1910, 135; Op. Atty. Gen. 1915-1916, 254. | yond the furnishing of a syllabus or outline and In the first instance the query was: the setting of examination, rating of papers and determining of credit.

"Has a teacher the legal right to open school each morning with a prayer?

"Third. It is contemplated that all personal instruction and interpretation shall be given

In the second instance in answer to the in the home or by the religious organizations query:

"May the directors or a school district prescribe a course of Bible study for high school students and grant school credits to apply toward graduation from such high schools to students who successfully pass examinations upon such course of Bible study, provided that such Bible study shall be optional and shall be pursued outside of the public school buildings, and that no part of the public school money, time or property be used in conducting such courses"

-the Attorney General held that:

"The legal objection to the proposed system of Bible study is that the courses of study are made a part of the public school curriculum." Many people sincerely believe that a cultivation of religious sentiment, which we may admit is essential to the development of an enlightened citizenship, should be a part of the education and training of the children of our country, and they as firmly believe that the version of the Bible which is accepted and acknowledged by the great majority of the citizens of this country should be made the vehicle of that development. They believe that the Constitution can have no application, unless an attempt is made to advance the doctrine of a particular denomination, or to instill the dogma of sect in the mind of the pupil. Consequently it has been resolved by assemblies of teachers in this country and other countries that a course in Bible study should be a part of school work. In 1915 the state board of education adopted the following resolution:

with which the students are affiliated, follow-
tion.
ing the outline furnished by the board of educa-

"Fourth. Not more than one credit in Bible shall be allowed an individual in any one school

year.

quire the equivalent of one 45-minute lesson "Fifth. It is assumed that this work will reper week through the school year and the equivalent of three hours per week in outside study."

Authority for this resolution is found by counsel in the resolution of the state board of education, and in the Code:

*

*

"Every board of directors of a school district of the first class shall * * have the Power: *** Second. To prescribe a course of study and a program of exercises which shall prepared by the state board of education, for not be inconsistent with the course of study the use of the common schools of the state. Fourth. To adopt and enforce such sential to the well-being of the schools, and to rules and regulations as may be deemed esestablish and maintain such credits and departments, including night, high, kindergarten, manual training, and industrial schools,* promote the interests of education in that disas shall, in the judgment of the board, best trict." Rem. Code, § 4509.

*本

Counsel for respondent bases his argument upon two propositions:

First. The resolution does not establish or maintain any school system which is under sectarian control or influence.

funds for any religious worship, exercise or Second. There is no expenditure of public instruction, or the aid or support of any religious establishment.

The first premise will be dismissed, not "Since the board looks with favor upon al- because it will not bear argument, for there lowing credits for Bible study done outside of is much argument and authority on either school, it is moved that a committee be ap- side, but because the case can be determinpointed to consider a plan for allowing such credits, one-half credit to be given for Old Tes-ed by reference to the second premise tament, and one-half credit for New Testament, alone. The framers of the Constitution were on the basis of thirty to thirty-two credits for not high school graduation, and that a syllabus of Bible study be issued under the auspices of the state department of education with rules and regulations for the distribution of examination questions at least once a year."

The plan thus outlined is in effect, so we are informed by counsel, in Spokane, Tacoma, Centralia, Sunnyside, and Everett, from whence this case comes. To make the plan feasible, and to avoid the rock of the Constitution as we may well presume, the school board adopted the following resolution:

schools should be kept free from sectarian content to declare that our public control or influence; they went further and made it certain that their declaration should not be overcome by changing sentiments or opinions. They declared that "no public money or property shall ever be appropriated or applied to any religious worship, exercise or instruction," and in this respect our Constitution differs from any other that has been called to our attention.

It has been held in several of the states "Resolved, by the board of education, Ever- that the reading of the Bible, or the Ten ett, Washington, that high school credit for Bi- Commandments, or the recital of the Lord's ble study may be allowed to the members of Prayer, without comment or remark, does the Everett High School to the extent of one credit on Old Testament Scriptures and one not violate a Constitution providing that no credit on New Testament Scriptures, under the person shall be compelled to attend or supfollowing conditions: "First. Credit shall be granted only after port any place of religious worship, or to successfully passing an examination covering pay taxes for the support of any minister the historical, biographical, narrative and literary features of the Bible, and based upon an outline to be hereafter adopted by the board of education.

"Second. Supervision of instruction in Bible shall not be undertaken by the high school be

of the gospel or teacher of religion, or that sectarian purposes, or for the support of no public moneys shall ever be used for sectarian schools, or equivalent expressions. Church v. Bullock, 104 Tex. 1, 109 S. W.

