Opinion ID: 2375317
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Heading: Does the Act Violate the Federal Constitution?

Text: We start with the fundamental proposition that every Act is presumed to be both valid and Constitutional. United States v. National Dairy Corporation, 372 U.S. 29, 32; Madden v. Kentucky, 309 U.S. 83, 88; Highland v. Russell Car and Snow Plow Co., 279 U.S. 253, 262; Home Telephone Co. v. Los Angeles, 211 U.S. 265, 281; Sweet v. Rechel, 159 U.S. 380. Cf. also Goldblatt v. Hempstead, 369 U.S. 590, 595-596; United States v. Carolene Products Co., 304 U.S. 144, 152-154. The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States pertinently provides: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; . . . Although this clause in the First Amendment clearly constitutes a religious restraint only on Congress, recent decisions of the Supreme Court hold that the Fourteenth Amendment has made the First Amendment a restraint upon the States as well as upon Congress. School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, and cases cited therein; Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105, 108; Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1; Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S. 203, 210-211; Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U.S. 306; McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U.S. 420; Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488; and Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421. The short 15-word Establishment and Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment has generated many different and widely divergent views. To state the law in broad terms and generalities is easy, to particularize and to apply it is often difficult. Because of the great change in the life and habits and thoughts of the American people, and indeed of education itself, from the days of our Framing Fathers, and because the questions and issues are often very close and overlapping or conflicting and at times filled with emotion, the net result has been the drawing of a line which is often thin and shadowy or elusive [] between the Constitutionally permissible and the Constitutionally impermissible. So far as the Establishment Clause is concerned, I believe the present cases are ruled by the leading case of Everson v. Board of Education , 330 U.S., [] supra, where the facts and issues are strikingly similar. A New Jersey statute authorized district boards of education to make contracts for the transportation of children to and from schools other than private schools operated for profit. A board of education by resolution authorized the reimbursement of parents for fares paid for the transportation by public carrier of children attending public and Catholic schools. The Catholic schools operated under the superintendency of a Catholic priest and, in addition to secular education, gave religious instruction in the Catholic Faith. A district taxpayer challenged the validity under the Federal Constitution of the statute and resolution, so far as they authorized reimbursement to parents for the transportation of children attending sectarian schools. Without deciding whether the exclusion of reimbursement to parents of children attending private schools operated for profit constituted a denial of the equal protection of the law, the Supreme Court sustained the Constitutionality of the Act and held: 1. The expenditure of tax-raised funds thus authorized was for a public purpose, and did not violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; and 2. The statute and resolution did not violate the provision of the First Amendment which was made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment, prohibiting any law respecting an establishment of religion. [] The Court, in Everson v. Board of Education , 330 U.S., pertinently said (pages 14, 16, 17): Their decisions, [the decisions of the State Courts] however, show the difficulty in drawing the line between tax legislation which provides funds for the welfare of the general public and that which is designed to support institutions which teach religion. . . . New Jersey cannot consistently with the `establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment contribute tax-raised funds to the support of an institution which teaches the tenets and faith of any church. On the other hand, other language of the amendment commands that New Jersey cannot hamper its citizens in the free exercise of their own religion. Consequently, it cannot exclude individual Catholics, Lutherans, Mohammedans, Baptists, Jews, Methodists, Non-believers, Presbyterians, or the members of any other faith, because of their faith, or lack of it, from receiving the benefits of public welfare legislation. . . Measured by these standards, we cannot say that the First Amendment prohibits New Jersey from spending tax-raised funds to pay the bus fares of parochial school pupils as a part of a general program under which it pays the fares of pupils attending public and other schools.  Plaintiffs present plausible arguments to support their contentions of unconstitutionality and argue, inter alia, (1) that Everson, 330 U.S., supra, is no longer the law because three of the five majority Justices in that case have died and another one has changed his views, [] and (2) subsequent decisions of the Supreme Court have abandoned or changed some of the reasoning or statements upon which the majority relied in that case. See and compare, Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra; McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U.S. 420; Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 442; Sherbert v. Verner, 374 U.S. 398, 410. In order to determine the contentions and the issues raised by the parties, we shall briefly analyze and review the subsequent cases which have been relied upon by one or more of the parties. The Supreme Court in Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S. 203, struck down as violative of the First Amendment the teaching of religion in public school buildings by outside teachers supplied by various denominations under a released time for children arrangement