The separation of church and state has been a cornerstone of the American experience, but like so many things in this country, long held beliefs and practices have been under threat. The public funding of religious schools has been off limits in this country. But a set of cases coming before the Supreme Court next month could upend this separation and allow, in these cases, Christian schools to be funded by taxpayers. The implications of this ruling will be far reaching. We wanted to better understand the case and its implications for American Jews, so we reached out to Rachel Laser, CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Here is that interview:
Berman Archive: Can you tell us about your role and your connection to the American Jewish community, personally and professionally?
Rachel Laser: Personally, I was raised as a Reform Jew at KAM Isaiah Israel, the oldest synagogue in Chicago, where I had my bat mitzvah and was also confirmed. I adored my childhood rabbi, Rabbi Arnold Jacob Wolf, who delivered probing and provocative sermons and encouraged my peers and me to ask questions about our religion and to be civically engaged with our communities. I raised my three kids at a Conservative Jewish synagogue in Washington, D.C., because of my husband’s religious background and also the synagogue’s generosity in letting us join for free in our mid-twenties shortly after my husband’s grandpa passed away when he was looking for some (Jewish) solace.
Professionally, my first and only time working officially inside the Jewish community was from 2012 through 2015, when Rabbi David Saperstein recruited me to be the deputy director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. In that role, I ran many interfaith campaigns, including one against gun violence and one to support working families. Before that, I led a project at the center-left think tank Third Way bringing together evangelical Christians and progressives, including some Jewish leaders, on some of the most divisive culture issues of our time, like abortion rights and LGBTQ+ equality.
My role at Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which began in 2018, connects profoundly to my Judaism. America’s promise of religious freedom, which enabled my own relatives to flee religious persecution and thrive here (like many American Jews), is dependent on our country’s commitment to the separation of religion and government. Church-state separation enables American Jews to make personal decisions about our own bodies according to our own moral and religious beliefs, to send our children to public schools knowing that they will not be taught a religion different from our own, and to worship or not freely, according to our own belief system. It has been critical to the advancement of full equality for Jewish Americans.
BA: There are two big cases coming before the Supreme Court—Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v. Drummond and St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School v. Drummond—what should American Jews know about them?
RL: On April 30, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in these consolidated cases about whether Oklahoma can create the nation’s first religious public charter school, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School. It would be a dangerous sea change for public education, our democracy, and for American Jews if the Court allows public schools to be religious.
The Oklahoma Supreme Court correctly ruled last summer that charter schools are public schools that must be secular and open to all students. But Christian Nationalist organizations urged the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case because they see religious public charter schools as a next (giant) step in their crusade to indoctrinate the next generation of Americans into their beliefs. Their two-pronged campaign, which we are seeing take effect across the country, includes infusing Christianity in public schools and funneling more taxpayer money to private religious schools.
If public schools can be religious schools, Jewish families in many locations could find themselves with no options other than (public or private) schools that favor Christianity, putting their children at risk of being taught a religion that’s not their own, of being bullied or ostracized based on their religion, and of being in an unfavorable learning environment.
Church-state separation enables American Jews to make personal decisions about our own bodies according to our own moral and religious beliefs, to send our children to public schools knowing that they will not be taught a religion different from our own, and to worship or not freely, according to our own belief system. It has been critical to the advancement of full equality for Jewish Americans.
BA: Until now, what would you say has been the most consequential Supreme Court ruling on religion in America?
RL: I’m finding it difficult to narrow this down to just one case, so I’m going to offer two sets of cases—one set that significantly improved religious freedom for public school students, and one recent set that significantly undermined church-state separation and religious freedom—in the context of schools and beyond.
In 1962 and 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court decided a pair of landmark cases that stopped public schools from sponsoring coercive prayer and Bible-reading. In 1962’s Engel v. Vitale, the Court said New York education officials could not draft a prayer and encourage public schoolchildren to recite it. A year later in School District of Abington Township, Pa. v. Schempp, the Court ruled that public schools in Pennsylvania and Maryland could not require students to read from the Bible every school day. These cases were instrumental to protecting the religious freedom of school children, who are impressionable and also captive audiences in school.
