SC High Court Invalidates School Voucher Program

The South Carolina Supreme Court has decided in a 3-2 opinion that a program allowing parents to use public funds to pay for private education violates the state constitution. The South Carolina constitution states that:

No money shall be paid from public funds nor shall the
credit of the State or any of its political subdivisions be
used for the direct benefit of any religious or other private
educational institution.

The court majority decided that parent-directed tuition payments are a prohibited “direct benefit.”  The fact that parents choose the school to receive the payments does not make the payments indirect or primarily a benefit to parents.  The court reasoned that schools benefit from the parents' decision, and that the benefits are direct within the meaning of the constitutional prohibition.

The court left untouched the portions of the statute that allow payments for supplementary items and activities such as textbooks, tutoring, and therapy for students with disabilities.

The state plans to ask the court to reconsider the case, and school choice proponents in the state may attempt to amend the constitution to allow tuition payments to private schools.