James Uthmeier won’t enforce parts of Florida law and the state Constitution preventing government funding for religious entities. (Photo by Mitch Perry/Florida Phoenix)
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier won’t enforce part of the state Constitution banning government funding for churches and other religious groups on the theory it violates the First Amendment, he claimed this week.
“This [Florida] constitutional provision reads as a prohibition barring religious entities from partaking in any grant program, no matter how they would use the funds,” Uthmeier wrote in a legal opinion released Thursday, advocating for the state’s ability to pay for religious charter schools and provide scholarships for religious universities.
“These provisions therefore have no place in our constitutional order,” he continued. “They actively undermine the central place religion plays in our Republic, which the Framers sought to guarantee by deploying the Religion Clauses.”
Uthmeier laid out a nine-page explanation for why he will refuse to enforce or defend various state laws and parts of Article I, Section 3, of the Florida Constitution. His arguments include that the separation of Church and State exclusively applies to the federal government; Christianity is at the “center of the nation’s identity;” and states can “encourage” Christianity as long as they don’t sacrifice individual rights in the process.
His push to widen the state and church intersection comes days before Easter, during the Roman Catholic Holy Week. It also falls amid a broader, Florida-wide conversation about how appropriate it is to spend taxpayer dollars on religious schools.
The conversation has spanned decades, ramping up months ago when Uthmeier called to cancel vouchers for Islamic schools he said propagated Sharia Law. Pointing to two Tampa schools that received millions in these vouchers, he claimed their alleged affiliation with members of the Muslim Brotherhood undermined “Western values.”
Just days ago, the Florida Legislature sent Gov. Ron DeSantis a bill demanding schools tied to state-deemed terrorists lose their tuition vouchers.
‘Secularist gloss’
Uthmeier in his opinion referred to the section of the Florida Constitution called the “No Aid Provision.”
“No revenue of the state or any political subdivision or agency thereof shall ever be taken from the public treasury directly or indirectly in aid of any church, sect, or religious denomination or in aid of any sectarian institution,” it reads.
This is wrong, Uthmeier argued.
He cited a slew of founder remarks, court cases, and even Biblical text throughout, largely to assert that the United States was founded with Christianity in mind. Nowadays, Uthmeier says that’s been changed.
“Many have tried to force a modern, secularist gloss upon the First Amendment, but that reading cannot be squared with the overwhelming evidence of religion’s — and specifically Christianity’s — influence at the Founding and its intended role within our constitutional order,” he wrote.
He pointed to two state-level laws that he also declared invalid. One prevents students attending religious schools from accessing the Effective Access to Student Education grant, which provides scholarships to private, nonprofit colleges.
The other is a ban on state dollars funding religious charter schools. He called it a “blanket ban” that violates the First Amendment, citing two U.S. Supreme Court cases that found the exclusion of religious observers from otherwise available public benefits to be unconstitutional.
“Any law, or interpretation of the State Constitution, that violates this basic right will not — consistent with my oath — be enforced or defended by my office,” Uthmeier concluded.