WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that states must sometimes provide aid to religious groups even when their state constitutions call for a strict separation of church and state. The decision concerned a state program to make playgrounds safer that excluded those affiliated with churches, and it had implications for all kinds of government aid to religious institutions.
The Missouri Constitution bars spending public money “directly or indirectly, in aid of any church,” and the state Supreme Court has called for “a very high wall between church and state.” Thirty-eight other states have similar provisions.
Read more in The New York Times.