Court Opinion

ID: 9666168
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:06:58.92752+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:24.395160
License: Public Domain

DUNN, Chief Justice
(dissenting).
The majority opinion holds SDCL 13-34-16 and 13-34-16.1 unconstitutional under the provisions of Article VI, § 3, and Article VIII, § 16, of the South Dakota Constitution. It does not reach the *610question of whether the two statutes violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. I think a review of what the United States Supreme Court has said in this area is important, not only to determine if the loaning of texbooks to nonpublic school children by the state violates the United States Constitution but also as to whether it violates our own Constitution.
The issue of loans of textbooks to nonpublic school children first reached the United States Supreme Court in the 1930 case of Cochran v. Louisiana State Board of Education, 281 U.S. 370, 50 S.Ct. 335, 74 L.Ed. 913. The specific question there was whether a Louisiana law providing free books to nonpublic school children was a taking of public property for private purposes in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The reason the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment was not considered was that the Court had not yet applied that particular clause to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court upheld the textbook law and in doing so quoted the language of the Louisiana Supreme Court in its opinion as follows:
“ ‘The appropriations were made for the specific purpose of purchasing school books for the use of the school children of the state, free of cost to them. It was for their benefit and the resulting benefit to the state that the appropriations were made. True, these children attend some school, public or private, the latter, sectarian or nonsectarian, and that the books are to be furnished them for their use, free of cost, whichever they attend. The schools, however, are not the beneficiaries of these appropriations. They obtain nothing from them, nor are they relieved of a single obligation because of them. The school children and the state alone are the beneficiaries' ” (Emphasis supplied) 281 U.S. at 374-375, 50 S.Ct. at 335, 74 L.Ed. at 915.
This “child benefit” theory was subsequently used by the Supreme Court when it was faced with a challenge to public expenditures to parochial school children and their parents based upon the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. In Everson *611v. Board of Education, 1946, 330 U.S. 1, 67 S.Ct. 504, 91 L.Ed. 711, the challenge was to a New Jersey law which authorized school districts to reimburse parents of parochial school children the cost of transporting the children to school on public transportation. The Supreme Court, through Mr. Justice Black, held that the law did not violate the Establishment Clause, as the benefit of the law went to the school children and their parents, rather than to any religious sect or the parochial schools. The Court concluded the opinion by saying:
“The State contributes no money to the schools. It does not support them. Its legislation, as applied, does no more than provide a general program to help parents get their children, regardless of their religion, safely and expeditiously to and from accredited schools.” 330 U.S. at 18, 67 S.Ct. at 513, 91 L.Ed. at 725.
In 1968 the Supreme Court applied the “child benefit” theory to a New York law which required school districts to purchase and loan textbooks to students enrolled in parochial as well as in public and private schools. The issue was whether the law violated the mandates of the Establishment Clause. The Court held that it did not, placing prime reliance on the fact that the books went directly to the students and did not directly benefit or aid the parochial schools.
“Appellants have shown us nothing about the necessary effects of the statute that is contrary to its stated purpose. The law merely makes available to all children the benefits of a general program to lend school books free of charge. Books are furnished at the request of the pupil and ownership remains, at least technically, in the State. Thus no funds or books are furnished to parochial schools, and the financial benefit is to parents and children, not to schools. Perhaps free books make it more likely that some children choose to attend a sectarian school, but that was true of the state-paid bus fares in Everson and does not alone demonstrate an unconstitutional degree of support for a religious institution.” Board of Education v. Allen, 392 U.S. 236 at *612243-244, 88 S.Ct. 1923 at 1926-1927, 20 L.Ed.2d 1060 at 1065-1066.
The Allen case is still good law. In more recent years the Supreme Court has added other tests. These were summarized in the case of Meek v. Pittenger, 1975, 421 U.S. 349, 95 S.Ct. 1753, 44 L.Ed.2d 217.
“First, the statute must have a secular legislative purpose. E.g. Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U.S. 97, 89 S.Ct. 266, 21 L.Ed.2d 228. Second, it must have a ‘primary effect’ that neither advances nor inhibits religion. E.g. School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S.Ct. 1560, 10 L.Ed.2d 844. Third, the statute and its administration must avoid excessive government entanglement with religion. E.g. Walz v. Tax Comm n, 397 U.S. 664, 90 S.Ct. 1409, 25 L.Ed.2d 697.” 421 U.S. at 358, 95 S.Ct. at 1760, 44 L.Ed.2d at 227-228.
