Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1195_g314.pdf
Page Number: 59

4 

ESPINOZA v. MONTANA DEPT. OF REVENUE 

GINSBURG, J., dissenting 

op., at 9–10); alterations in original).  As I see it, the deci-
sion  below—which  maintained  neutrality  between  sec-
tarian and nonsectarian private schools—did no such thing.
Finding the “beginning” of the Montana Supreme Court’s
decision erroneous, this Court regards the state court’s ul-
timate  judgment  as  irrelevant.    Ante,  at  20–22.    In  the 
Court’s recounting, the Montana court first held that reli-
gious  schools  must  be  excluded  from  the  scholarship  pro-
gram—necessarily  determining  that  the  Free  Exercise 
Clause  permitted  that  result—and  only  subsequently 
struck the entire program as a way of carrying out its hold-
ing.  See ante, at 21 (“When the [Montana Supreme] Court 
was called upon to apply a state law no-aid provision to ex-
clude religious schools from the program, it was obligated 
by the Federal Constitution to reject the invitation.”).  But 
the initial step described by this Court is imaginary.  The 
Montana court determined that the scholarship program vi-
olated the no-aid provision because it resulted in aid to re-
ligious schools.  Declining to rewrite the statute to exclude
those  schools,  the  state  court  struck  the  program  in  full. 
393 Mont. 446, 463–468, 435 P. 3d 603, 612–614 (2018).  In 
doing so, the court never made religious schools ineligible
for an otherwise available benefit, and it never decided that 
the Free Exercise Clause would allow that outcome.1 

Thus, contrary to this Court’s assertion, see ante, at 21, 
the no-aid provision did not require the Montana Supreme 

—————— 

1  In  its  opinion,  Montana’s  highest  court  stated  without  explanation 
that this case is not one in which application of the no-aid provision vio-
lates  the  Free  Exercise  Clause.    393  Mont.,  at  468,  435  P. 3d,  at  614. 
When the court made that statement, it had already invalidated the en-
tire scholarship program.  Ibid.  Accordingly, the court’s statement can-
not be understood to have approved of excluding religious schools from 
an otherwise available scholarship.  Instead, the statement is most fairly 
read to convey that the Free Exercise Clause allows a State to decline to
fund any private schools, an outcome that avoids state aid to religious 
schools.