Oklahoma to vote on first taxpayer-funded religious school in US

The first taxpayer-funded Christian charter school in the United States is up for vote in Oklahoma on Tuesday, and the outcome of the vote is expected to spark a court dispute that will put the separation of religion and state to the test.

The Statewide Virtual Charter School Board will decide whether to approve an application for the establishment of St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School. The school’s founders intend for it to provide an online education for kindergarten through high school for 500 students at first, and eventually 1,500.

The board is a governmental organization that evaluates requests for charter schools, which are publicly funded but autonomously administered and operate essentially throughout Oklahoma. The three voting members of the board were all chosen by Republican state politicians.

According to the school’s planners, the first five years of operation might cost Oklahoma’s tax payers up to $25.7 million. The Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City provided the inspiration for the institution. The application was aided by the law school of the Catholic university of Notre Dame in Indiana.

Any legal battle over St. Isidore could put to the test the limits of the First Amendment “establishment clause” of the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits public servants from endorsing a certain religion or advocating religion over atheism.

Regardless of how Tuesday’s vote turned out, both proponents and opponents of the proposed school predicted a court battle. Officials from the church have expressed their optimism that the case will go before the US Supreme Court, whose 6-3 conservative majority has embraced a broad interpretation of religious freedom, particularly in two decisions made since 2020 involving schools in Maine and Montana.

St. Isidore is largely designed to satisfy the requirements of rural families who want a Catholic education but do not live close to any physical schools, according to Brett Farley, executive director of the Catholic Conference of Oklahoma.

After recent Supreme Court rulings, Farley, whose group defends the church in matters of public policy, expressed optimism that the court would eventually permit a publicly funded Catholic charter school.

The negative effects of permitting taxpayer-funded religious schools have been highlighted by the proposal’s opponents.

America needs to “wake up to the truth that religious radicals are coming for our public schools,” according to Rachel Laser, president of the advocacy group Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

The issue of how the school will strike a balance between state and federal anti-discrimination laws, such as those prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation, remains unanswered. The school’s declared goal in its application is to hire teachers who adhere to Catholic doctrine, which the U.S. College of Catholic Bishops claims regards homosexuality as a sin.

Farley said he was unable to comment on any hypothetical situation involving the hire of a gay instructor or the admission of a gay student, but he expressed confidence that the school could “square with state regulations, operate within the safeguards that precedent has given us.”

Farley asserted that the concept of a “separation of church and state” is unconstitutional because it is not mentioned in the language of the Constitution.

About St. Isidore and any other publicly supported religious institution, Laser disagreed and declared that her group will take the Catholic church to court.

The conversion of public schools in Oklahoma to Christian institutions is the target of an attack, according to Laser.

The chairman of the Statewide Virtual Charter School Board, Robert Franklin, declined to say how he would vote but stated that “the majority of external contacts that have contacted me are irritated and opposed to the request of the archdiocese’s proposal.”

Franklin stated that in order to approve the school’s application, all three members of the voting board would need to do so.