McCollum v. Board of Education
| McCollum v. Board of Education | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Argued December 8, 1947 Decided March 8, 1948 |
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| Full case name | People of State of Illinois ex rel. Vashti McCollum v. Board of Education of School District № 71, Champaign County, Illinois, et al. |
| Citations | 333 U.S. 203 (more) |
| Holding | |
| The use of public school facilities by religious organizations to give religious instruction to school children violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. | |
| Court membership | |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Black, joined by Vinson, Murphy, Douglas, Rutledge, Burton |
| Concurrence | Frankfurter, joined by Jackson, Rutledge, Burton |
| Concurrence | Jackson |
| Dissent | Reed |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const., Amends. I and XIV | |
McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S. 203 (1948), was a landmark 1948 United States Supreme Court case related to the power of a state to use its tax-supported public school system in aid of religious instruction. The case was an early test of the separation of church and state with respect to education.
The case tested the principle of "released time", where public schools set aside class time for religious instruction. The Court struck down a Champaign, Illinois program as unconstitutional because of the public school system's involvement in the administration, organization and support of religious instruction classes. The Court noted that some 2,000 communities nationwide offered similar released time programs affecting 1.5 million students.
The case was brought by Vashti McCollum, the mother of a student enrolled in the Champaign public school district.
In 1940, interested members of various Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish faiths formed an association named the Champaign Council on Religious Education. This association obtained permission from the Champaign Board of Education to offer voluntary religious education classes for public school students from grades four to nine. These weekly 30- and 45-minute classes were led by clergy and lay members of the association in public school classrooms during school hours.
McCollum, an atheist, objected to the religious classes, stating that her son James was ostracized for not attending them. After complaints to school officials to stop offering these classes went unheeded, McCollum sued the school board in July 1945, stating that the religious instruction in the public schools violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment—the principle of separation of church and state in the United States. McCollum also complained that the school district's religious education classes violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The principal elements of the McCollum complaint were that:
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