Depositphotos.com image “ Taxes are what we pay for [a] civilized society .” Compania General de Tabacos de Filipinas, The Collector of Internal Revenue 275 U.S. 87 (1927) (Holmes, J., dissenting) A unique measure enacted recently in Iowa providing parents public funding to send their children to private schools, including parochial ones, owed much to its neighbor to the north: Minnesota. It comes in the 40th anniversary of a pair of tax tussles that reached rival results before the U.S. Supreme Court. The unprecedented Iowa law, known as the Students First Act (FSA), may become a trend-setter for similar legislation in other states. It comes on the heels of a series of U.S. Supreme Court decisions that have opened the door, rather widely, to use of public funds for religiously based educational institutions. Those trends stem from a Minnesota tax-tuition case decided by the Supreme Court 30 years ago, Mueller v. Allen , 463 U.S. 388 (1983). With the deadline for filing individual income taxes next week, Tuesday, April 18, a review of these developments, past, present and future, is timely. Iowa initiative Marshall H. Tanick The Iowa measure was the product of an initiative that began three years […]
