religion that the First Amendment does not mandate or even allow. The First Amendment might properly prohibit the state from offering scholarships available ONLY to religion students, or available to Presbyterians but not Catholics. But to suggest that the state can indirectly fund anything except the study of religion seems to me to go too far.

2 - The connection between the state and religion is too attenuated to justify this sort of treatment. The state is funding a individual student, who is free the use the funds on any course of study. It is not analogous to what would be impermissible, such as direct state funding of a particular seminary. This support is indeirect in a categorical sense - the state has made no comprehensive commitment to funding religion - even if it is direct in this one instance. This should not violate the First Amendment.

3 - Perhaps less clear, this gets into the issue of defining "religion" and "religious views" about which I have blogged before. Just to make the most obvious point, Washington would presumably have allowed this guy to major in philosophy (as I did) and devote himself to studying, for example, Neitzsche ("God is dead"). It seems to me that this is a religious sort of study, and differentiating between this and a religion major is tricky stuff. I recognize that one can draw a distinction between academic study of religious issues and training to be a religious leader. But this distinction is, I think, both weak and impossible to apply. One could just duck the issue by majoring in the academic discipline of religion and them attending seminary afterwards. That seems a pretty fine slice on the hair, and it would allow colleges to duck the issue by replacing pre-seminary programs with generic religion majors, which looks a triumph of form over substance.

I'll watch for highlights of the argument and post about them tomorrow.
- posted by Anonymous @ 12:42 PM