Court Opinion

ID: 9761372
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 01:41:02.410377+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:23.215622
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Mr. Chief Justice Bell:
Is the Act of June 15, 1965,* which amends §1861, of the Act of March 10, 1949,** known as the “Public School Code of 1949,” Constitutional under both the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of Pennsylvania? Each of the present actions sought to prohibit the defendant school district’s expenditure of public funds for the purpose of furnishing free transportation to pupils attending Catholic and other nonprofit sectarian schools, as authorized by the aforesaid amending Act of 1965.
Prior to the aforesaid 1965 amendment to the Public School Code, §1361 of the Public School Code provided only that “the Board of School Directors in any school district may, out of the funds of the district, provide for the free transportation of any resident pupil to and from the public schools***. . .”
The Act of 1965 pertinently provides: “The General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania hereby enacts as follows: Section 1. Section 1361, act of March 10, 1949 (P. L. 30), known as the ‘Public School Code of 1949,’ is amended to read:
“Section 1361. When provided
“The board of school directors in any school district may, out of the funds of the district, provide for the *236free transportation* of any resident pupil to and from the public schools and to and from any points in the Commonwealth in order to provide tours for any purpose connected with the educational pursuits of the pupils. When provision is made by a board of school directors for the transportation of resident pupils to and from the public schools, the board of school directors shall also make provision for the free transportation** of pupils who regularly attend nonpublic elementary and high schools not operated for profit. Such transportation provided for pupils attending nonpublic elementary and high schools not operated for profit shall be over established public school bus routes. Such pupils shall be transported to and from the point or points on such routes nearest or most convenient to the school which such pupils attend. . .”
In the Amendatory Act of 1965 the Legislature in the clearest language directed boards of school directors (in any school districts in this Commonwealth) to use (under certain circumstances) public funds for the free transportation of pupils who regularly attend nonpublic elementary and high schools which are not operated for profit*** whenever provision is made by such a board for the transportation of resident pupils to and from the public schools.
The essential averments in the complaints before us are that pursuant to the Amending Act, a school dis*237trict has agreed to supply, or has appropriated tax money for the purpose of supplying, free transportation to pupils attending nonprofit schools outside the public school system. In the Worrell (Delaware County) action it is averred that such transportation will be supplied to pupils attending “sectarian” schools. In the Rhoades (Montgomery County) case, plaintiffs particularize. They aver that in the Abington Township School District there are five nonprofit schools owned and operated by the Roman Catholic Church, that these schools are sectarian and are parts of an independent school system maintained by such Church for the teaching and propagation of its particular faith, and that the furnishing of transportation to parochial school children is a necessary function in the operation of such schools.
Plaintiffs contend that the furnishing of free transportation by school districts to children attending sectarian schools constitutes a use of public funds to or is clearly for the benefit of sectarian schools and therefore violates (1) the First Amendment to the Federal Constitution and also (2) (a) Article I, §3, and (b) Article III, §18, and (c) Article X, §2, of the Constitution of Pennsylvania. They further contend that the alleged purpose of the Act, viz., protection of the health, safety and welfare* of children attending sec*238tarian and nonprivate schools, is unjustly discriminatory and is merely a sham and a subterfuge for financial aid to sectarian schools. For example, so far as health and safety are concerned, (1) young children attending private schools are unprovided for, and (2) young children attending public schools and sectarian schools (a) who do not live near an established bus route or (b) who live within a mile and a half of the public or sectarian school they attend, are unprovided for, and (3) young children who have to cross hazardous city streets near their school in a large city are unprotected and unprovided for.
The principal defense raised by the school districts and also by the Commonwealth is that the “sole purpose and effect” of the 1965 Amendatory Act is to promote the safety, health and welfare of children attending nonpublic, nonprofit schools in the same manner as the safety, health and welfare of children presently attending public schools are promoted, and a similar protection for children attending private schools is unnecessary and irrelevant.
