RELIGION/SUPREME COURT: “The Supreme Court ruled on Monday [6-26-17] that states must sometimes provide aid to religious groups even when their state constitutions call for a strict separation of church and state. The decision concerned a state program to make playgrounds safer that excluded those affiliated with churches, and it had implications for all kinds of government aid to religious institutions.
The Missouri Constitution bars spending public money ‘directly or indirectly, in aid of any church,’ and the state Supreme Court has called for ‘a very high wall between church and state.’ Thirty-eight other states have similar provisions.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the majority, said the United States Constitution forbids some forms of discrimination against religious institutions. Officials in Missouri, he wrote, were not entitled to reject an application from a Lutheran church for a grant to use recycled tires to resurface a playground.
A 2004 Supreme Court decision, Locke v. Davey, allowed Washington State to offer college scholarships to all students except those pursuing a degree in devotional theology. That case involved direct support for religion, Chief Justice Roberts wrote. Playgrounds, he argued, were a different matter.”
-Adam Liptak, “States Must Aid Some Church Programs, Justices Rule,” The New York Times online, June 26, 2017