Minnesota

AMENDMENT LANGUAGE

State Constitutional Provision

Minn. Const. art. XIII, § 2: "PROHIBITION AS TO AIDING SECTARIAN SCHOOL. In no case shall any public money or property be appropriated or used for the support of schools wherein the distinctive doctrines, creeds or tenets of any particular Christian or other religious sect are promulgated or taught."

RELEVANT CASES

State Courts

·       Minnesota Federation of Teachers v. Mammenga, 500 N.W.2d 136 (Minn. App. 1993) (Minnesota appellate court held that Post-Secondary Enrollment Options Act, which allowed high school students to take nonsectarian courses at colleges to be reimbursed by the state did not violate the Minnesota constitutional provision prohibiting public aid to sectarian schools, because the benefits to the sectarian colleges were indirect and incidental).

·       Minnesota Higher Educ. Facilities Authority v. Hawk, 232 N.W.2d 106 (Minn. 1975) (Minnesota Supreme Court held that the Facilities Authority’s issuance of tax-exempt revenue bonds to refinance the indebtedness of private sectarian colleges in their construction of secular educational facilities did not violate the Minnesota constitutional provision prohibiting the use of public funds for the support of sectarian schools).

·       Americans United Inc. as Protestants and Other Americans United For Separation of Church and State v. Ind. School Dist. No. 622, Ramsey County, 179 N.W.2d 146 (Minn. 1970) (Minnesota Supreme Court held that a statute authorizing the public transportation of parochial school students did not violate the Minnesota constitutional provision prohibiting the use of public funds to support sectarian schools).

Kaplan v. Independent School District, 214 N.W. 18 (Minn. 1927) (When teachers resort to any religious text for the purpose of ethical as distinguished from religious instruction, courts should require rather clear proof of the violation of constitutional limitations or guaranties before interfering. No such proof has been presented in this case).

Federal Courts

·       Stark v. Independent School Dist., No. 640, 123 F.3d 1068 (8th Cir. 1997) (Eighth Circuit held that the opening of an elementary school primarily attended by students belonging to a particular religious group, and the elementary school’s accommodation of parental requests to exempt students from certain components of the curriculum for religious reasons, did not violate the Minnesota constitutional provision prohibiting the use of public funds to support sectarian schools, because the school furthered the valid secular purpose of educating the district’s children).

REPEAL EFFORTS

See the Heritage Foundation website for a list of state contacts.