Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters and the board overseeing charter schools in the state attempted to fund a private Catholic charter school using taxpayer money. However, as a guardian of church-state separation, the Oklahoma Supreme Court rejected their efforts this week.
In a 7-1 majority opinion, the court ruled that the attempt to use taxpayer money to advance religion clearly violated the Oklahoma and United States Constitutions. Republican Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond brought the suit in an effort to cancel the contract between the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board and St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School.
The charter school board voted 3-2 in 2023 to use taxpayer money to fund St. Isidore. The school admits it will discriminate in enrolling students and require religious instruction for all students. The Oklahoma Supreme Court recognized religious discrimination and education should not be supported by public money because taxpayers represent citizens from different faiths and no faith.
While church-state separation advocates celebrated this week’s ruling, the decision is not the end of the road. It is expected to be appealed, potentially bringing the case closer to the United States Supreme Court and extending the reach of this legal battle.
It is crucial to know that the United States Supreme Court, with a 6-3 conservative majority, has recently prioritized the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause over the Establishment Clause. This context is vital to know the potential future of this case and its broader implications, emphasizing the need for informed and nuanced discussion.
Local media outlets have recently inquired why I—as a clergy member—oppose the public funding of religious education. They seem genuinely surprised that a minister in Oklahoma would oppose such a policy. This has allowed me to educate the media and public about the importance of church-state separation to maintain religious liberty for everyone.
As a person of faith from the Baptist tradition, I was taught my spiritual ancestors advocated for church-state separation. Before the Revolutionary War, Baptists were marginalized and oppressed by the ruling authorities, who strictly adhered to Puritan theology and practices.
Any person practicing a faith contrary to that of the state religion (those holding power and influence) faced severe consequences for their heresy.
Non-Puritans were taxed higher and imprisoned for preaching and practicing a faith contrary to the state religion. Baptists, such as Obadiah Holmes in 1651, in New England were jailed for preaching and practicing believer’s baptism. In 1660, Mary Dyer, a Quaker, was executed in the Boston Commons for heresy.
For these reasons, Baptists such as Isaac Backus and John Leland lobbied the founding fathers to include the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting its free exercise.”
Baptists and the founders knew the only way to maintain religious liberty for every citizen and protect the government from religious intrusion was to separate them. Thomas Jefferson solidified this practice when he wrote to Baptists in Danbury, Connecticut, during his first presidential term in office.
Jefferson wrote: “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”
Jefferson was building upon the work of 17th-century cleric Roger Williams when he wrote about the “hedge or wall of separation between the garden of the church and the wilderness of the world.” In addition, Williams concluded, “Forced worship stinks in God’s nostrils.”
As an advisor to Jefferson and James Madison, Leland offered this wisdom: “The [religious] liberty I contend for is more than toleration. The very idea of toleration is despicable; it supposes that some have a pre-eminence above the rest to grant indulgence, whereas all should be equally free, Jews, Turks, Pagans, and Christians.”
As we approach Independence Day next week, citizens need to remember the sacred principles protecting the rights of every citizen. America operates at its best when we think about the rights of the whole instead of focusing on our own self-interests.
Church-state separation is a significant value that we uphold, for it considers every individual’s right to practice or not practice a religion of their choice.
Unfortunately, the wall of separation continues to be attacked. Days after the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s decision was announced,