We have then not only "religious exercise" and "instruction" which is prohibited, but their natural consequence-religious discussion and controversy. The most ready and popular argument for the avoidance of these constitutional provisions has been that whereas the Bible inculcates a code of morality, which if understood and practiced will make for better citizenship, and whereas it is essential that the youth should be impressed with an understanding of the fundamental principles of right and wrong, and thus grow in moral stature, that Bible instruction by reading selected passages without comment can do no violence to the Constitution, no hurt to the principle of divorcement of church and state, and that it should be therefore not only tolerated, but encouraged. Hackett v. Brooksville Graded School District, 120 Ky. 608, 87 S. W. 792, 69 L. R. A. 592, 117 Am. St. Rep. 599, 9 Ann. Cas. 36.

115, 16 L. R. A. (N. S.) 860; Pfeiffer v. Į dantly proved by the cases to which we have Board of Education, 118 Mich. 560, 77 N. referred. W. 250, 42 L. R. A. 536; Billard v. Board of Education of Topeka, 69 Kan. 53, 76 Pac. 422, 105 Am. St. Rep. 148, 66 L. R. A. 166, 2 Ann. Cas. 521; Moore v. Monroe, 64 Iowa, 367, 20 N. W. 475, 52 Am. Rep. 444. But these cases are based upon provisions that go no further than article 9, § 4, of our own Constitution. Their purpose is to prevent the teaching of any of the beliefs, creeds, doctrines, opinions, or dogmas of any sect, and to prevent the appropriation of money for parochial and denominational schools; a privilege that had been abused by the Legislature of some of the states, and of which the people were no doubt mindful at the time our Constitution was adopted. In the light of other Constitutions, the abuses in other states, and the evident purpose of the framers of the Constitution to save some of the questions which had there arisen, there can be no doubt that more was intended than a simple declaration that our schools should be kept free of sectarian influences. Article 1, § 11, is all-significant. The words "no public money shall be appropriated for or applied to any religious worship, exercise, or instruction" are sweeping and compre

hensive.

It is upon these cases and those cited above that counsel relies, and as paradoxical as it may seem, our best authority for rejecting the doctrines announced is to be found in the cases themselves. Quickly put they disthe dogmas, creeds, or opinions of sect, and tinguish religion in its broader sense from hold that although the Bible may be the narrative, biography, and its moral persuatext-book of every sect, yet in its history, sions, it serves no sect, but on the contrary is a spiritual stimulant in every individual whether he be a Jew or a Gentile, a Catholic or a Protestant, a Moslem or a Buddhist, a Christian or a Pagan, a believer or an atheist.

That the study of the Bible for its history, narrative, biography, or literary features serves the religious impulse and the ends of those who would aid the growth of religion as distinguished from mere sect is acknowledged.

[1] Our inquiry may be limited then to the one question whether an examination of pupils upon "the historical, biographical, narrative, and literary features" of the Bible is religious instruction within the meaning of the Constitution. To meet the premise of counsel for respondent, we would have to read the prohibition as if it were, "No public money shall be applied to any denominational or sectarian worship, exercise, or instruction," and reject the broader term "religious," for his argument proceeds as if the sole object of the Constitution was to keep the schools free of sectarian influences. While selections such as the Lord's Prayer, the Twenty-Third Psalm, and the Sermon on the Mount are regarded as masterpieces of literature, and inspiringly grateful to a thirsty soul, they are calculated to invite or excite the youthful mind to inquiry and the elder to resentment, for some, the Jew for instance, while accepting the Twenty-Third Psalm might reject the Lord's Prayer and the Sermon on the Mount as the work and words of one whom he regards as an impostor. Then, too, the Twenty-Third Psalm as we understand it is not the Twenty-Third Psalm in the Douay Bible, but the Twenty-Second. Neither is the translation the same as in our own Bible. Nor is the Lord's Prayer trans- It will thus be seen that the cases cited lated in the same way. These objections to were dealing only with the question whether many of us would seem light and trivial, but the reading or study of the Bible might be a history has been made over the controversies sectarian influence, and not with the question that have arisen out of such as these, and whether such reading or study was religious that such innocent uses of the Bible has instruction. To prove that it is not sectarian

"Every pupil who enters a public school has demand, of the teacher that such pupil shall a right to expect, and the public has a right to come out with a more acute sense of right and wrong, higher ideals of life, a more independent and manly character, a higher conception of his duty as a citizen, and a more laudable ambition in life, than when he entered. The system ought to be so maintained as to make this certain. The noblest ideals of moral character are found in the Bible. To emulate these is the supreme conception of citizenship. It could not, therefore, have been the intention of the duty upon the Legislature of establishing a sysframers of our Constitution to impose the tem of common schools where morals were to be inculcated and exclude therefrom the lives of those persons who possessed the highest moral attainments." Billard v. Board of Education, supra.

religious or moral instruction, and so affirming logically hold that if their Constitutions had been such as ours they would have held to the contrary.

