Released Time

Released time programs allow for public school students, who have written requests from their parents, to take time during regular school hours to receive religious instruction. In many ways, this program is an invitation for constitutional conflict, pitting the establishment clause of the First Amendment against those wishing to initiate and participate in such programs.

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The first released time programs began in 1914, in Gary, Indiana, when William Wirt, the superintendent of schools, enlisted 600 students to enroll in off-site religious instruction during the school day. By the early 1920s, there were 40,000 students in 200 school districts nationwide participating in this type of religious instruction. Participation in released time programs reached its zenith in the mid-1940s, with two million students in 2,000 school districts. For the most part, any generally accepted religious organization could take part in the programs.

The first major challenges to these programs as separation of church and state issues came in the 1940s. In the first case, which did not directly involve released time but would establish a precedent for dealing with such issues, a New Jersey resident, Arch R. Everson, challenged a state law that allowed for parents to be reimbursed for public transportation expenses for their children. Reimbursement could be claimed by parents of students attending Roman Catholic schools as well as those attending public schools. Everson said the law was in violation of the establishment clause of the Constitution. The controversy reached the Supreme Court in Everson v. Board of Education (1947), where the Court held that the law did not violate the Constitution. In his majority opinion Justice Hugo L. Black ruled that the reimbursement program was neutral and treated all residents the same regardless of their religion. Black’s opinion stated that the government could not do something that would aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another and that the New Jersey program did none of these. More important than the immediate ruling, however, Everson is significant because, in this case, the Supreme Court incorporated the establishment clause into the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, thus making this clause of the First Amendment applicable to state and local laws.

At about the time that released time programs reached their apex, members of the dominant religions in Champaign, Illinois, formed a voluntary association called the Champaign Council on Religious Education. In cooperation with the board of education, it offered weekly voluntary classes in religious instruction to public school students in grades four through nine. Parents could choose whether to send their children to the classes and, if so, to which class. The classes for Protestant students were held in separate rooms within the school building; Jewish and Catholic students met in places of worship in the community. The location of the classes was a departure from the World War I–era classes, which were held in local places of worship. Furthermore, although the teachers were paid by independent religious organizations, their appointments were subject to approval by the public school superintendent, and the school district used its resources to print the forms for the parents to sign. Vashti McCollum, an atheist whose son attended an elementary school in Champaign, challenged this program in the Illinois court system.

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