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New Jersey Superior Court, Mercer County/Direct
Marc Stern/American Jewish Congress
On August 28, 2003, the ACLU-NJ filed a lawsuit challenging the distribution of $500,000 of State funds to two private Catholic high schools. The funds were designated for the two schools as part of the State's budget, with $250,000 to go to Seton Hall Prep for 'expansion' and $250,000 to go to St. Peter's Prep for "field remediation." The ACLU-NJ claimed in its complaint that the provision of taxpayers' funds to the two religious schools violates the Establishment Clause of the New Jersey Constitution and the "No Preference" Clause of the New Jersey Constitution. While the United States Supreme Court has upheld programs in which funds or benefits are made generally available to all schools or students and therefore end up in part going to parochial schools, the New Jersey legislature's grant of direct funds solely to the two Catholic schools (to the exclusion of other non-secular and secular schools) lacks the essential element of "neutrality." In addition to representing itself, the ACLU represents Madeline Houston, who has two children currently in the Montclair public school system. Her son is at a Montclair Middle School which rents out space in a church because it does not have sufficient facilities. For use of a gym or library, the students at the Middle School must walk to the YMCA or to the town's public library. On December 17, 2003, the ACLU-NJ agreed to dismiss the claims regarding the funds to St. Peter's after it was clarified that the funds for St. Peter's would be used solely for environmental clean-up, which would protect the surrounding community from chemicals that could seep into the surrounding land and that had been present on the site before St. Peter's bought the land. The case continued, however, based upon the challenge to the grant to Seton Hall Prep. On February 26, 2004, the Office of the Attorney General certified that the State will not release the $250,000 in State funds to Seton Hall Prep. Given this success, on March 1, 2004, the ACLU-NJ filed a notice to dismiss the complaint.
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