[2] But it is said that the teaching is to be upon the historical, biographical, narrative, and literary features of the Bible only, and in this the instruction will be neither sectarian, doctrinal, denominational, or religious. This might be true if all citizens were agreed that the King James' translation of the Bible is a true version of the Scriptures, and then only if the teaching were under the control of those who are selected through the means and methods provided by law. But the vice of the present plan is that school credit is to be given for instruction at the hands of sectarian agents. Then, too, all citizens are not agreed as to the narrative and historical worth of the Bible. It is true that some of the events there recorded have shaped the destinies of millions of people, yet they are not mentioned in profane cotemporaneous history. Some are not agreed whether many of the events there narrated are historical or allegorical. Whether the earth was created in six days, where Cain obtained his wife, whether the whole earth was covered with a flood of waters, whether Jonah was swallowed by a whale, whether Elijah was translated by a whirlwind into heaven, whether Lot's wife was turned into a pillar of salt, whether our God stopped the sun in its course that Joshua might overcome his enemies, whether He made the waters of the sea to recede that His chosen people might pass to the promised land, whether God spake with the prophets, or ordered the lives of such great rulers as David and Solomon, are questions all sounding in narrative and history that have excited differences and controversies that are never settled.

aminer may not know the faith and teachings of those of a different faith; the other and more conclusive objection is that to give a credit in the public school for such instruction is to give a credit for sectarian teaching and influence, which is the very thing outlawed by the Constitution.

"Courts have been zealous in protecting the money set apart for the maintenance of the a deaf ear to every enticement and frowned upfree schools of the country. They have turned on every attempt, however subtle, to evade the Constitution. Promised benefit and greater gain have been alike urged as reasons, but without avail." School District No. 20 v. Bryan, 51 Wash. 498, 99 Pac. 28, 20 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1033.

In that case it was sought to justify the expenditure of school money for the instruction of children outside the public schools. The logic of our opinion is that instruction upon all subjects proper for the advancement or credit of a pupil should be given within and not without the schools, or at least under the immediate tuition of a teacher who has qualified to teach under the laws of this state.

The plan for the education of our youth as outlined by the Legislature indicates that it had no intention of ever providing credit for work done under the tuition of any one who had not been licensed to teach by the school authorities.

"No person shall be accounted as a qualified valid teacher's certificate, or diploma issued by teacher who is not the holder of a lawful authority of this state." Rem. Code, § 4543.

The law provides (Rem. Code, § 4550) that it shall be the duty of the teacher to impress upon the minds of the pupils morality, truth, etc. It would seem that the Legislature would have declared in words that the Bible should be regarded as a text-book, and that credits could be given for study outside the school and under those not holding either That Bible history, narrative and biog- teacher's certificate or diploma if it had so raphy cannot be taught without leading to intended. It is no more than a subterfuge opinion and ofttimes partisan opinion is to urge that the public moneys will not be understood and anticipated by the school applied for religious instruction, because the board. They admit as plainly as language teaching is done outside the school by a can admit that Bible teaching does lead to preacher or priest, or in the home of the sectarian opinion and differences of opinion pupil, or by a religious organization, with upon religious questions. They employ the which the student may be affiliated, for the word "religious" in a narrow and sectarian time of the teachers as well as their technical sense. They speak of "religious organiza- skill will be consumed while under the pay tions," and provide that "interpretation" of the state in furnishing the syllabus or shall be given in the home, or by some "religious organization." Now we had thought that "history, biography and biblical nar-er credits. rative" would require no interpretation- There are many cases in the books upon the certainly no interpretation calling for the questions herein discussed, but none of them doctrinal opinion of a religious organization. have reference to a constitutional provision And who of authority in our schools is to say exactly like our own. They are collected in that a pupil shall or shall not have credit if the several series of selected cases. Pfeiffer he answers questions in a way that is differ- v. Board of Education of Detroit, 118 Mich. ent from the way intended by those who pre- 560, 77 N. W. 250, 42 L. R. A. 536; Church v. pared the course of instruction. It may be Bullock, 104 Tex. 1, 109 S. W. 115, 16 L. R. A. said that the pupil is entitled to credit if he (N. S.) 860; State ex rel. Weiss v. District answers in a way that is consistent with the Board of School District No. 8, 76 Wis. 177, faith of his instructor. But there are two 44 N. W. 967, 7 L. R. A. 330, 20 Am. St. Rep.

outline, the conducting of examinations, the rating of papers, and the determining of prop

