Religious Charter Schools Are OK in Oklahoma

This was an op-ed in the WSJ

Supporters of educational choice and religious liberty had cause for celebration on June 5, when the Oklahoma Virtual Charter School Board approved the initial application for the nation’s first religious charter school. St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, a joint venture of the Oklahoma City and Tulsa dioceses, will serve students statewide with the goal of bringing high-quality Catholic education to those who need it most. As the state’s bishops explained after the vote, the school will “be founded in the Catholic intellectual tradition of excellence” and “provide innovative educational options for underserved populations,” including students in rural areas, Hispanic and Native communities, and those with “special educational needs.”

That sounds promising—unless you oppose educational freedom or maintain antiquated views of the First Amendment. Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond declared the board’s decision “unconstitutional.” Rachel Laser, president of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, vowed legal action, characterizing the decision as an affront to Oklahomans’ religious liberty and a “sea change for American democracy.” Harvard law school’s Noah Feldman predicted that the approval will test the “Supreme Court’s willingness to abandon the establishment clause of the Constitution.”

More..

https://archive.is/bWTY9

To which OK AG replied:

Regarding Nicole Stelle Garnett’s “Religious Charters Are OK in Oklahoma” (Houses of Worship, June 16): Oklahoma is now the testing ground in a deeply troubling effort to reshape public education in America by allowing state tax dollars to fund religious schools directly. The Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa recently won approval from an obscure state board to operate a virtual charter school that purports to be “Catholic in teaching, Catholic in employment and Catholic in every way.”

That the school is Catholic isn’t the issue. Once one religion receives approval, every religion is entitled to equal treatment. In all seriousness, the Satanic Temple has already indicated it may apply to sponsor a school. If state and federal courts allow the Catholic charter school to move forward, the damage to the ideal of religious liberty will be irreversible.

The U.S. always has been a shining beacon of freedom for people to worship however they choose—or to be free from government-sanctioned religion. So deeply is this right ingrained in our national consciousness, the framers enshrined it in the first clause of the First Amendment. Forcing Oklahomans to fund religious teaching is a violation of their religious liberty. If permitted to stand, the result is obvious: Muslim taxpayers will be forced to fund Jewish and Christian schools, Jewish taxpayers will be compelled to fund Christian and Muslim schools, and taxpayers of no faith will be made to fund religious schools of all faiths.

The framers of the U.S. Constitution clearly understood that the best way to protect religious liberty is to prevent the state from sponsoring any religion at all. Unfortunately, their centuries-old wisdom is now at risk of being discarded unless state or federal courts determine otherwise. While it is encouraging that the U.S. Supreme Court allowed a lower-court ruling to stand in Charter Day School Inc. v. Peltier—effectively affirming that charter schools are state actors—I expect much litigation on this issue in the months to come. Until then, I will continue to uphold my solemn obligation to honor the rule of law and defend the Constitution, so help me God.

Gentner Drummond

Attorney General of Oklahoma

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Can one hope that once this question reaches SCOTUS that we will have different justices?