The Commonwealth further contends that the fact that the Act is part of the Public School Code is of no significance, and the public policy of the Commonwealth has utilized the Public School Code and funds *239of the school districts as the particular instrument and means for carrying on a wide variety of welfare, health and safety activities some of which have no realistic connection to the support of public schools.
Nearly all of the important facts and factors are agreed upon; the parties differ widely and vigorously upon (1) inferences and conclusions deduced or drawn from the facts, and (2) the correct meaning and interpretation of the pertinent provisions of the Federal and State Constitutions, and (3) the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Does the Act Violate the Federal Constitution?
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; Zo*240rack 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 ease 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 edu*241cation to make contracts for the transportation of children to and from schools other than private schools operated for profit. A hoard 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 legisla*242tion 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 ease 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.
*243In 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 Unconstitutional 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. Mary*244land, 366 U.S., supra, and in Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra. In McCowan 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 unconstitutional 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 *245Bible 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 *246of 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 fo 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.”
*247To 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.
Does the Amendatory Act of 1965 Violate the Constitution of Pennsylvania?
Plaintiffs contend that the 1965 Amendatory Act violates Article I, §3, and Article III, §§7 and 18, and Article X, §2, of the Constitution of Pennsylvania.
The principle is well settled in Pennsylvania that an Act will be declared unconstitutional only if it “clearly, palpably and plainly” violates the Constitution : Milk Control Commission v. Battista, 413 Pa. 652, 659, 198 A. 2d 840; Daly v. Hemphill, 411 Pa. 263, 271, 191 A. 2d 835; Dauphin Deposit Trust Co. v. Myers, 388 Pa. 444, 450, 130 A. 2d 686, and Evans v. W. Norriton Twp. Mun. Auth., 370 Pa. 150, 158, 87 A. 2d 474.
For many years, Collins v. Kephart, 271 Pa. 428, 117 Atl. 440, was considered the leading case in this field. In Collins v. Kephart, a bill in equity for an injunction was brought in five separate taxpayers’ suits. The Court declared Unconstitutional an appropriation to the Passavant Hospital of Pittsburgh and to St. Timothy’s Memorial Hospital and to the Duquesne University of the Holy Ghost and to the Dubois Hospital Association and to the Jewish Hospital Association of Philadelphia. Each of these hospitals was a very worthy charity. Each contended that it was not a denominational or sectarian institution. Each of the hospitals admitted persons without regard to their religious faith and had nonsectarian directors and boards composed of *248various denominations to conduct the hospitals and to take part in its management, and each proclaimed that it was not a sectarian or denominational institution. The Court held (a) that Article III, §18,* forbids State aid to all institutions affiliated with a particular religious sect or denomination, or which are under the control, domination or governing influence of any religious sect or denomination, and therefore, (b) the appropriations, even though they had been made without question or complaint for a period of 40 years, were f/uconstitutional. Chief Justice Moschziskeb, speaking for a unanimous Court said (pages 434-435) : . . long persistence in a breach of the Constitution neither warrants the course pursued nor gives it legality: Kucker v. Sunlight, etc., Oil Co., 230 Pa. 528, 533.
“It is quite apparent that the creation of the so-called local board represents simply an effort to make the Passavant Hospital appear as though it were not a denominational institution, and thus enable it to obtain state aid; but that which cannot be done directly the law will not permit to be accomplished by indirection, for such a course, when tolerated by the courts, only serves to bring the law into contempt. The appropriation under attack, having in fact been made to a sectarian and denominational institution, cannot stand in law.” (Pages 436-437)
“. . . While all persons, without distinction of race, color or religion, are admitted to defendant hospital, yet there can be no doubt that it is a sectarian institution within the meaning of that term as used in the Constitution; therefore the appropriation to it fails in law.” (Page 437)
“We cannot but see that the arrangement before us is nothing more nor less than a plan to evade the Con*249stitution. No doubt the plan was honestly conceived, in the belief that it was permissible and would prove effective; but this makes it none the less a legal subterfuge. The pruning knife of the law elminates all such devices, and lays bare the realities of the situation, with which we must deal; these show the hospital named in the appropriation act to be under the control of a well known, much respected, religious order, and the state’s money cannot be permitted to go through the agency of the hospital association to this sectarian institution, since it falls within the class to which that character of recognition is forbidden by the Constitution.” (Pages 439-440)