Girls, 125 Ill. 540, 18 N. E. 183, 1 L. R. A. In disregard of the deeper reasons which 437, 8 Am. St. Rep. 386, 414; People ex rel. prompted the people to take some security Ring v. Board of Education, 245 Ill. 334, 92 against the breeding of religious controversies N. E. 251, 29 L. R. A. (N. S.) 442, 19 Ann. in schools supported by the public school Cas. 220; 35 Cyc. 1127. The following cases, funds, reasons adverted to in many of the decihowever, support our views: State ex rel. sions, some courts as it seems to the writer of Weiss v. District Board of School District No. this opinion have inclined to the letter rather 8, 76 Wis. 177, 44 N. W. 967, 7 L. R. A. 330, than to the spirit of the Constitution. To 20 Am. St. Rep. 41; People ex rel. Ring V. illustrate, the Supreme Court of Nebraska Board of Education of District 24, 245 Ill. held their Constitution, providing that "No 334, 92 N. E. 251, 29 L. R. A. (N. S.) 442, 19 sectarian instruction shall be allowed in any Ann. Cas. 220. school or institution supported, in whole or We shall not go far afield when we sug-in part, by the public funds set apart for gest that it is a matter within the common educational purposes," forbade the reading knowledge of those who followed the discus- of passages from King James' version of the sion attending the framing of our Constitu- Bible, the singing of religious songs, and tion that it was the purpose of the men of songs sung in "orthodox evangelical churchthat time to avoid all of the evils of reli-es," and the offering of prayer in accordance gious controversies, the diversion of school with the customs of usages of sectarian funds to denominational schools and insti- churches or religious organizations. On retutions, and the litigation that had occurred hearing evidence was quoted to show that in other states. For it was known that re- the first opinion of the court was well foundligious opinion is a thing that men willed upon the facts of the case at hand. The fight for, and sometimes in most insidious court met the vigorous assault made upon ways. The question then was, and the people who adopted the Constitution were so advised, whether we should adopt a Constitution which provided in terms that no religious instruction should ever be a part, directly or indirectly, of the curriculum of our schools. To compromise opinion in these matters is to lead to confusion, which would make the courts the arbiter of what is and what is not religious worship, instruction, or influence, which would be as intolerable to the citizen as it would be to leave a decision to a school board. To this end the Supreme Court of Iowa had led the law, as witness their halting after declaring that their Constitution did not interdict Bible reading. They say, "It is perhaps not to be denied that the principle carried to extreme logical results might be sufficient to sustain the appellant's position," which means more than this: The courts will say how far you may go in matters of this kind, whereas if the right or prohibition be in the Constitution, there is no middle ground; no twilight zone for the courts to explore. It is either a right, or a prohibition. Then, too, witness the illogic of the Kentucky Court in Hackett v. Brooksville Grade School District, 120 Ky. 608, 87 S. W. 792, 69 L. R. A. 592, 117 Am. St. Rep. 599, 9 Ann. Cas. 36. It says:

no

"The Book [meaning The Bible] itself to be sectarian must show that it teaches the peculiar dogmas of a sect as such, and not alone that it is so comprehensive as to include them by the partial interpretation of its adherents."

Notwithstanding it is known of all men that the rock upon which the religious opinions of men have split is the "Word," and that every sect is able to sustain itself at least to its own satisfaction, by reference to the literal word of the Bible. It is the other sect that is the victim of partial interpreta

the first opinion by declaring that "the decision does not, however, go to the extent of entirely excluding the Bible from the public schools. It goes only to the extent of denying the right to use it for the purpose of imparting sectarian instruction," and to quote from the syllabus prepared by the writer of the opinion on rehearing:

"The courts have no right to declare its use to be unlawful because it is possible or probable that those who are privileged to use it will misuse the privilege by attempting to propagate their own peculiar theological or ecclesiastical views and opinions. * Whether it is prudent or politic to permit Bible reading in the public schools is a question for the school authorities, but whether the practice of Bible reading has taken the form of sectarian instruction is a question for the courts to determine upon evidence. It will not be presumed in any leged violation must be established by compecase that the law has been violated; every altent proof." State ex rel. Freeman v. Scheve, 65 Neb. 853, 877, 91 N. W. 846, 93 N. W. 169, 59 L. R. A. 927.

There is another reason for our holding which is not suggested in the briefs, but it nevertheless seems forceful to the writer. It is, that neither the board of education nor the school board has undertaken to define the meaning of the word "Bible." It may be said that they did not have the Jewish Bible in mind, for credit is provided for instruction and examination in the new Testament, but we apprehend that this would not be binding on a Jewish school board. It would be free to prescribe the Talmud. A school board made up of Protestants would have in mind and provide for instruction and examination in the King James' version. A board made up of Catholics would no doubt insist upon the use of the Douay Bible, while a board made up of Lutherans would hold the pupil to the translations of Luther.

"For more than three centuries it has been