Use of Federal Money at Private Schools Weighed

In another test of the line separating church and state, the Supreme Court said Monday that it would decide whether parochial schools in low-income areas can receive a share of federal funds for computers, library books and instructional equipment.

The case, to be heard in the fall, will affect directly about $12 million annually in federal funds. But lawyers for the parochial schools said that the impact could be far broader and touch 1 million students in religious schools nationwide.

Meanwhile, lawyers voiced concern that the conservative court may use the case to endorse the use of public vouchers for students in private schools.

More likely, however, the justices will focus narrowly on a dilemma that has bedeviled them in the past. Since 1965, Congress has appropriated billions of dollars in federal funds to aid the education of children from disadvantaged backgrounds. From the start, the law made clear that this promise of federal help extended to children in parochial schools as well as those in public schools.

However, the 1st Amendment has also been interpreted to forbid government funding of religious institutions. Giving money directly to religious schools would be unconstitutional.

So, public school officials have tried a variety of ways of serving parochial students without directly subsidizing parochial schools.

When these schemes have been challenged, the courts have responded with a series of confusing rulings. During the 1970s, a closely divided Supreme Court contributed greatly to the confusion. The justices ruled, for example, that federal money could be used to pay for books in parochial schools but not maps.

What about atlases? asked Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.), a witticism that has now come back in the form of a new case before the court.

In Jefferson Parish, La., public school officials used their share of federal funds to loan computers, television sets and library books to parochial schools. But three taxpayers complained and federal judges ruled that the distribution of the instructional equipment unduly subsidized religious schools. Paying for textbooks is allowed, the appeals court said, but not library books.

University of Utah law professor Michael McConnell, an expert on church-state law, appealed on behalf of the parochial schools and the justices announced Monday that they would hear the case (Mitchell vs. Helms, 98-1648).

In recent years, the high court has backed away from an insistence on a strict separation of church and state. Instead, the justices have called for neutral or evenhanded treatment. For example, if a law allows funding for schools, the court has said that the money may be used for parochial schools as well as public ones, as long as the government does not favor religion.

The decisions have come on close votes and the opinions speak narrowly. Advocates of the older strict-separation rule say that the trend is troubling. The recent rulings “have knocked small holes in the wall of separation between church and state. This gradual destruction of our heritage must stop and this case is a good place to draw the line,” said the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

The Clinton administration gave the parochial schools advocates a boost. U.S. Solicitor General Seth Waxman had urged the justices to take up the appeal.