“. . . Those who adopted the restriction against appropriating money to sectarian institutions must change the rule, if desired, either through an amendment to the present Constitution or by making a new one; neither the legislature, acting alone, nor the courts have power so to do.” (Page 441)
“The history of the development of social and political life in America shows a set purpose to divorce, absolutely, church and state: and this is the real underlying explanation of provisions like the one now before us, which appear, in one form or another, in the constitutions of many American commonwealths. The intent of these provisions was, and therefore still is, to forbid the state from giving, either directly or indirectly, any recognition to a religious sect or denomination, even in the fields of public charily and education-, they in effect provide that, to serve charitable, educational or benevolent purposes, the money of the people shall not be put under denominational control or into sectarian hands, for administration or distribution, no matter how worthy the end in view.” (Page 432)
In other words, the Court held that the language, meaning and intent of this provision of the Constitu*250tion was clear and plain, and no worthy objective would be allowed to circumvent or distort it or to give tawpayers’ money directly or indirectly by evasion or circumvention or subterfuge to or for the benefit of a sectarian church, hospital or charitable institution, body, group, sect or denomination, even for very benevolent or important educational purposes.
Collins v. Kephart has been cited several times with approval, and has never been overruled or distinguished.
In Constitutional Defense League v. Waters, 308 Pa. 150, 162 Atl. 216, which arose by a taxpayer’s bill in equity seeking injunctive relief, this Court in a unanimous Opinion held that a charitable appropriation by the Legislature to a sectarian hospital was Unconstitutional because it violated Article III, §18, of the Constitution of Pennsylvania. The Court quoted with approval excerpts from Collins v. Kephart, 271 Pa., supra. The case is well summarized in the following paragraph of the syllabus: “Article III, section 18, of our state Constitution, forbids state aid to institutions affiliated with a particular religious sect or denomination, or which are under the control, domination or governing influence of any religious sect or denomination.”
In spite of the Collins and Constitutional Defense League v. Waters cases, supra, and Snyder v. Newtown, 147 Conn. 374, 161 A. 2d 770,* the Commonwealth con*251tends that the recent case of Schade v. Allegheny County Inst. Dist., 386 Pa. 507, 126 A. 2d 911, sustains the constitutionality of the Amendatory Act of 1965. Schade is clearly distinguishable on its facts. That case correctly decided that payments by an institution district, or by any State Agency for the support, care and maintenance of delinquent, neglected or dependent children placed by the Juvenile Court in sectarian or denominational homes and institutions do not violate Article III, §18, of the Pennsylvania Constitution nor the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court pertinently said (pages 510-512) : “It was the plaintiffs’ contention below, which the appellant renews here, that the payments made by the Institution District to the named denominational and sectarian institutions for the board, care and maintenance of dependent and neglected children committed thereto by the Juvenile Court of Allegheny County violated Article III, Section 18 of the Pennsylvania Constitution which provides that ‘No appropriations shall be made for charitable, educational or benevolent purposes to amy person or community nor to any denominational and sectarian institution, corporation or association.’ The appellant also contends that such payments violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Federal Constitution by effecting a deprivation of the liberty guaranteed by the First Amendment through the prohibition respecting ‘an establishment of religion.’ This question was not raised in the court below and got into the case solely by being dealt with by the dissenting chancellor upon the entry of the final decree by the court en banc.
“The opinion for the court [below] is based principally on the conclusion that the inhibition of Article III, Section 18 of the Constitution is directed solely *252against appropriations of State funds by the legislature and does not apply to a governmental agency such as an Institution District. With that, we are unable to agree. ... It would be strange, indeed, if the legislature by creating a body politic or corporate to exercise a legislative function could do indirectly what it may not do directly. It seems too plain for cavil that, if a mere creature of the legislature can do what the legislature itself is constitutionally prohibited from doing, the carefully designed prohibition of Section 18 of Article III could readily be rendered useless. Such a result is not to be sanctioned: Collins v. Kephart, 271 Pa. 428, 439, 117 A. 440.
