Reading Room Document

Constitutionality of assistance to sectarian schools

In this memorandum, the OLC addressed the "difficult problem" of religious education, especially in the context of proposals to include sectarian schools as beneficiaries of primary and secondary school grants, long-term construction loans to sectarian schools, and the inclusion of private schools in then-pending bills to provide college scholarships. The OLC explained that the constitutionality of federal or state legislative proposals would depend on whether there was a legitimate, non-religious public purpose, which could be ascertained by how closely tied the benefit was to the religious aspects of the institution, the extent of the economic benefit, the level of education involved, whether the benefit accrued to the student or the institution, whether there were alternate means of providing the benefit.

March 20, 1961