Ruling tests limits on school vouchers in Vermont Modified: 1/28/2021 10:12:49 PM A federal appeals court judge has ruled that three Vermont school districts cannot, for now, exclude Catholic school students from the state’s voucher system. Whether that decision will stick, and what it means for the state’s decades-long prohibition on spending public funds at religious schools, remains to be seen. But a series of rulings suggest Vermont may soon find out whether two constitutional principles — one enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, the other in Vermont’s — can indeed coexist. Vermont is currently defending itself in court against two separate lawsuits brought by two powerful national conservative legal groups. Both cases argue that the exclusion of religious schools from the state’s “town-tuitioning” program is unconstitutional. Districts that don’t have their own schools have been allowed to “tuition out” students to private or public schools. Eighty-one towns across the state offer the school choice option, which is paid for by taxpayer dollars.