Correspondence

...If a state wants to pay for bus transportation to all schools for all students or to provide the same textbooks to all students--without the interference of religious schools--it would not be in violation of the principle of separation...

...I disagree with Mr...

...Chapman was assumedly as objective as possible, the significant Zorach case (1952) was left emharrassingly unmentioned in the article...

...Accordingly, only those cases which support public aid to students seeking a parochial education"suffer from inconsistency and a limp reluctance to offend...

...Almost identical to the "landmark" McCollu~ case (1948), Zorac~ v. ClaRson concerned an arrangement whereby the City of New York allowed children in public schools to be released from classes once a week in order to attend refigious instruction off the school grounds at centers of their parents' choice...

...The Court's decision in the textbook case was mistaken because the books were chosen not by the students or the state, but by the schools...

...R. Cloud, Jr...

...The accusation of "relentless logic" is no doubt intended to...

...His logic fits together well, considering Black's argument which further stated that, "The state cannot exclude individual(s)...because of their faith, or lack of it, from receiving the benefits of public welfare legislation...

...Cloud is mistaken in suggesting that I began my research already committed to the point of view reflected in my article...

...Chapman began his research with some predetermined assumptions which worked to the article's detriment...

...For it then respects the religious nature of our people and accommodates the public services to their spiritual needs...

...Why not...

...The public school system is widely accepted-correctly or not--to have important benefits for all citizens, not only those who attend public schools...

...The fundamental issue involved here is not that America wishes to separate church from state...

...It is probably true that high taxes prevent some parents from sending their children to parochial schools, but the villain is high taxes, not the principle of separation...

...Chapman's relentless logic, one is forced to ask if the unbreachable wall of separation between church and state renders municipal police and fire protection to religious groups unconstitutional, since he obviously considers other forms of public assistance to religious institutions an infraction of the law...

...Such public welfare measures, like police and fire protection, are perfectly legitimate...

...I don't quarrel with Justice Black's opinion that the state cannot exclude people from the benefits of public welfare legislation because of their religious beliefs: I simply befieve, as I said in the original piece, that the law upheld in the Everson case was not an example of such legislation...

...Cloud's argument that strict enforcement of separation interferes with the free exercise of religion...

...The Alternative: Ar~ American Spectator May 1977 37...

...rather it is that the state wishes to separate" its citizens from their religious institutions by making the continued existence of parochial education virtually impossible...

...be pejorative, but I accept it as a high compliment...

...the law was simply a clever ruse to circumvent the establishment clause...

...In fact, I originally suspected that in prohibiting any aid to parochial schools and banning prayer from public schools, the Supreme Court had gone further than it should have, and only a great deal of study persuaded me that my suspicion was wrong...

...That would be preferring those who believe in no religion over those who believe...

...He gave me long, long proof that I was totally wrong but I tried to redress the situation last night with Bill when, th.anks to many helpings of the local wine, we "depristinated" several glasses together...

...Louis...

...Only when Justice Black in the Everson case upholds New Jersey's law which reimbursed parents for bus fares to send their children to parochial schools, after having declared a forceful separatist constitutional interpretation, is he considered to have shown a "lack of rigor" in his logic...

...To hold that it may not would be to find in the Constitution a requirement that the government show a callous indifference to religious groups...

...The only real difference between the Zor~h and McCo//um cases was that the location of religious instruction in the former was not on public school grounds...

...What is clear in Mr...

...We find no constitutional requirement that makes it necessary for government to be hostile to religion and to throw its weight against efforts to widen the effective scope of religious influence...

...Following Mr...

...Chapman's article is that in order to exercise their religious liberties many citizens must pay for the secular schools they wish their children not to attend, while paying the high tuitions of parochial education, and simultaneously be denied the benefits of safe public transportation for'their children, for which they have been taxed, "free" textbooks, for which they have been taxed, and student health services, for which they have been taxed...

...The law which provided for reimbursement of parents for the costs of the bus transportation needed to send their children to parochial or public schools was clearly aimed at helping Catholic schools and parents, since other private schools, religious or secular, were excluded...

...QIooji~ *.OBOeB*~OOO C O R R E S P O N D E N C E I I I , I II I I t H i l i i Pristiae P i c t u r e , My one and only review (of Bill Bucidey's book A/r~rn~ [January 1977]) has brought me some harsh words from a gentleman in San Francisco who deplored my suggestion that Bill had invented the word "repristinate...

...If the benefits of publicly purchased textbooks ought to be utilized by every student with the exception of those attending parochial schools, what within the single criterion of absolute separation justifies public fire protection of religious buildings...

...His well-documented and clear-headed analysis is commendable...

...Apparently, Mr...

...Writing the majority opinion, Justice William O. Douglas reaffirmed the religious foundation of the American political order: When the state encourages religious instruction or cooperates with religious authorities by adjusting the schedule of events to sectarian needs, it follows the best of our traditions...

...The fact that parents who prefer to send their children to parochial schools are nonetheless required to help pay for the public schools is a regrettable circumstance of our republican form of government, in which a great many people are taxed to pay for things they don't want and from which they receive no direct benefits...

...Under this "released-time" practice, as Justice Douglas said, "the public schools do no more than accommodate their schedules to a program of outside religious instruction...

...There is a clear and substantial difference between the Zorach and McCollum cases: in the latter, religious instruction was provided in the public schools, with the active assistance of their administrators, while in the former, students merely were released from school so they could go elsewhere to receive religious instruction...

...however, the article and especially its conclusions are not above criticism...

...Although Mr...

...Chapman's interpretation of the Constitution implicitly denies the second clause of the First Amendment which guarantees us our religious liberty...

...Chapman rsplies: Mr...

...Chapman takes a very selective approach to American legal history...

...Should a city ftre department allow a blazing church building to burn to the ground...

...David Ni~n Chateau D'o~x, Switzerland More on Church and State Seldom have I read an article concerning the First Amendment as informative and as unfettered by emotive bigotry as Stephen J. Chapman's "Disconnecting Church and State" (February 1977...

...Missouri Mr...

...The Supreme Court upheld this practice of New York with a six-to-three majority...