Some advocates of school vouchers have been pushing it as a means to enable funds to go to parochial schools without violating the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution. They have been doing this while cutting funding for public schools.
Jonathan Turley says that the state of Tennessee is having second thoughts about its voucher program because of the possibility of some of that money going to fund Muslim schools. As a result, in an unexpected ironic twist to to prevent that possibility, the Republicans in the state legislature are threatening to kill a measure to expand the voucher program.
Secularists have been pointing out for a long time that efforts by Christians to break down the wall of separation between church and state would, apart from violating the constitution, have as one consequence that the government would end up having to deal will all manner of religious beliefs seeking such funding. But of course they did not listen.
Well, of course they did not listen. To them, there aren’t any other religions, just the superstitions that “non-Christians”(*) cling to in the face of the “obvious” truth.
(*) “Non-Christian” varies depending on who’s defining “Christian”, of course.
I suggest we form a School of the FSM (let’s call it Noodle High School) and claim some of that voucher money.
Then, when the Christians freak out about funding an ostensibly atheist school, and change their minds on the first amendment endorsement of religion clause, we simply pull a Bill O’Reilly and claim that Pastafarianism is really a philosophy, not a religion, so the school should keep its voucher money.
🙂
I’m sure they can come up with some legal barriers to avoid having to deal with all the “heathen” schools.
Hey North Carolina, once you’ve established your established church, which we all know will be some flavor or evangelical Christianity, what happens to all the people who don’t belong to that particular church? Do you think the Catholics, Jews, Methodists, Episcopalians, etc. will be happy about supporting your favorite church? I can easily see a member of the Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1879 going to court to have his church become the established religion instead of the Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1915.
Ulysses #4: Die, heretic!
I like the idea of poisoning the appeal of pandering to favored groups by having disfavored groups demand their share. Perhaps the only way to advance the cause of gun control would be to revive the Black Panthers, brothers in black berets sporting assault rifles patrolling schools and shopping malls in Atlanta, brown berets in Phoenix.
bad Jim: Maybe the good God-fearin’ heartland American judges and prosecuters in Texas can HIRE the Black Panthers as security now?