Mueller v. Allen

For the first time, the Court let stand a law that in practice benefited parochial schooling, as a majority found the law was primarily secular.

The First Amendment contains in its first clause that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." As interpreted by the Supreme Court, the Establishment Clause prohibits the government from promoting religious beliefs in any form. After passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, the clause was applied to state law as well.

In the twentieth century, the Supreme Court has considered a number of cases involving state support of parochial (also called sectarian) schooling. The Court has generally limited efforts to subsidize religious schooling, viewing those attempts as the establishment of religion. The Court, however, has found exceptions to those limits, and Mueller v. Allen is one of the most important of these.