This WORLD Magazine article provides information and background regarding Lincoln Elementary’s Released Time program.
Reviews, Journals, and News
Sophia Lee, Bible Lessons at the Lunch Bell, 18 WORLD Magazine 54–57
2007 Credit for Religious Classes, State Legislatures 8
This excerpt announces South Carolina Legislature’s approval of Released Time educational credit for participating high school students.
Gordon Butler, Cometh the Revolution: The Case for Overruling McCollum v. Board of Education, 99 Dick. L. Rev. 843
“This Article will illustrate how current Establishment Clause jurisprudence, which seeks to micro-manage the interaction of public schools and religion, prevents the educational establishment from coming to grips with American society's religious character and fosters disrespect by denying the law's dependence on religion as a justification for its authority. Indeed, the religious foundation of the doctrine of church-state institutional separation and the support the religious community has given that doctrine are generally ignored. Recognition of the historical dependence of law on religion should preclude a jurisprudence that permits government to monopolize education (an essentially parental function which traditionally includes a strong religious component), expels the religious component from education under the guise of fulfilling a Constitutional mandate designed to protect religion, and then claims that the public school is the chief means of fulfilling the nation's destiny. This Article will suggest that permitting voluntary, parentally controlled religious instruction, as was the case for fifty years preceding McCollum, offers the promise of releasing the religious expression inherently present in the educational process, thus giving full respect to the dignity and diversity of the cultural and religious heritages present in American culture.”
Cometh the Revolution: The Case for Overruling McCollum v. Board of Education (psu.edu)
Jo Kadlecek, Public School Students Get Religion – Legally, 14 Christianity Today 74
This Christianity Today new article describes the impact and concerns of Released Time Education programs.
Michael R. McIntee, Constitutional Law - Separation of Church and State - Released Time Program for Religious Instruction of School Children, 28 N. D. L. Rev. 222
This Law Review article was published in the same year that the Supreme Court decided Zorach v. Clauson. The author provides a brief description of the case as well as provides proposed questions regarding the constitutional limitations of Released Time Programs.
Wilber G. Katz, Freedom of religion and state neutrality, 20 U. Chi. L. Rev. 426 (1952).
This Law Review article discusses the implication of “separation of church and state” regarding Released Time Bible Education Programs. The article acknowledges that a “strict separation would be seriously limit the religious freedom of the citizens concerned.” The author further states, “it is impossible both to protect religious freedom and to keep the state completely insulated from religion.” In public schools, maintaining the balance of “keeping the schools secular and yet avoiding inculcation of secularism” is not easy. However, so long as governments do not provide aid to Released Time programs, there is no violation of neutrality.
2 A.L.R.2d 1371: Right of School Authorities to Release Pupils During School Hours for the Purpose of Attending Religious Education Classes
“This annotation discusses cases determining the right of school authorities to release pupils during school hours for the purpose of attending classes in religious education.”
67B AM Jur 2d Schools § 426 - "Released Time" programs for religious instruction
78A C.J.S. Schools and School Districts § 1014: Validity of compulsory school attendance statutes—Freedom of religion
- Note: American Law Reports are accessible through any legal library in a printed version.