Experts say this could be a hugely influential test case before the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority.
The case was first decided by the Oklahoma Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of State Attorney General Gentner Drummond in June. Drummond argued against the Oklahoma Charter School Board, which voted to authorize St. Isidore’s contract as its previous iteration, the Oklahoma Virtual Charter School Board.
The board voted in July to appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The school was set to open last August but then voted not to open its doors. It is managed by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa.
The contract has been rescinded by the board after significant pressure from Drummond, who threatened contempt charges if it did not comply with the court order. The board voted with the caveat that St. Isidore’s contract would be reinstated should the U.S. Supreme Court reverse or nullify the current order.
The board took on the Alliance Defending Freedom as its national litigation group. The ADF is designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “hate group.”
The ADF issued a press release Friday afternoon, arguing the Oklahoma Supreme Court erred in its decision, and the U.S. Supreme Court has held that religious groups “cannot be excluded from generally available programs solely because of their religious character.”
“There’s great irony in state officials who claim to be in favor of religious liberty discriminating against St. Isidore because of its Catholic beliefs,” ADF Chief Legal Counsel Jim Campbell said in the release. “The U.S. Constitution protects St. Isidore’s freedom to operate according to its faith.”
What did the lower court rule?
The state supreme court held because St. Isidore will evangelize its faith as part of its curriculum, it violates Oklahoma laws, the Oklahoma Constitution and the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution. It said there was “no question” St. Isidore was a sectarian institution and would be sectarian in its programs and operations.
“Although a public charter school, St. Isidore is an instrument of the Catholic church, operated by the Catholic church, and will further the evangelizing mission of the Catholic church in its educational programs,” the court wrote. “The expenditure of state funds for St. Isidore’s operations constitute the use of state funds for the benefit and support of the Catholic church.”
Despite St. Isidore arguing its creation was lawful through the U.S. Constitution’s Free (religious) Exercise Clause, the court wrote that as a state-created school, St. Isidore doesn’t exist independently of it and isn’t a private entity — as in the other case precedents St. Isidore’s arguments relied on.
“Enforcing the St. Isidore contract would create a slippery slope and what the framers warned against — the destruction of Oklahomans’ freedom to practice religion without fear of government intervention,” the court wrote.
As a public charter school, the court said St. Isidore is a governmental entity and a state actor. And, because of that, it is subject to the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which says the state cannot pass laws that, as the court cites from a 1947 ruling, “aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another.”
The court argued that not only does the Clause prohibit government spending in “direct support” of any religious activities or institutions, but, citing a 2004 case, the court wrote the Clause “also prohibits the government from participating in the same religious exercise that the law protects when performed by a private party.”
“What St. Isidore requests from this Court is beyond the fair treatment of a private religious institution in receiving a generally available benefit, implicating the Free Exercise Clause,” the court wrote. “It is about the State’s creation and funding of a new religious institution violating the Establishment Clause. Even if St. Isidore could assert free exercise rights, those rights would not override the legal prohibition under the Establishment Clause.”
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