The outcome of these cases shouldn’t have been controversial in a country that prides itself on its promise of religious freedom, but Christian Nationalists have railed against these decisions ever since. Even though public school students continue to have the right to pray, read the Bible, and join religious clubs as long as these activities are voluntary and don’t occur during instructional time, Christian Nationalists erroneously claim prayer and God have been removed from public schools in an effort to mislabel church-state separation as anti-religion (which it’s not).
The backlash to those 1960s cases contributed to a pair of Supreme Court rulings in 2022 that severely undermined church-state separation. First, in Carson v. Makin, the Court’s ultra-conservative bloc forced the state of Maine to fund religious education where, in order to protect the religious freedom of its taxpayers, it was intentionally providing only secular private school tuition assistance to rural families who lacked access to a nearby public school. In her dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor summarized the Court’s decision as “lead[ing] us to a place where separation of church and state becomes a constitutional violation.” This case was the culmination of a string of cases meant to gut constitutional safeguards against public funding of religion.
Also in 2022, the Court ruled in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District that a public high school football coach could pray on the field in front of students directly after football games. My organization represented the school district in that case. Our concern was for the students who felt coerced to join the coach’s on-field prayers. Because the Court accepted what a federal judge called a “deceitful” narrative that the coach’s prayers were silent and private (they weren’t, as photographic evidence showed), the Court’s decision didn’t actually significantly change the law. But it emboldened Christian Nationalist legal organizations to misrepresent the decision and use it to justify new laws aimed at imposing coercive religion on public schools – like those in Kentucky and Idaho that encourage teachers to pray in front of and even with students and the new law in Louisiana requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom. AU and our allies are challenging the Louisiana law in court on behalf of Jewish, Christian, Unitarian Universalist and nonreligious families.
BA: Why do you think that American Jewish organizations have historically supported the strict separation of church and state?
RL: Religious minorities need the separation of church and state in order to have freedom and equality in our society. Without that separation, the state is likely to favor the religion of the majority – in the U.S., Christians – over others (and over nonreligion). Jews know all too well from our history of persecution that without church-state separation we can expect to be a disfavored religion in a country where we are only 2% of the population. Already today—with church-state separation is under attack and Christian Nationalists occupy some of the highest positions of power throughout the federal, state and local governments—Jews are experiencing a heightened level of antisemitism.
American Jews also support church-state separation because we believe in religious liberty for all people, we know separation protects religion as much as it protects religious freedom, and we cherish American democracy, which depends on this separation. The Reform Jewish Movement, which has advocated for church-state separation for 60 years, proclaimed in 1965: “[W]e reaffirm our long-established position that the principle of separation of church and state is best for both church and state and is indispensable for the preservation of that spirit of religious liberty which is a unique blessing of American democracy. This principle is shared by forward-looking elements of all faiths.”
BA: What, if anything, might Jews stand to gain if public funds were permitted to support Jewish day schools, for instance?
RL: Direct public funding for Jewish day schools would be a pyrrhic victory for Jews. In most communities, Jews are unlikely to have a large enough population to make a Jewish day school feasible. In fact, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) recently reported that a Jewish, Florida-based charter school operator who supports the creation of St. Isidore had toured Oklahoma, hoping the lawsuit could pave the way for a publicly funded Jewish school there. According to the article, he conceded “the state’s small Jewish population made the idea impractical.”
If our country continues down the dangerous path of inserting religion into public schools and publicly funding private religious schools, the end result will be fewer options for Jews, other religious minorities and the nonreligious to attend adequately funded public schools that are open to all and don’t discriminate or indoctrinate.
BA: What’s one text or source that inspires your work?
“You are not obligated to complete the work but neither are you free to desist from it “ – Pirkei Avot (a compilation of Rabbinic ethical teachings). I love this quote because it can be overwhelming to do the work of tikkun olam or repairing the world. This piece of wisdom helps motivate me to do my part, no matter how great the challenge.
Rachel Laser became president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State in February 2018. She is the organization’s first non-Christian and female leader in its 78-year history. Rachel is a lawyer, advocate and strategist who has dedicated her career to making our country more inclusive. In her position at Americans United, Rachel oversees the organization’s work to protect freedom of conscience for all and ensure religion is not used to justify discrimination.
