When government money pays for education, it rarely comes with no strings attached. States attach safety rules, staffing rules, and often civil-rights rules. The question in a new Supreme Court case is whether a state can keep one particular string firmly tied: a promise not to discriminate.
The case is St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, and it comes out of Colorado’s publicly funded, universal preschool program for four-year-olds. Colorado lets religious providers participate, but only if they agree not to exclude children based on protected traits, including race, religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity.
That condition is at the heart of a larger First Amendment dispute: When does a neutral rule for receiving public benefits become unconstitutional pressure on religious exercise?
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The dispute
Colorado created a universal preschool program funded with public dollars. The program is open to a range of preschool providers, including faith-based ones, as long as they agree to follow the program’s nondiscrimination requirements.
Several religious schools have agreed to those terms and joined. But the Archdiocese of Denver, two parish preschools, and two parents sued, arguing that Colorado’s terms effectively force church-run schools to choose between receiving public funds and operating according to religious beliefs about gender identity and same-sex relationships.
Colorado’s position is straightforward: if you opt into a public program, you must follow the same baseline rules as everyone else. The challengers’ position is also straightforward: those baseline rules, as applied to them, burden religious exercise.
More than admissions
Cases like this can be described as “school choice” disputes, but the practical issue is more personal: who gets access to publicly supported early education and under what conditions.
Justice Elena Kagan pointed to an important shift. She described the Court’s earlier public-funding cases as situations where religious people were not being treated like everyone else. In this case, she said, the challengers are asking for something “far beyond that.”
“Even though religious people are being treated the same way…that’s not enough. They need a special accommodation.” Kagan said.
That “accommodation” would be the ability to take public money without agreeing to the nondiscrimination rules that other participating preschools must accept.
Neutral rules and exemptions
At the center of this case is a familiar constitutional tension:
- Free Exercise: Government cannot punish or target religious practice.
- Equal administration of public programs: Government can set neutral eligibility rules for public benefits, especially when those rules apply to everyone who participates.
Colorado argues its nondiscrimination policy is generally applicable. That means it is a program-wide condition that applies across the board. Colorado also emphasized that it proved at trial that the requirement applied equally to all participating preschools, and the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.
The challengers, joined by the Trump administration, argue the rule effectively targets religious schools by forcing them to compromise religious beliefs as the price of entry.
Strict scrutiny stakes
A major fault line in the argument is how courts should review claims like this.
The challengers and the federal government urged the Court to apply strict scrutiny, a demanding standard that generally requires the government to show a very strong interest and that it chose the least restrictive means to accomplish it.
The concern raised by several justices was not just the outcome in this one preschool program. It was what happens if nearly every religious objection to a neutral public-benefits rule becomes a strict-scrutiny, case-by-case balancing test.
Kagan warned that this approach could turn judges into ongoing referees of religious importance versus governmental interests:
“Everything’s going to be about ‘How important is this religious belief to you?’ versus ‘How important is this interest here in non-discrimination law to the state?’”
And she added a practical question that any public school parent can understand: “Why would we put ourselves in the middle of that?”
Her point is about governability. If every benefit condition can be relitigated as a bespoke religious exemption, states may struggle to run stable, predictable programs.
Beyond LGBTQ issues
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson pressed on a question that makes many nondiscrimination policies feel like a single system: If an entity can claim a religious right to opt out of one protected category, what stops the same reasoning from being used to opt out of others?
Jackson framed it this way:
“The religious entity does not want to have to commit to opening its schools to students, children of LGBTQ couples. Couldn’t that same logic support a religious entity who says we don’t want to open our schools to students of races that we disagree with, or ethnicities that we disagree with?”
In response, Sarah Harris, the Justice Department lawyer arguing the administration’s position, suggested courts would likely reject race discrimination under strict scrutiny. Jackson was not persuaded that this kind of line-drawing would be principled rather than ad hoc, responding: “But that’s just arbitrary.”
Justice Samuel Alito, meanwhile, emphasized the impact a neutral policy can have on certain faith traditions. “We have here a requirement that has a very severe impact on certain religions” he said, adding that it was a consequence people “could have anticipated” when the requirement was adopted.
Where the line is
When readers ask me where the “line” is, they often mean: What is the Constitution supposed to allow, and what is it supposed to forbid? This case sits right on that uneasy boundary.
A clean way to frame it
- Government cannot exclude a provider just because it is religious. That is the equality principle Kagan referenced in discussing prior cases.
- Government can define the terms of a public program. The state is not required to fund every provider on whatever terms the provider prefers.
- Nondiscrimination rules are typically written as universal conditions. Colorado says its rule is exactly that: neutral and applicable to all who opt in.
- Religious institutions argue that some “universal” conditions hit them differently. That is the exemption principle, and it is what would expand if strict scrutiny becomes the default.
The Supreme Court’s decision will signal which principle dominates when they collide: equal access to public funds for religious providers, or equal protection from discrimination for families seeking publicly funded services.
What to watch for
Even if you never read a legal brief, there are two practical outcomes to watch for:
- A broad ruling: The Court could announce a new rule that makes it easier for religious entities to claim exemptions from generally applicable conditions tied to public benefits.
- A narrower procedural move: The Court could send the case back to lower courts with instructions to apply strict scrutiny, effectively changing the playing field without resolving every detail itself.
Either way, the stakes are not abstract. They involve who can participate in publicly funded early education, and whether states can enforce the idea that public dollars come with public obligations.
FAQ
Is Colorado banning religious preschools from the program?
No. Colorado allows religious preschools to participate, but requires them to agree not to exclude children based on protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender identity.
Why does strict scrutiny matter?
Because strict scrutiny is a very demanding test. If it becomes the standard path for religious objections to benefit-program rules, states could lose many disputes over neutral conditions they consider essential to running public programs fairly.
Could the ruling affect more than preschool?
Yes. During argument, justices discussed how a strict-scrutiny approach could spill over into other public benefits and other types of nondiscrimination rules, depending on how the Court writes its reasoning.