“We, therefore, choose to bottom our decision on the ground that payments made by the Institution District for the support and maintenance of neglected or dependent children, who are under the jurisdiction and control of the Juvenile Court, are not appropriations* within the meaning of that term as employed in Section 18 of Article III. . . .
“ ‘The cost of the maintenance of neglected children either by the State or the County is neither a charity nor a benevolence, but a governmental duty [irrespective of the religion of a neglected child]. All the plaintiffs proved was that the monies received by the defendant institutions were in partial reimbursement for the cost of room and board of such minors** .... A considerable part of this money is recouped by the Juvenile Court from the parents of these minor wards. The balance of the funds so expended are, in legal effect, payments to the child,—not the institution sup*253porting and maintaining him or her. [See Cochran v. Board of Education, 281 U.S. 370, 374-375]***----”
The Court then added by way of dictum (pages 512-513) : “The appellant’s further contention that such payments by the Institution District are in violation of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is equally unmeritorious. Inasmuch as this point was not raised in the court below nor there passed upon by the majority, we are not required to consider it here: Sherwood v. Elgart, 383 Pa. 110, 115, 117 A. 2d 899. We shall, however, point out the fallacy of the appellant’s argument.
“As it has been held that the concept of liberty, as used in the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, secures to the individual as against state action the same rights as are guaranteed against congressional action by the First Amendment (Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296, 303; Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105, 108; Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1, 15; and McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S. 203, 211), the appellant argues that the Institution District’s payments to the denominational or sectarian defendants tend toward governmental ‘establishment of religion’ and, consequently, are violative of the Fourteenth Amendment. . . . The Supreme Court has, in principle, settled it adversely to the appellant’s position. See Everson v. Board of Education, supra, where it was held that a State’s use of public taw funds for the transportation of pupils to and from sectarian *254schools did not serve to promote the establishment of religion.”
We approve the decision in Schade, bnt not that part of its language which conflicts with and is irreconcilable with the Court’s decision in Collins v. Kephart, 271 Pa., supra, which it cites with approval.
Furthermore, we must consider not only Article III, §18, but also Article III, §7, and Article X, §§7 and 2, of our Constitution, which were not involved or discussed in the Schade case. All of these Articles must be considered together in discussing and determining the issues in this case, i.e., whether the Amendatory Act of 1965, which amends the Public School Code, violates these or any other provisions of the Constitution of Pennsylvania.
Article III, §7, of the Constitution of Pennsylvania prohibits the General Assembly from passing any local or special law “regulating the affairs of . . . school districts, [or] granting to any . . . individual any special or exclusive privilege. . . .”
Article X, §1, provides: “The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public schools, wherein all the children of this Commonwealth above the age of six years may be educated, . . .”
Article X, §2, provides as follows:
“Section 2. No money raised for the support of the public schools of the Commonwealth shall be appropriated to or used for the support of any sectarian school.”
It will be instantly observed that the language of the Pennsylvania Constitution differs greatly from the pertinent language of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, which pertinently merely prohibits any “law respecting an establishment of religion.” The Constitution of Pennsylvania clearly and expressly mandates a public school system for *255Pennsylvania school children, and (a) clearly and expressly prohibits appropriations to or use of public money for the support of any sectarian school and (b) in Article III, §18, provides: “No appropriation shall be made for charitable, educational or benevolent purposes to any person or community nor to any denominational or sectarian institution. * Considering all the aforesaid Articles together, as of course we should, it is crystal clear that no money raised by the Commonwealth or by any of its agencies or by any governmental institution can be used for the support of any sectarian school, or used to grant any special privilege to the children who attend it, no matter how worthy and benevolent that sectarian school or institution is, and no matter how beneficial these grants to the children or their parents would be.
