Separation Anxiety

"Separation of church and state is dead," says Martha McCarthy, professor of education law and policy at Indiana University Bloomington. From increased state aid for religious schools to the U.S. Education Department's controversial prayer guide—an overview of legally acceptable instances when students may pray in school that, according to critics, pushes the parameters of the law—McCarthy observes a trend toward increasing religious accommodation. Others disagree: "It all depends on what you take that vague metaphor to mean," says UCLA law Professor Eugene Volokh. "If you mean that the state may not throw its weight behind religion, then separation of church and state is alive and well. If you interpret it to mean that nothing religious should be allowed on public property, that principle is dead, and good riddance to it."

At issue is the Establishment Clause, the first 16 words of the First Amendment, which prohibits the government from advancing or inhibiting religion. For something that sounds so simple, this directive has caused a lot of recent confusion on school campuses—and in the courts.

Case: Westfield High School L.I.F.E. Club v. Westfield Public Schools