In Meek the Court applied the above tests to the textbook loan provisions of a Pennsylvania law. While it struck down other provisions of the law in the face of the Establishment Clause, the Court upheld loans of textbooks to parochial school children. The Court stressed that the benefits accrued to the children rather than to the schools.
“In sum, the textbook loan provisions of Act 195 are in every material respect identical to the loan program approved in Allen. Pennsylvania, like New York, ‘merely makes available to all children the benefits of a general program to lend school books free of charge.’ As such, those provisions of Act 195 do not offend the constitutional prohibition against laws ‘respecting an establishment of religion.’ ” 421 U.S. at 362, 95 S.Ct. at 1761-1762, 44 L.Ed.2d at 230.
Based upon the holdings of the Supreme Court in Allen and Meek, SDCL 13-34-16 and 13-34-16.1 comport with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitu*613tion. These two cases have been cited with approval in the very recent United States Supreme Court case of Roemer v. Board of Public Works of Maryland, 426 U.S. 736, 96 S.Ct. 2337, 49 L.Ed.2d 179, decided June 21, 1976.
The majority opinion states that the provisions of the South Dakota Constitution are more restrictive than the Establishment Clause. I do not feel that a lengthy discussion of whether the South Dakota provisions are more restrictive than the provisions of the Establishment Clause or the Pennsylvania Constitution or the Nebraska Constitution will in any way help resolve the overall question of the validity of the challenged provisions under the South Dakota Constitution. Any inquiry should be directed first to the words of the constitutional sections involved.
Article VI, § 3, states in pertinent part:
“No person shall be compelled to attend or support any ministry or place of worship against his consent nor shall any preference be given by law to any religious establishment or mode of worship. No money or property of the state shall be given or appropriated for the benefit of any sectarian or religious society or institution.”
Article VIII, § 16, states:
“No appropriation of lands, money or other property or credits to aid any sectarian school shall ever be made by the state, or any county or municipality within the state, nor shall the state or any county or municipality within the state accept any grant, conveyance, gift or bequest of lands, money or other property to be used for sectarian purposes, and no sectarian instruction shall be allowed in any school or institution aided or supported by the state.”
It is my feeling that this case revolves around the key words “benefit of any sectarian or religious society or institution” and “aid any sectarian school” in the above quoted sections. While the *614wording of these sections varies greatly from the simple words of the Establishment Clause, the meaning is the same; state expenditures which aid and benefit religious societies or schools are prohibited. Thus the inquiry should be the same under our own Constitution as that used by the Supreme Court with the Establishment Clause: Who reaps the benefits of the challenged legislation, the schools or the school children? In Cochran, Allen and Meek, supra, the Supreme Court has said explicitly that when the state loans school textbooks to parochial school children, the benefit accrues to the children and the state rather than to any sectarian institution. Article VI, § 3, and Article VIII, § 16, of our Constitution clearly state that the expenditures must not benefit and aid a religious society or institution. Since SDCL 13-34-16 and 13-34-16.1 do not directly benefit these institutions, they should be upheld by this court.
The majority opinion does not distinguish this court’s holding in Synod of Dakota v. State, 1891, 2 S.D. 366, 50 N.W. 632, from the present case. It states that to attempt to distinguish the cases would somehow circumvent the principles of our Constitution. I disagree. I feel that in failing to set out the factual and legal differences the opinion not only circumvents the principles of our Constitution but also ignores the plain words of the relevant constitutional sections. The case of Synod of Dakota v. State, supra, involved payments by the State to Pierre University, a Presbyterian College, for student tuition. Unlike the instant case, money was paid directly to a sectarian institution for the benefit of that institution in its operations. Here we have books loaned to school children for the benefit of their respective secular education and ultimately for the benefit of the state. In short, Synod cannot be considered as precedent for declaring the challenged statutes unconstitutional. The difference in the facts of the two cases is to me the difference between an unconstitutional appropriation of money to sectarian colleges and a constitutional loan of books to children who happen to attend nonpublic schools.
A quality education is one of the most important gifts that our children can receive. The legislature, in its collective wisdom, has sought to insure a quality education for all the children of the state by loaning secular textbooks to them free of charge. It *615fulfills a further purpose in insuring that all schools, public or sectarian, abide by a course of study which is set up by the state for its school children. The use of the same textbooks would serve to carry out this course of study for all students. I have not changed my mind on the question of state aid to a sectarian institution for the benefit of that institution or its operations. This should not be tolerated, but I do not believe that some children should be deprived of these books simply because they happen to attend sectarian schools, nor do I feel that our federal or state Constitution so mandates. The judgment and order of the circuit court should be affirmed.