The vast majority of private schools are run by religious groups. According to the U.S. Department of Education, 76 percent of private schools have a religious affiliation. Over 80 percent of students attending private schools are enrolled in religious institutions. Most of these religious schools seek to indoctrinate as well as educate. They integrate religion throughout their curriculum and often require all students to receive religious instruction and attend religious services. Thus there is no way to prevent publicly funded vouchers from paying for these institutions' religious activities and education.
In other words, vouchers force Americans to pay taxes to support religion. This runs counter to the First Amendment's guarantee of religious liberty in America. All religious activities should be supported with voluntary contributions.
James Madison, Thomas Jefferson and other founders strongly supported the separation of church and state and opposed taxation to support religion. As Ben Franklin succinctly put it, "When a religion is good I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself and God does not care to support it, so that its professors are obliged to call for the help of the civil power, 'tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one."
