Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1088_dbfi.pdf
Page Number: 37

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

15 

BREYER, J., dissenting 

lic money to promote religion.  And considering the Estab-
lishment Clause concerns underlying the program, Maine’s
decision not to fund such schools falls squarely within the 
play  in  the  joints  between  those  two  Clauses.    Maine  has 
promised all children within the State the right to receive a
free public education.  In fulfilling this promise, Maine en-
deavors  to  provide  children  the  religiously  neutral  educa-
tion required in public school systems.  And that, in signif-
icant part, reflects the State’s antiestablishment interests 
in  avoiding  spending  public  money  to  support  what  is  es-
sentially  religious  activity.  The  Religion  Clauses  give 
Maine the ability, and flexibility, to make this choice. 

B 
In  my  view,  Maine’s  nonsectarian  requirement  is  also
constitutional because it supports, rather than undermines, 
the Religion Clauses’ goal of avoiding religious strife.  Forc-
ing Maine to fund schools that provide the sort of religiously 
integrated education offered by Bangor Christian and Tem-
ple Academy creates a similar potential for religious strife
as  that  raised  by  promoting  religion  in  public  schools.  It 
may appear to some that the State favors a particular reli-
gion over others, or favors religion over nonreligion.  Mem-
bers of minority religions, with too few adherents to estab-
lish  schools,  may  see  injustice  in  the  fact  that  only  those
belonging to more popular religions can use state money for 
religious education.  Taxpayers may be upset at having to 
finance the propagation of religious beliefs that they do not
share and with which they disagree.  And parents in school 
districts that have a public secondary school may feel indig-
nant that only some families in the State—those families in 
the  more  rural  districts  without  public  schools—have  the 
opportunity to give their children a Maine-funded religious
education. 

Maine legislators who endorsed the State’s nonsectarian 
requirement  understood  this  potential  for  social  conflict.