Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1088_dbfi.pdf
Page Number: 45

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

5 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

schools  may  contract  directly  with  a  public  school  in  an-
other SAU, or with an approved private school, to educate
their students.  See Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 20–A, §§2701, 
2702 (2008).  I do not understand today’s decision to man-
date that SAUs contract directly with schools that teach re-
ligion, which would go beyond Zelman’s private-choice doc-
trine  and  blatantly  violate  the  Establishment  Clause.
Nonetheless, it is irrational for this Court to hold that the 
Free Exercise Clause bars Maine from giving money to par-
ents to fund the only type of education the State may pro-
vide  consistent  with  the  Establishment  Clause:  a  reli-
giously neutral one.  Nothing in the Constitution requires 
today’s result. 

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What a difference five years makes.  In 2017, I feared that 
the Court was “lead[ing] us . . . to a place where separation 
of church and state is a constitutional slogan, not a consti-
tutional commitment.”  Trinity Lutheran, 582 U. S., at ___ 
(dissenting opinion) (slip op., at 27).  Today, the Court leads
us to a place where separation of church and state becomes
a constitutional violation.  If a State cannot offer subsidies 
to its citizens without being required to fund religious exer-
cise, any State that values its historic antiestablishment in-
terests more than this Court does will have to curtail the 
support it offers to its citizens.  With growing concern for
where this Court will lead us next, I respectfully dissent.