A charter school board in Oklahoma has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a state court ruling denying authorization for the nation’s first publicly-funded religious charter school.
“A sponsor may not authorize a charter school or program that is affiliated with a nonpublic sectarian school or religious institution,” the statute states. The charter school has to be “nonsectarian in its programs, admission policies, employment practices, and all other operations.”
The Oklahoma constitution provides that the state should maintain a “system of public schools ... free from sectarian control.’”
Last year, the Catholic nonprofit corporation St. Isidore of Seville Virtual Charter School Inc. was founded by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa. The charter school plans to offer “a learning opportunity for students who want and desire a quality Catholic education but, for reasons of accessibility to a brick-and-mortar location or due to cost, cannot currently make it a reality,” the petition said.
The board approved the school’s application in June 2023 despite the school’s religious character and ties to a religious institution. As one board member said, the board had to approve the application because failing to do so would violate the U.S. Constitution’s Free Exercise Clause, which all board members had sworn to uphold, according to the petition.
Drummond sued in October 2023 in the Oklahoma Supreme Court, asking it to compel the cancellation of St. Isidore’s contract and declare the contract in violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause, state law, and the state constitution.
Drummond argued that the authorization of the school had to be canceled or the state would receive “requests to directly fund all petitioning sectarian groups,” and this could include “extreme sects of the Muslim faith to establish a taxpayer funded public charter school teaching Sharia Law.” This could “pave the way for proliferation of the direct public funding of religious schools whose tenets are diametrically opposed by most Oklahomans,” according to the petition.
On June 25 of this year, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled against the school, directing the board to rescind the contract and finding the school was a governmental entity. Because it was deemed a state actor, denying the school charter status did not contradict the Free Exercise Clause, the court determined.
The court also found that St. Isidore’s contract with the board ran afoul of the Oklahoma constitution’s prohibition against “using public money for the benefit or support of any religious institution.”
Commenting on the new petition, ADF Senior Counsel Phil Sechler said, “Oklahoma parents and children are better off with more choices, not fewer.”
“Protecting the freedom of St. Isidore and other charter schools to operate according to their beliefs bolsters religious freedom across Oklahoma, which is why we are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to take this important case.”
The request comes after the nation’s highest court handed school choice advocates a major victory in 2020.
The court ruled that Montana’s decision to exclude religious schools from a state scholarship program funded by tax credits violated the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
It is unclear when the Supreme Court will consider the new petition.
