September 3, 1999

ORTHODOX UNION JOINS IN BRIEF ASKING SUPREME COURT TO PERMIT GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIES FOR COMPUTERS IN PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS

Today, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, through
its Institute for Public Affairs, joined with other Orthodox Jewish
organizations in a friend of the court brief urging the United States
Supreme Court to permit parochial schools to receive federal education
subsidies for computers technology hardware and software. The National
Jewish Commission on Law and Public Affairs served as counsel of record
for the Orthodox groups’ brief.

The California based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the
New Orleans based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit have
issued conflicting rulings over federal provision of these funds
violates the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause.  The brief joined
in by the Orthodox Union contends that the Court’s recent jurisprudence
in the church-state arena has shifted and that there is no justification
under current precedents to continue to exclude parochial schools from
religion-neutral government subsidies and that such exclusion violated
the principle that the government should be neutral toward religion.

Nathan Diament, director of the Institute for Public Affairs, issued the
following statement in connection with filing the brief:

The Court’s rulings on government aid to parochial schools has been in
disarray for many years; textbooks can be loaned but not maps, prompting
one to ask – what about atlases?  The time for the Court to clearly rule
on this issue is long overdue and in 1999, computer training is an
essential component of the secular education that our schools provide.
To prohibit parochial schools from receiving otherwise available federal
support for obtaining computers and software is nothing short of
discrimination against religion.  The Constitution calls upon the state
to be neutral toward religion, not hostile towards it.  We are confident
that the Court will issue a ruling consistent with our views next term.

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