874
Souter, J., dissenting
[or] all religions . . . . No tax in any amount . . . can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions . . . whatever form they may adopt to teach . . . religion." 330 U. S., at 16. Thus, the principle of "no aid," with which no one in Everson disagreed.4
Immediately, however, there was the difficulty over what might amount to "aid" or "support." The problem for the Everson Court was not merely the imprecision of the words, but the "other language of the [First Amendment that] commands that [government] cannot hamper its citizens in the free exercise of their own religion," ibid., with the consequence that government must "be a neutral in its relations with groups of religious believers and non-believers," id., at 18. Since withholding some public benefits from religious groups could be said to "hamper" religious exercise indirectly, and extending other benefits said to aid it, an argument-proof formulation of the no-aid principle was impossible, and the Court wisely chose not to attempt any such thing. Instead it gave definitive examples of public benefits provided pervasively throughout society that would be of some value to organized religion but not in a way or to a degree that could sensibly be described as giving it aid or violating the neutrality requirement: there was no Establishment Clause concern with "such general government services as ordinary police and fire protection, connections for sewage disposal, public highways and sidewalks." Id., at 17-18. These "benefits of public welfare legislation," id., at 16, extended in modern times to virtually every member of the population and valuable to every person and association, were the paradigms of advantages that religious organiza-4 While Everson's dissenters parted company with the majority over the specific question of school buses, the Court stood as one behind the principle of no aid for religious teaching. 330 U. S., at 15-16; id., at 25-26 (Jackson, J., dissenting); id., at 28-29, 31-32 (Rutledge, J., dissenting).
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