ABSTRACT
In the late 1990s, the State of Ohio began to allow private schools in Cleveland, including religious schools, to cash state-funded educational vouchers. In 2002, Ohio successfully litigated the constitutionality of those vouchers in the United States Supreme Court. Proponents expected these victories to launch a nationwide voucher juggernaut, whereupon public schools, secular private schools, and religious schools would compete for students and resources in a transformed educational marketplace. When only a handful of new voucher programs emerged in the early 2000s, many therefore deemed the voucher experiment, notwithstanding the Court’s constitutional sanction, a bust. But, in fact, the voucher movement did transform American schooling. Vouchers might be dramatically resurrected by a Donald Trump Administration, although this is far from certain. Even if not, though, vouchers stimulated the explosive growth of charter schools, which strongly resemble vouchers in design and implementation. And it seems likely that the voucher litigation ultimately will also catalyze increased interpenetration of the religious and secular school sectors, as more and more school programs move online.
