884
Souter, J., dissenting
opinion in the case underscored just this point: "I fully agree . . . that '[p]ublic funds may not be used to endorse the religious message.' [487 U. S.,] at 642 [(Blackmun, J., dissenting)]. . . . [A]ny use of public funds to promote religious doctrines violates the Establishment Clause." Id., at 622-623 (concurring opinion) (emphasis in original).
Bowen was no sport; its pedigree was the line of Everson v. Board of Ed., 330 U. S., at 16-18, Board of Ed. v. Allen, 392 U. S., at 243-249, Tilton v. Richardson, supra, at 678- 682, Hunt v. McNair, supra, at 742-745, and Roemer v. Board of Public Works of Md., 426 U. S., at 759-761. Each of these cases involved a general aid program that provided benefits to a broad array of secular and sectarian institutions on an evenhanded basis, but in none of them was that fact dispositive. The plurality opinion in Roemer made this point exactly:
"The Court has taken the view that a secular purpose and a facial neutrality may not be enough, if in fact the State is lending direct support to a religious activity. The State may not, for example, pay for what is actually a religious education, even though it purports to be paying for a secular one, and even though it makes its aid available to secular and religious institutions alike." 426 U. S., at 747 (opinion of Blackmun, J.).
Instead, the central enquiry in each of these general aid cases, as in Bowen, was whether secular activities could be separated from the sectarian ones sufficiently to ensure that aid would flow to the secular alone.
Witters, Mueller, and Zobrest expressly preserve the standard thus exhibited so often. Each of these cases explicitly distinguished the indirect aid in issue from contrasting examples in the line of cases striking down direct aid, and each thereby expressly preserved the core constitutional principle that direct aid to religion is impermissible. See Zobrest, 509 U. S., at 11-13 (distinguishing Meek v. Pittenger, 421 U. S. 349 (1975), and School Dist. v. Ball, 473 U. S. 373 (1985), and noting that " '[t]he State may not grant aid to a
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