Emphasizing that more than 50,000 pupils are now attending about 250 elementary and secondary Hebrew Day Schools in 26 states at an annual cost of $25,000,000, the National Society for Hebrew Day Schools–known as Torah Umeso-rah–today asked the United States Senate and the House to include religious schools in the Kennedy Administration bill to provide Federal aid to the nation’s public schools. The Administration measure excludes aid to private religious schools on grounds such aid would violate the Constitutional principle of separation of church and state.
The Torah Umesorah statement, which was submitted to the Senate Labor and Public Welfare Committee and the House Education and Labor subcommittee, asserted that restriction of the Federal aid program to the public schools only, as proposed in the Administration bill, would be discrimination “against religiously oriented schools” which have “enriched” the educational system in the United States. The statement rejected the argument that Federal aid to religious schools was contrary to the first amendment of the Constitution.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