between them and the Board of Education. Under this arrangement, the Board released the public school children for limited periods and allowed the use of its school buildings for the teaching of various denominational beliefs by outside religious teachers. On the other hand the Supreme Court in Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U.S. 306, held Constitutional a released time program for the religious education of public school children off the premises of such schools, in which for brief periods the schools released children whose parents desired them to receive denominational education in their own Churches and Sunday Schools. In Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 422, the Supreme Court declared Un constitutional a directive by the Board of Education to cause the following prayer to be said aloud by each class in the presence of a teacher at the beginning of each school day, although no student was compelled to attend or to join in the prayer over his or his parents' objection: Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our Country. This decision to me is incomprehensible. Cf. also, Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S., supra. On the other hand, Everson v. Board of Education has been followed and affirmed in McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U.S., supra, and in Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra. In McGowan v. Maryland, supra, where a divided Court in Opinions covering 162 pages analyzed and reviewed prior decisions and after quoting with approval (on pages 443-444) Everson v. Board of Education , held Constitutional a Maryland law which generally prohibited the sale on Sunday of all merchandise, although it contained many specific exceptions and limited the act to retailers in one county. The Court held, inter alia, that the purpose and effect of the statute was for the public welfare, i.e., not to aid religion, but to set aside a day of rest and recreation [] for the public at large. In Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra, the Court said (pages 205-222): Once again we are called upon to consider the scope of the provision of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution which declares that `Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. . . .' These companion cases present the issues in the context of state action requiring that schools begin each day with readings from the Bible. While raising the basic questions under slightly different factual situations, the cases permit of joint treatment. In light of the history of the First Amendment and of our cases interpreting and applying its requirements, we hold that the practices at issue and the laws requiring them are un constitutional under the Establishment Clause, as applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. . . . The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania by law. . . requires that `At least ten verses from the Holy Bible shall be read, without comment, at the opening of each public school on each school day. Any child shall be excused from such Bible reading, or attending such Bible reading, upon the written request of his parent or guardian.' . . . Participation in the opening exercises, as directed by the statute is voluntary. . . . It is true that religion has been closely identified with our history and government. As we said in Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 434 (1962), `The history of man is inseparable from the history of religion. . . .' The fact that the Founding Fathers believed devotedly that there was a God and that the unalienable rights of man were rooted in Him is clearly evidenced in their writings, from the Mayflower Compact to the Constitution itself. This background is evidenced today in our public life through the continuance in our oaths of office from the Presidency to the Alderman of the final supplication, `So help me God.' Likewise each House of the Congress provides through its Chaplain an opening prayer, and the sessions of this Court are declared open by the crier in a short ceremony, the final phrase of which invokes the grace of God. [] Again, there are such manifestations in our military forces, where those of our citizens who are under the restrictions of military service wish to engage in voluntary worship. Indeed, only last year an official survey of the country indicated that 64% of our people have church membership, Bureau of Census, U.S. Department of Commerce, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 48 (83d ed. 1962), while less than 3% profess no religion whatever. Id., at p. 46. It can be truly said, therefore, that today, as in the beginning, our national life reflects a religious people who, in the words of Madison, are `earnestly praying, as . . . in duty bound, that the Supreme Lawgiver of the Universe . . . guide them into every measure which may be worthy of his [blessing.. . .]' [] . . . This freedom to worship was indispensable in a country whose people came from the four quarters of the earth and brought with them a diversity of religious opinion. Today authorities list 83 separate religious bodies, each with memberships exceeding 50,000, existing among our people, as well as innumerable smaller groups. . . . . . [and then, most importantly, the Court said] . . . The test may be stated as follows: what are the purpose and the primary effect of the enactment? If either is the advancement or inhibition of religion then the enactment exceeds the scope of legislative power as circumscribed by the Constitution. That is to say that to withstand the strictures of the Establishment Clause there must be secular legislative purpose and a primary effect that neither advances nor inhibits religion. Everson v. Board of Education, supra; McGowan v. Maryland, supra, at page 442. To summarize: notwithstanding the difficulty of reconciling all of the aforesaid cases, I believe that Everson v. Board of Education , 330 U.S., supra, and Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra, are still the law and require us to hold that the Amendatory Act of 1965 does not violate the First or Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.