High Court Blurs The Line Separating Church, State State University Told To Fund Student Religious Magazine

A sharply divided Supreme Court opened the door Thursday to greater government financial support for religious organizations, ruling 5-4 that the University of Virginia constitutionally is required to subsidize a student religious magazine on the same basis as any other student publication.

The majority rejected the university’s argument that it would violate the constitutional separation of church and state to use university funds to help pay the printing costs for the explicitly Christian magazine.

To the contrary, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said in the majority opinion, once a state-supported university decides to underwrite the private speech of any group of students, it “may not silence the expression of selected viewpoints” on the ground that the expression is religious in content. “Vital First Amendment speech principles are at stake here,” Kennedy said.

To the dissenters, led by Justice David H. Souter, another important First Amendment principle was compromised by the decision: the principle against direct governmental financing of religious activity.

The fact that the five-justice majority included an obviously troubled concurring opinion by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor left uncertain the court’s willingness to carry its analysis beyond the context of this case.