A quirk of history and misaligned constitutional provisions soon could kill public charter schools in Washington state. A case before the U.S. Supreme Court would make that happen. A Supreme Court challenge to Maine’s ban on using taxpayer funds to enable rural kids to attend private religious schools might have surprising effects here in Washington state. Several isolated areas of Maine are without public schools, so that state pays for sending affected children to private schools — so long as those schools are nonreligious. But during Dec. 8 oral arguments, a majority of justices seemed inclined to rule that Maine’s exclusion of religious schools violates the First Amendment’s protection of “free exercise” of religion. A court ruling against Maine would spark a chain of events eventually ending public charter schools in our state. Here’s why and how it would happen. Washington’s 1889 Constitution contains one of the strongest religious freedom provisions in America. Article I, Section 11, states: “Absolute freedom of conscience in all matters of religious sentiment, belief and worship, shall be guaranteed to every individual. But that is followed by a declaration that: “No public money or property shall be appropriated for or applied to any religious […]
