United States Fourth Circuit

For purposes of determining whether financial assistance to an institute of higher learning would violate the Establishment Clause, it no longer matters whether an institution is "pervasively sectarian" as long as the aid program has a secular purpose and uses neutral criteria.

Appellate Information

• Argued 05/07/2001
• Decided 06/26/2001
• Published 06/26/2001

Judges

• Before WILKINSON, Chief Judge, and WILLIAMS and DIANA GRIBBON MOTZ, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Fourth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• ARGUED:  Andrew Howard Baida, Assistant Attorney General, Baltimore, MD, for Appellants. R. Hewitt Pate, Hunton & Williams, Richmond, VA, for Appellee.   ON BRIEF:  J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Attorney General of Maryland, Mark J. Davis, Assistant Attorney General, Baltimore, MD;  Pace J. McConkie, Assistant Attorney General, Annapolis, MD, for Appellants.  Geremy C. Kamens, Hunton & Williams, Richmond, VA;  Mark B. Bierbower, Hunton & Williams;  Michael P. McDonald, Michael E. Rosman, Center For Individual Rights, Washington, DC;  Professor Michael W. McConnell, Salt Lake City, Utah, for Appellee.  Ann D. Springer, Donna R. Euben, American Association of University Professors, Washington, DC;  Professor David M. Rabban, University of Texas School of Law, Austin, TX, for Amicus Curiae AAUP. Steven K. Green, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Washington, DC;  Martin E. Karlinsky, Elizabeth J. Coleman, Steven M. Freeman, Antidefamation League, New York, NY, for Amici Curiae Americans United, et al.  Stuart H. Newberger, Jeffrey E. Greene, Amy E. Laderberg, Crowell & Moring, L.L.P.;   Dwight Sullivan, American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Maryland, Baltimore, MD;  Arthur B. Spitzer, American Civil Liberties Union of the National Capital Area, Washington, D.C., for Amici Curiae Foundation, et al.   Lee Boothby, Boothby & Yingst, Washington, DC, for Amici Curiae Council for Religious Freedom, et al.  Carl H. Esbeck, Gregory S. Baylor, Center for Law and Religious Freedom, Christian Legal Society, Annandale, VA, for Amici Curiae Society, et al.