US Supreme Court to weigh public funding of religious charter school

The US Supreme Court agreed on Friday to weigh whether public funds can be used to establish a religious charter school, a major case testing the historic separation of church and state.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled last year that the public funding mechanism for a proposed Catholic charter school in the southwestern state was unconstitutional.

Charter schools, of which there are some 8,000 in the United States, are government-funded but operate independently of the local school district.

They are not allowed to charge tuition or have a religious affiliation.

ALSO READ: Inside the parade of right-wing world leaders flocking to D.C. for Trump's inauguration

The Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal of the Oklahoma Supreme Court's ruling that blocked the state Charter School Board's 2023 approval of the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School.

The separation of church and state is a founding US principle. The First Amendment of the US Constitution forbids the establishment of a national religion or the preference of one religion over another.

An attorney for the conservative Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which is representing the school board, welcomed the decision of the Supreme Court to hear the case.

"Oklahoma parents and children are better off with more educational choices, not fewer," ADF chief legal counsel Jim Campbell said.

"The US Constitution protects St. Isidore's freedom to operate according to its faith and supports the board's decision to approve such learning options for Oklahoma families."

The American Civil Liberties Union, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and allied groups urged the Supreme Court to uphold the ruling by Oklahoma's top court.

"The law is clear: Charter schools are public schools and must be secular and open to all students," they said. "Converting public schools into Sunday schools would be a dangerous sea change for our democracy."

The conservative-dominated Supreme Court has issued a number of recent rulings blurring the boundaries between church and state, including a decision that a public high school football coach can lead his players in prayer.

The court has also allowed parents to use government vouchers to pay for the education of their children at private religious schools.

Oklahoma's Republican superintendent Ryan Walters, the highest education official in the state, has been among those pushing for the establishment of the religious charter school.

In June, Walters ordered public schools in Oklahoma, part of America's so-called "Bible Belt," to teach the Bible, a move met with lawsuits by parents and teachers.

The Supreme Court did not set a date for oral arguments in the religious charter school case but ordered briefs to be submitted by April 21.