The raising of money by taxes or by borrowing or the expenditure of public funds to provide transportation not for all school children in Pennsylvania but only for children who attend public or sectarian schools which are not operated for profit, clearly violates the spirit, the meaning and the intent of the aforesaid provisions of the Pennsylvania Constitution, and, we believe, the language thereof. These Constitutional provisions are of such tremendous importance to all the people of Pennsylvania that no circumvention, dilution or distortion should be allowed to evade or nullify or make a mockery of them. The 1965 Amendatory Act undoubtedly benefits healthwise and safetywise a restricted class of school children, as well as sectarian schools. If it is both reasonable and necessary to protect the safety and health of public school children and sectarian school children by the State’s use of public or *256institutional tax funds for their transportation to school, how can it be reasonable and legal and Constitutional, and not arbitrary and discriminatory, to exclude private school children from the benefits of these health and safety measures?*
The title of the 1965 Act states that its purpose is to provide “for the health, welfare and safety of the children of the Commonwealth”, and yet in the very same breath excludes those children who attend schools which are operated for profit. The fact that the so-called School Busing law or its 1965 amendment does not provide for the transportation of all school children, regardless of the kind of school they attend, demonstrates that the real “purpose and the primary effect” of the Act of 1965 was to benefit and protect the health and safety of only sectarian school children (as well as, indirectly, their schools), rather than to provide for and protect the health and safety of all the school children of Pennsylvania.
To express it in other words, if this 1965 Act is, as its proponents contend, really for the protection of the health and safety—«oí of all school children but only— of sectarian school children, by providing public funds for the protection of the health and safety of this special class of school children, i.e., parochial or sectarian school children, then it is unreasonable, arbitrary and *257invidiously, discriminatory, and such an obviously patent device to circumvent and nullify the Constitution as to be clearly and beyond any doubt Unconstitutional.
Legislative Classification
We may add that there is another barrier which the majority does not even discuss. Legislative classifications are permitted in Pennsylvania and are Constitutional, provided they are not unreasonable and arbitrary and have a reasonable basis for the distinctions and classifications they make. We all agree that the wisdom or lack of wisdom of an Act is a matter for the Legislature and not for the Courts, and that classifications and distinctions will be sustained provided they are “reasonable and founded upon a genuine distinction.”
The law is well expressed in Kurtz v. Pittsburgh, 346 Pa. 362, 31 A. 2d 257, where the Court held unconstitutional, as being in plain contravention of Article III, §7, the Act of June 7, 1917, as amended. That Act provided for the payment to dependent wives of public employees in the armed forces of the United States of a specified portion of their salary. In a lengthy 24-page Opinion, the Court analyzed and reviewed many of the cases involving the question of a violation of Article III, §7, of the Pennsylvania Constitution,* and pertinently said (pp. 367, 368, 369) : “Class legislation has frequently been declared void by this Court, and what is** class legislation has been defined and illustrated in a long line of decisions. In Penna. Co. for Insurances on Lives and Granting Annuities et al., Ap*258pellants, v. Scott, Prothonotary et al., 329 Pa. 534, 198 A. 115, this Court in an Opinion by Mr. Justice Linn quoted what was said in Laplacca et ux. v. Phila. Rapid Transit Co., 265 Pa. 304, 108 A. 612, as follows: ‘The basis for classification must be reasonable and proper and founded upon a real, and not merely artificial, distinction between the members of the class and the general public, and based upon “a necessity springing from manifest peculiarities, clearly distinguishing those of one class from each of the other classes, and imperatively demanding legislation for each class, separately, that would be useless and detrimental to the others” ’.
. . In Ayars’ Appeal, 122 Pa. 266, 16 A. 356, Justice Sterrett said: ‘The underlying principle of all the cases is that classification ... is essentially unconstitutional, unless a necessity therefor exists [a necessity springing from manifest peculiarities, clearly distinguishing those of one class from each of the other classes and imperatively demanding legislation for each class separately, that would be useless and detrimental to the others] . . .’ This principle was applied in Commonwealth ex rel. Brown v. Gumbert et al., 256 Pa. 531 [534], 100 A. 990. Although the legislation under attack there was ‘humanitarian’, we said that a ‘positive constitutional requirement’ cannot be disregarded because of an act’s ‘beneficent aim.’
“. . . arbitrary selection can never be justified by calling it classification. . .”
See also Davis v. Sulcowe, 81 Dauphin 72 (1963), wherein it was held that there was no basis for distinguishing between nonprofit nursing homes and proprietary nursing homes for minimum wage requirement purposes.
Because the 1965 Amendatory Act has such an important and beneficial purpose and objective, it is with great regret that I feel I must dissent and hold that the Amendatory Act of 1965, with its arbitrary and un*259reasonable distinctions and classifications—wbicb do not imperatively demand safety and health protection for sectarian school children which would be useless and detrimental to private school children—is clearly and plainly unconstitutional.

