It seems to me that if there is a problem with modern
"released time" programs, the problem is not with the
releasing of students whose parents request a release,
but rather in not providing something to do for the
kids whose parents don't wish them to be released.
I don't know the facts of the cases Marty mentions. It
seems to me that the school must do *something* with
the kids who stay behind. Even a supervised study
hall, in which students have an opportunity to work on
their homework assignments or to study for tests and
quizzes, is something. It would probably be even
better if the school provided some kind of
activity--say, art or multicultural appreciation--for
the students who stay on campus during the released
time period.
Mandatory attendence laws and the public school
monopoly over public funding of education do indeed
impose a substantial burden on families who wish their
children to be exposed to more diversity of thought
and opinion than they receive in the secular public
schools. The released time program permits children to
be exposed to another way of looking at the world; it
provides them an opportunity to choose to visit a
spiritual oasis in what is otherwise a secular
intellectual desert.
Since children are released only if their parents
consent and request release, as in Good News there is
no state-imposed coercion imposed on children who
participate in the program.
I don't see a problem under the EC. Indeed, how can it
be an establishment of religion for the state merely
to release children, upon the request of their
parents, from state custody.
Suppose the program were amended to allow children who
do not wish to be part of an organized released time
program to be released instead into the custody of
their parents for that hour? Shouldn't that take care
of any objection about leaving some children behind?
Rick Duncan
University of Nebraska College of Law
Red State Lawblog: www.redstatelaw.blogspot.com
=====
Rick Duncan
Welpton Professor of Law
University of Nebraska College of Law
Lincoln, NE 68583-0902
"When the Round Table is broken every man must follow either Galahad or
Mordred: middle things are gone." C.S.Lewis, Grand Miracle
"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or
numbered." --The Prisoner
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