Zorach et al. v. Clauson et al., Constituting the Board of Education of the City of New York, et al. (343 U.S. 306)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided April 28, 1952 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 343 U.S. 306 · 72 S. Ct. 679
- Docket
- No. 431
- Argued
- January 31, 1952
- Decided
- April 28, 1952
- Term
- October Term 1951
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Douglas
- Issue area
- First Amendment
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Vinson, Justice Minton, Justice Clark, Justice Burton, Justice Douglas (wrote), Justice Reed
- Dissenting
- Justice R. H. Jackson (wrote), Justice Frankfurter (wrote), Justice Black (wrote)
Opinion excerpt
Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. New York City has a program which permits its public schools to release students during the school day so that they may leave the school buildings and school grounds and go to religious centers for religious instruction or devotional exercises. A student is released on written request of his parents. Those not released stay in the classrooms. The churches make weekly reports to the schools, sending a list of children who have been released from public school but who have not reported for religious instruction. This “released time” program involves neither religious instruction in public school classrooms nor the expenditure of public funds. All costs, including the application blanks, are paid by the religious organizations. The case is therefore unlike McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S. 203, which involved a “released time” program from Illinois. In that case the classrooms were turned over to religious instructors. We accordingly held that the program violated the First Amendment which (by reason of the Fourteenth Amendment) prohibits the states from establishing religion or prohibiting its free exercise. Appellants, who are taxpayers and residents of New York City and whose children attend its public schools, challenge the present law, contending it is in essence not different from the one involved in the…
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