 Act No. 91, P. L. 133, 24 P.S. §13-1361.

 P. L. 30, 24 P.S. §13-1361.

 Italics throughout, ours, except where underlinings appear in a statute.

 by school conveyances, private conveyances or electric railways or other common carriers. Section 1362.

 See also, “Section 2. The amendments made by this act shall not be so construed as to limit or reduce in any way the payments now made by the Commonwealth to various school districts to help defray the cost of transporting pupils and the additional costs incurred by the boards of school directors in furnishing transportation under said amendments shall be included in the amounts for which reimbursement may be received from the Commonwealth as now provided by law.”

 with provisions and limitations not here pertinent.

 The Pennsylvania Secretary of Public Welfare, Mr. Arlin M. Adams, testifying at the public hearings before the Senate Education Committee, said: “. . . school bus transportation clearly involves the safety and health of our children. The busing of school children is for their protection against hazards of the roadways and of traffic, against dangers occasioned by exposure to weather, against evils of child molestation. In 1963, there were 2.3 deaths per 100,000,000 miles, in cars, as compared with .2 death, per 100,-000,000 miles, in school buses. With respect to injuries, a person is five times as safe in a school bus as in a car. With respect to death, a person is ten times as safe in a school bus as in a car.” However, strange to say, the Act did not require transportation *238by a bus, although all the parties in their briefs discuss the issues on the basis that the transportation will be by busing. Moreover-, neither Mr. Adams’ testimony upon which the majority Opinion relies, nor the State of the Commonwealth Message delivered by the Governor of Pennsylvania (William W. Scranton) to the General Assembly, January 5, 1965, which recommended legislation to provide free bus transportation for children attending public and nonpublic schools in order to protect the health and safety of such children, upon which the Commonwealth and other parties rely, is admissible. Bowers v. Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board, 402 Pa. 542, 557-558, 167 A. 2d 480; Henderson Estate, 395 Pa. 215, 224, 149 A. 2d 892; National Transit Co. v. Boardman, 328 Pa. 450, 454, 197 Atl. 239.

 Mr. Justice Bbennan, in a concurring Opinion, in Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S., supra, said (pages 230, 231, 245) : “The Court’s historic duty to expound the meaning of the Constitution has encountered few issues more intricate [or more filled with emotion'] or more demanding than that of the relationship between religion and the public schools. . . The fact is that the line which separates the secular from the sectarian in American life is elusive. The difficulty of defining the boundary with precision inheres in a paradox central to our scheme of liberty. . . . The case [U.S. v. Ballard, 322 U.S. 78, 95] shows how elusive is the Une which enforces the Amendment’s injunction of strict neutrality, while manifesting no official hostility toward religion. . .”

