Fighting faith-based spending in court

Significant constitutional cases don't always arrive at the ball dressed up as such. Sometimes they come in the modest trappings of an obscure technical dispute too dull to capture public attention. On Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in just such a case. Hein vs. Freedom From Religion Foundation is unlikely to make headlines, but it could deal a sharp blow to the wall of separation between church and state.

The plaintiffs are ordinary citizens who object to their federal tax dollars being used to fund the president's program for "faith-based and community initiatives." In particular, they claim that several conferences sponsored by the program were propaganda vehicles for religion and therefore violated the establishment clause of the 1st Amendment, which forbids government promotion of religion.

The government defendants — "Hein" is Jay F. Hein, director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives — dispute the plaintiffs' claim about the conferences. But at this stage, the Bush administration is asking the court to throw the case out on grounds that ordinary taxpayers have no legal interest in how the executive branch spends public money.

It seems like the kind of dry, legalistic dispute that only a lawyer could love. But the appearance is deceiving. If the court grants the administration's request, it will eliminate what is often the only effective mechanism for challenging financial support of religion by the executive branch. The effect would be to grant the president and his staff, as well as the vast federal bureaucracy, a license to preach.

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For the last 40 years, however, the Supreme Court has consistently given special treatment to taxpayer suits that challenge government spending in support of religion. The justification is simple and compelling. Government spending in support of religion generally does not inflict tangible injury on anyone, so if taxpayers don't have legal standing, no one does. In terms of government spending, the establishment clause would be rendered merely advisory.

That, of course, is how the Bush administration prefers its constitutional constraints.


http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-coan22feb22,0,6853622.story?coll=la-opinion-rightrail