Religious Schools v. Children's Rights

Despair over the reported inadequacies of public education leads many people to consider religious schools as an alternative. James G. Dwyer demonstrates, however, that religious schooling is almost completely unregulated and that common pedagogical practices in fundamentalist Christian and Catholic schools may be damaging to children. He presents evidence of excessive restriction of children's basic liberties, stifling of intellectual development, the instilling of dogmatic and intolerant attitudes, as well as the infliction of psychological and emotional harms, including excessive guilt and repression and, especially among girls, diminished self-esteem.

Courts, legal and political theorists, and the public typically argue that families and religious communities are entitled to raise their children as they see fit and that the state must remain neutral on religious matters. Dwyer proposes an alternative framework for state policy regarding religious schooling and other child-rearing practices, urging that the focus always be on what is best, from a secular perspective, for the affected children. He argues that the children who attend religious schools have a right to adequate state regulation and oversight of their education. States are obligated to ensure that such schools do not engage in harmful practices and that they provide their students with the training necessary for pursuit of a broad range of careers and for full citizenship in a pluralistic, democratic society.

James G. Dwyer is Professor of Law at the College of William and Mary. He is the author of Vouchers within Reason: A Child-Centered Approach to Education Reform, also from Cornell, and The Relationship Rights of Children.

This is a serious book, which should be read by anyone making education decisions.... As serious to the well-being of children as desegregation, Dwyer's ideas deserve to be read. Recommended for academic libraries.

This book certainly will inspire lively and intense discussions.

James G. Dwyer has forced me to see the connection between religion and schooling from a novel and powerful point of view.

Given the current popularity of the parental choice to raise one's child as one sees fit, as well as the intensified efforts of school voucher proponents to use public money for private education, Dwyer's thesis is not likely to receive a warm embrace. For that reason, this book should be read.

James G. Dwyer's Religious Schools v. Children's Rights is a contribution to the appropriate balance between the liberty rights of children and the rights of parents to control and direct the behavior of their children.... Rights to the protection of one's interests, Dwyer contends, are rights that children should possess, including 'a right to protection from any state interference that is not, on the whole, to their benefit'.... Dwyer's job is to convince courts and legislative bodies that they ought to extend the Limited Rights Principle to children. It is at this point that Dwyer does his best work.