 Mr. Justice Rutledge filed a lengthy dissenting Opinion in which three other Justices joined. Furthermore, Mr. Justice Douglas expressly stated in Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, that after further thoughtful consideration he believed he and the rest of the majority in Everson were mistaken in their Opinion in that case.

 Tlie Court reviewed (a) the evils, the struggles and persecutions which had been going on abroad for centuries and from time to time in the Colonies between various religions, and religious faiths; and (b) the belief and reliance of our Colonists in God; and (c) the historical debates which induced the adoption of the First Amendment.

 I agree with the Court’s decision, but it is this writer’s opinion, which the dissenting Justices of the Supreme Court clearly emphasize in Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S., supra, that some of the analogies employed by the majority of the Supreme Court to support its opinion are neither relevant nor convincing.

The Court on page 437 referred to tlie long and intensive struggle for religious freedom in America as set forth, in the Opinions in Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S., supra, and the historical position of Sunday closing laws as set forth in the same ease.

 We may add that every daily session of the State Supreme Court and of every State Court in Pennsylvania is opened with a very brief ceremony which ends with the words “God save the Commonwealth and this Honorable Court.” President Washington, President Lincoln, President Cleveland, President Wilson, President Roosevelt, President Eisenhower, President Kennedy, and nearly every President of the United States, have invoked in one or many of their speeches the aid of God. One of the lines of the Star-Spangled Banner is, “Then conquer we must when our cause it is just, and this be our motto ‘In God Is Our Trust.’ ” Since 1865, the words “In God We Trust” have been impressed on our coins and imprinted on our paper money. The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag contains the words “One Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

 Notwithstanding these and even stronger religious sentiments expressed by the majority in the Everson case, I believe—as do the dissenting justices in that case—that what the Supreme Court avows about our religious beliefs and liberties, its conclusions and decisions too often disavow.

 Quoted hereinafter.

 In the Snyder case, the highest Court in Connecticut held that a statute which authorized the town to transport at public expense children to non-profit private schools did not violate the Federal or the State Constitutional provisions respecting establishment of religion, but that insofar as it purported to make available for the transportation of pupils attending non-profit private schools money derived from school funds, it was unconstitutional under the State Constitution, in that the money had been inviolably appropriated to the support and encouragement of public or common schools. On appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States, 365 U.S. 299, *251tbe Court banded down tbe following Opinion “Per Curiam”: “Tbe motion to dismiss is granted and tbe appeal is dismissed for want of a substantial Federal question.”

 It must ba remembered that appropriations can be made only from revenue obtained from taxes or borrowing.

 Moreover, it is a matter of common knowledge that places for the commitment of neglected children are both insufficient in number and in many ways inadequate.

 In Ooohran, the Court held that an appropriation by the State of money derived from taxation to the supplying of school books free for school children is not objectionable under the Fourteenth Amendment as a taking of private property for private purposes where the books furnished for private schools are not granted to the schools themselves but only to or for the use of the children, and are the same as those furnished for public schools and private schools aUke, and are not religious or sectarian in character.

 With certain provisions, grants and exceptions not here pertinent.

 We further note that under §1362 of the Public School Code, free transportation of resident pupils of public and sectarian schools may be provided out of the funds of the school district, but such transportation (1) shall be over established public school bus routes and not nearer a school than a mile and a half, and (2) may be furnished by using either school conveyances, private conveyances, or electric railways or other common carriers. What happens or may happen to the safety and health of all those school children (1) (a) who live far from an established bus route station, or (b) within a mile and a half of the public or sectarian school they attend; and (2) those children who attend a private school?

 For a more recent analysis and review of many decisions of this Court and of the Supreme Court of the United States, see the dissenting Opinion in Bargain City U.S.A. v. Dilworth, 407 Pa. 135-142.

 Italics in Kurtz Opinion.