This research paper discusses separation of church and state and other issues relating to religion in the public schools in the United States. A number of factors determine the ground rules for the handling of such issues by teachers and school administrators --school policies, state and federal legislation and rulings by state and federal courts. The ultimate arbiter is the United States Supreme Court the decisions of which have been clear in some areas, such as school prayer and less clear in others, such as the permissible limits of public aid to religious institutions and school dress codes.
The First Amendment of the United States Constitution provides: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" (U.S. Constitution, 1787, Amendment 1). Under the Tenth Amendment, educational policy is primarily the responsibility of the states, but the Supreme Court has held that the above constitutional guarantees apply to the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The First Amendment establishment clause relates to preventing the government from supporting or aiding religion. The free exercise clause was designed to protect citizens against government interference with religious practices. The two clauses are inter-related. As Cochran, Mayer, Carr & Cayer point out, the interpretation of either of these clauses, if expanded "to its logical extreme, it may . . . violate a conception of the other clause" (1996, p. 409).
Early (19th century) case law upheld the practice of compulsory Bible reading in the public schools, Donahoe v. Richards, 38 Me. 379 (1854). The first case holding otherwise was State ex rel. Weiss v. District Board, 44 N.W. 967 (Wis. 1890). The leading 20th century cases are Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421, 425, in which the Court said: "it is no part of the business of government to compose official prayers for any group of the Am...