Opinion ID: 2823788
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Americans United Is Distinguishable

Text: Â¶34Â Â Â Â Â Â Â In Americans United, we upheld a grant program that awarded public money to college students who attended religious universities, provided those universities were not âpervasively sectarian.â 648 P.2d at 1074â75. Respondents assert that the present case is âno differentâ from Americans United, meaning that we must uphold the CSP. Our analysis reveals, however, that the grant program in Americans United diverges from the CSP in numerous critical ways. As such, the outcome of that case is not dispositive ofâand indeed has minimal bearing onâthe present dispute. Â¶35Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Americans United revolved around the Colorado Student Incentive Grant Program (âthe grant programâ), a scholarship for in-state college students. Id. at 1074. The grant program allowed eligible universities to recommend particular students deserving of scholarships to the Colorado Commission of Higher Education, which in turn administered the grants. Id. at 1075. The Commission awarded the grant money to the university, which then reduced the studentâs tuition by the amount of the grant. See id. at 1081 (âThe educational institution serves essentially as a conduit for creditingÂ the funds to the studentâs account.â). Although the grant program embraced most colleges and universities, it excluded institutions that were âpervasively sectarian,â and it defined six eligibility criteria that schools needed to meet in order not to be branded pervasively sectarian. Id. at 1075. We deemed the grant program to be constitutional, id. at 1074, and Respondents thus contend that we must now reach the same result with the CSP. Â¶36Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Respondentsâ reasoning is flawed. Admittedly, the grant program and the CSP share certain core features; both award public money to students attending religious schools, and both are primarily designed to aid students rather than institutions. But closer scrutiny reveals a crippling defect in Respondentsâ argument: The rationales animating our holding in Americans United are inapplicable to this case. That is, in determining that the grant program complied with section 7, we cited several crucial factors. Id. at 1083â84. Those factors are absent here. Â¶37Â Â Â Â Â Â Â First, we noted in Americans United that the grant program was âdesigned to assist the student, not the institution.â Id. at 1083. Facially, that is true of the CSP as well. Yet in Americans United, we tethered this observation to the fact that grant recipients could not attend âpervasively sectarianâ institutions, noting that this exclusion âobviates any real possibility that the aid itself might somehow flow indirectly to an institution whose educational function is not clearly separable from its religious mission.â Id. at 1081 (emphasis added). Here, that possibility is very real. The CSP places no limitations on the extent to which religion infuses a Private SchoolÂ Partner, 18 and it in fact affirmatively authorizes partnering schools to make âenrollment decisions based upon religious beliefs.â Therefore, it is entirely plausible that the CSP gives aid to schools âwhose educational function is not clearly separable from [their] religious mission.â See Americans United, 648 P.2d at 1081. Â¶38Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Second, the grant program only awarded scholarships to students of higher education. Id. at 1084. Recognizing that âas a general rule religious indoctrination is not a substantial purpose of sectarian colleges and universities,â we concluded that âthere is less risk of religion intruding into the secular educational function of the institution than there is at the level of parochial elementary and secondary education.â Id. Obviously, this rationale of diminished risk cannot apply to the CSP, which covers not collegiate pupils but elementary and secondary school students. 19 Â¶39Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Third, the grant program aided students who attended both public and private universities. We deemed this to be of critical importance, noting that studentsâ opportunity to attend public schools âdispell[ed] any notion that the aid is calculated toÂ enhance the ideological ends of the sectarian institution.â Id. Once again, this is not true of the CSP, which only bestows scholarships to students attending private schools. Â¶40Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Fourth, the grant program explicitly provided that âno institution shall decrease the amount of its own funds spent for student aid below the amount spent prior to participation in the program.â Id. We recognized that this formal prohibition âcreate[d] a disincentive for an institution to use grant funds other than for the purpose intendedâthe secular educational needs of the student.â Id. As discussed, supra Â¶ 30, the CSP lacks this significant safeguard, and in fact one religious Private School Partner did reduce a studentâs financial aid in the amount of the studentâs scholarship. Â¶41Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Finally, in order to be eligible for the grant program, a universityâs governing board could not âreflectâ a particular religion, nor could its membership be âlimited to persons of any particular religion.â Americans United, 648 P.2d at 1075. We noted that this restriction âmilitate[d] against the type of ideological control over the secular educational functionâ that section 7 forbids, particularly because it ârequire[d] a strong commitment to academic freedom by an essentially independent governing board with no sectarian bent in the curriculum tending to indoctrinate or proselytize.â Id. at 1084. Because the CSP willingly partners with private schools that reflect a particular religion, this rationale from Americans United is wholly inapplicable here. Â¶42Â Â Â Â Â Â Â All told, although the grant program and the CSP feature surface similarities, they are two highly distinct scholarship programs. Therefore, because our analysis in Americans United relied heavily on elements of the grant program that are missingÂ from the CSP, that analysis is of minimal relevance in our quest to determine the CSPâs constitutionality. Â¶43Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Accordingly, we reject Respondentsâ argument that Americans United requires us to uphold the CSP. Having done so, we now turn to Respondentsâ assertion that invalidating the CSP in fact violates the First Amendment.