Court Opinion

ID: 9426474
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:18:05.498941+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:01.158442
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Brennan,
with whom Mr. Justice Marshall joins, dissenting.
I agree with Judge Bryan, dissenting from the judgment under review, that the Maryland Act “in these instances does in truth offend the Constitution by its provisions of funds, in that it exposes State money for use in advancing religion, no matter the vigilance to avoid it.” 387 F. Supp. 1282, 1298 (1974) (emphasis in original). Each of the institutions is a church-affiliated or church-related body. The subsidiary findings concerning the role of religion on each of the campuses, summarized by the plurality opinion, ante, at 755-758, conclusively establish that fact. In that circumstance, I agree with Judge Bryan that “[o]f telling decisiveness here is the payment of the grants directly to the colleges unmarked in purpose. . , . Presently the Act is simply a blunderbuss discharge of public funds to a church-affiliated or church-related college.” 387 F. Supp., at 1298-1299. In other words, the Act provides for payment of general subsidies to religious institutions from public funds and I have heretofore expressed my view that “ [g] eneral subsidies of religious activities would, of course, constitute impermissible state involvement with religion.” Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U. S. 664, 690 (1970) (concurring opinion). This is because general subsidies “tend to promote that type of-interdependence between religion and state which the First Amendment was designed to prevent.” Abington School Dist. v. *771Schempp, 374 U. S. 203, 236 (1963) (Brennan, J., concurring). “What the Framers meant to foreclose, and what our decisions under the Establishment Clause have forbidden, are those involvements of religious with secular institutions which . . . serve the essentially religious activities of religious institutions.” Id., at 294-295.
The history of the bitter controversies over public subsidy of sectarian educational institutions that began soon after the Nation was formed is recited in my separate opinion in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 642 (1971) (Lemon I). My reasons for concluding in Lemon I that all three statutes there before us impermissibly provided a direct subsidy from public funds for activities carried on by sectarian educational institutions also support my agreement with Judge Bryan in this case that “an injunction should issue as prayed in the complaint, stopping future payments under the Maryland Act to the [appellee] colleges.” 387 F. Supp., at 1300. I said in Lemon I, supra, at 659-660:
“I believe that the Establishment Clause forbids . . . Government to provide funds to sectarian universities in which the propagation and advancement of a particular religion are a function or purpose of the institution. . . .
“I reach this conclusion for [these] reasons . . . : the necessarily deep involvement of government in the religious activities of such an institution through the policing of restrictions, and the fact that subsidies of tax- monies directly to a sectarian institution necessarily aid the proselytizing function of the institution. . . .
“. . . I do not believe that [direct] grants to such a sectarian institution are permissible. The reason is not that religion 'permeates’ the secular education that is provided. Rather, it is that the secular edu*772cation is provided within the environment of religion; the institution is dedicated to two goals, secular education and religious instruction. When aid flows directly to the institution, both functions benefit.” (Emphasis in original.)
The discrete interests of government and religion are mutually best served when each avoids too close a proximity to the other. “It is not only the nonbeliever who fears the injection of sectarian doctrines and controversies into the civil polity, but in as high degree it is the devout believer who fears the secularization of a creed which becomes too deeply involved with and dependent upon the government.” Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, supra, at 259 (Brennan, J., concurring). The Maryland Act requires “too close a proximity” of government to the subsidized sectarian institutions and in my view creates real dangers of the “secularization of a creed.” Ibid.; Lemon I, supra, at 649 (opinion of Brennan, J.).
Unlike Judge Bryan, 387 F. Supp., at 1300, I would also reverse the District Court’s denial of appellants’ motion that the appellee institutions be required to refund all payments made to them. I adhere to the views expressed in Mr. Justice Douglas’ dissent, which I joined, in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 411 U. S. 192, 209 (1973) (Lemon II):
“There is as much a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment whether the payment from public funds to sectarian schools involves last year, the current year, or next year. . . .
“Whether the grant is for . . . last year or at the present time, taxpayers are forced to contribute to sectarian schools a part of their tax dollars.”
I would reverse the judgment of the District Court and remand with directions to enter a new judgment per*773manently enjoining the Board of Public Works of the State of Maryland from implementing the Maryland Act, and requiring the appellee institutions to refund all payments made to them pursuant to the Act.