Cite as: 536 U. S. 639 (2002)
Souter, J., dissenting
quences of "substantial" aid hypothesized in Meek are realized here: the majority makes no pretense that substantial amounts of tax money are not systematically underwriting religious practice and indoctrination.
B
It is virtually superfluous to point out that every objective underlying the prohibition of religious establishment is betrayed by this scheme, but something has to be said about the enormity of the violation. I anticipated these objectives earlier, supra, at 689-690, in discussing Everson, which cataloged them, the first being respect for freedom of conscience. Jefferson described it as the idea that no one "shall be compelled to . . . support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever," A Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom, in 5 The Founders' Constitution 84 (P. Kurland & R. Lerner eds. 1987), even a "teacher of his own religious persuasion," ibid., and Madison thought it violated by any " 'authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence . . . of his property for the support of any . . . establishment.' " Memorial and Remonstrance ¶ 3, reprinted in Everson, 330 U. S., at 65-66. "Any tax to establish religion is antithetical to the command that the minds of men always be wholly free," Mitchell, 530 U. S., at 871 (Souter, J., dissenting) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).22 Madison's objection to three pence has simply been lost in the majority's formalism.
As for the second objective, to save religion from its own corruption, Madison wrote of the " 'experience . . . that eccle-22 As a historical matter, the protection of liberty of conscience may well have been the central objective served by the Establishment Clause. See Feldman, Intellectual Origins of the Establishment Clause, 77 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 346, 398 (May 2002) ("In the time between the proposal of the Constitution and of the Bill of Rights, the predominant, not to say exclusive, argument against established churches was that they had the potential to violate liberty of conscience").
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