Today, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, the nation’s largest Orthodox Jewish umbrella organization, sharply criticized a ruling by New Hampshire’s Strafford County Superior Court Judge John Lewis invalidating the Granite State’s education scholarship tax credit program on state constitutional grounds.
Nathan Diament, the Orthodox Union’s executive director for public policy stated:
“For decades, the United States Supreme Court has recognized that under the United States Constitution, laws that support—via tax credits or other methods—private funds to flow to religious institutions do not violate the federal Establishment Clause. While the New Hampshire state constitution contains more restrictive language on this topic, the state court’s ruling is a radical departure from the spirit of American jurisprudence.
“In his opinion yesterday, Judge Lewis ruled the tax credit program violates Article 83 of the New Hampshire Constitution, which states that ‘no money raised by taxation shall ever be granted or applied for the use of the schools or institutions of any religious sect or denomination.’ Lewis found the program uses public funds, even if funding doesn’t come directly from the government. Money that would have flowed to the government, he said, is instead diverted for a specific purpose.
“Taken to its logical conclusion, this rationale would invalidate any charitable donation to a religious entity, since an individual’s dollar placed in the charity box would have otherwise flowed to the government’s coffers.
“This ruling must not stand. The Orthodox Union will work with our friends and allies to have it overturned by the New Hampshire State Supreme Court.”
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2 Responses
‘no money raised by taxation shall ever be granted or applied for the use of the schools or institutions of any religious sect or denomination.’
The judge correctly saw that a tax credit was nothing more than a diversion of tax money from the public treasury to religious schools. I support public funding of religious schools, but in 38 states it is necessary to repeal the Blaine Amendments in order to do that legally. This will be extremely difficult in New Hampshire because amendments to that state’s constitution require approval of 2/3 of voters in a statewide referendum.
Charlie, that’s not quite accurate. The program did not use public money, at least not as the U.S. Supreme Court (and every state supreme court to address the matter) has defined it. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that money does not become “public money” until it has reached the tax collector’s hand. This ruling is contrary to precedent and logic.
I explain more here: http://www.cato.org/blog/nh-court-you-can-choose-school-so-long-its-secular