A general view of the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington. Photo by Duncan Lock/Creative Commons (RNS) — The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday (Jan. 22) for a case that may put to rest decades of debate over government funding for private, religious schools. The case, Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, involves a program in Montana that provided tax breaks to people who funded scholarships for use at private schools, including religious institutions. The state’s Supreme Court ruled the program violated a portion of the Montana Constitution barring the use of government money for religious purposes. As a result, the program was shut down. With the case now before the nation’s highest court — which could overturn the lower court’s decision — several religious groups have voiced opposition to any ruling that would grant wide latitude for the government to fund religious education. “States should not have to fund religious schools,” Holly Hollman, general counsel for the BJC, or Baptist Joint Committee on Religious Liberty, said in a statement. “Religion is treated in a unique way in constitutional law, both to avoid its establishment by government and to avoid government interference in its free exercise. […]
