Via Americans United, a district judge has ruled unconstitutional yet another plan by South Bend, Indiana officials to transfer land to a local religious high school for an athletic field.
Back in September, the court struck down the city's original plan to purchase the land and transfer it to the St. Joseph's High School. In response, they agreed to auction off the land at an acceptable price, but only to bidders who agree to use it for the school's athletic field. In an opinion handed down yesterday, Judge Robert Miller said that route too violates the separation of church and state, leaving a reasonable observer to perceive the sale as a governmental endorsement of the Catholic faith.
[T]he reasonable, well-informed observer would see a City having acquired the parcel to transfer it to a particular Catholic school to promote that Catholic school’s athletic fields, a City having tried to transfer the parcel to that Catholic school to promote that Catholic school’s athletic fields, and a City now willing to sell the property to anyone who will promote that Catholic school’s athletic fields, and a City proposing to do so for a price that could be less than a third of what the City paid for the parcel (though for approximately the now-empty parcel’s fair market value). Nothing has been offered to change the court’s conclusion in the September 7 opinion that, “The objective, well-informed, reasonable observer would see no delineation between supporting the high school’s building project and supporting the religious school itself.” A well-informed and reasonable nonadherent would see the proposed transfer as a direct endorsement of a particular religion over other religions and non-believers.
