House Education briefing: Supreme Court rulings complicate Vermont town tuition decisions

At a Jan. 22 meeting of the Vermont House Committee on Education, Beth St. James of the Office of Legislative Council briefed lawmakers on recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions and the legal tension those decisions create with Vermont’s compelled support clause and a 1999 Vermont Supreme Court decision.

St. James told committee members the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly held that a state that offers a generally available public benefit may not disqualify otherwise eligible recipients solely because they are religious. She summarized two earlier cases and the more recent decision commonly known as Carson, telling members, “a state need not subsidize private education. But once a state decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.”

The presentation placed Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer (2017) and Espinosa v. Montana Department of Revenue (2020) as foundational precedents that the court relied on in Carson (commonly cited as Carson v. Makin). St. James said Trinity Lutheran involved Missouri denying a playground grant to a religiously affiliated applicant and held the denial violated the free exercise clause because the benefit was generally available. Espinosa concerned Montana tax-credit-funded private-school scholarships; the Supreme Court held once a state provides a generally…