On School Time or Off?

School boards and schoolteachers all over the U.S. were worried. The Supreme Court had ruled 8 to 1 for Unbeliever Vashti McCollum in her suit against the school board of Champaign, Ill. The court ruled that the board must stop making religious instruction available to its pupils in the school building and on school time. It also laid down the ruling that religious instruction in public schools was a violation of the First Amendment. Now the question was: Would the court also hold that religious education during "released time" was unconstitutional?

The National Education Association suggested that the system called "dismissed time" might prove to be the only 100% constitutional technique of religious teaching for public school children. Under this system, students are simply dismissed early one day a week, with no school checkup on whether they improve the shining hour in the local church, movie house or poolroom. Most widespread technique is known as "released time," which gives pupils religious education off school premises but with the school supplying attendance checkups and other active cooperation. By this week most schools on released time systems had decided to sit tight.

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