What is the Blaine Amendment?
By Idaho Freedom Caucus Member Representative Elaine Price
What is the Blaine Amendment?
In the 2024 legislative session, I worked with Senator Lenney on initiating the repeal of the Blaine Amendment from the Idaho Constitution. That effort taught me that most Idaho citizens do not realize we have a Blaine amendment, or what this prohibition in our constitution does.
What is the Blaine Amendment, anyway, and why do we need to repeal it? I would like to share a quick overview about why it is so important to get rid of this artifact of bigotry from our state.
In 1875, President Ulysses Grant proposed an amendment to the United States Constitution requiring free public schools and particularly denying public funding of sectarian schools. During this time, public schools had a very Protestant character, but by 1875 the Catholic Church had established many parochial schools which were privately funded.
US Representative and Speaker of the House James Blaine from Maine had his eyes set on being the next President of the United States. Blaine’s reaction to President Grant’s idea was to immediately introduce such an amendment to the United State Constitution. While the amendment overwhelmingly passed in the US House, it narrowly failed to achieve the supermajority necessary in the US Senate. By that time though, some states adopted such amendments to their state constitutions.
Then, backers of the Blaine Amendment succeeded in requiring that any new state joining the union include a prohibition on the public funding of religious schools in their state constitution.
This was a time in our country of anti-Catholic bigotry. The Catholic schools were on the rise and had nearly as many students enrolled as public schools. Although non-denominational, the public schools had a distinct protestant complexion, so the Catholics felt it only fair to share the public-school funds. Many in our country’s leadership had other plans, and the Catholic religion was not part of that plan.
Idaho joined the Union in 1890. The Idaho Constitution contains Article 9 Section 5: sectarian appropriations are prohibited. Idaho cemented this bigotry into our constitution.
Recently there have been Supreme Court rulings that have struck down the Blaine Amendment language based on the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. If a government entity provided any funding for a private, non-religious school, it could not discriminate against a religious school by withholding similar funding. Refer to Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue (2020), Carson v. Makin (2022), and Trinity Lutheran v. Comer (2017).
It has been argued that since each state’s amendment is worded a little differently, each must be litigated separately. Why would we waste taxpayer money to have our amendment litigated knowing it will be struck down; instead, let’s be proactive and repeal it.
Legislation presented in the last two sessions would do just that - ask that the question be put on the ballot for Idaho’s voters to decide: “Do you want to repeal Article 9 Section 5 of the Idaho Constitution?”
I say let the people of Idaho decide! Are we going to continue to have this language steeped in bigotry in our constitution, or are we going to repeal it?
I know my comments will go against the grain, but after observing public school education and many school board meetings and school board trainings, I favor repealing the entire Article IX of the Idaho Constitution (https://sos.idaho.gov/elect/stcon/article_IX.html), not just Section 5 (the "Blaine Amendment").
Here's Section 1 of Article IX:
"SECTION 1. LEGISLATURE TO ESTABLISH SYSTEM OF FREE SCHOOLS. The stability of a republican form of government depending mainly upon the intelligence of the people, it shall be the duty of the legislature of Idaho, to establish and maintain a general, uniform and thorough system of public, free common schools."
Public funding of education -- secular or religious -- needs a complete rethinking. Article IX of Idaho's constitution has led to wasted taxpayer money, poor student outcomes, massive bureaucracies and regulation, binders full of policies and procedures, and a loss of traditional family values.
I'd generally support providing a permanent endowment that enables taxpaying citizen parents to choose (within reason) how to educate their own children, without limiting their options to one kind of school or another. Tax credits or simply not taxing for education at all could put money in parents pockets to be used for their kids' educations.
Of course, the above ideas will never fly with the education bureaucracy or the tax collection agencies, would require massive layoffs, and roll back massive numbers of rules and regulations, but it could be the right thing to do.
Thank you for the education on an important topic. As the Jesuits have long seized control of the public education system nationwide, inclusive of Higher Ed. I'm thinking the historical 'discrimination' may not have worked out as planned. Is the taxes follow the student idea pertinent here?