The University of Wisconsin at Madison may be headed back to court in a dispute over the use of student-activity fees for a controversial purpose. Six years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the university did not violate the First Amendment rights of students when it used their mandatory fees to finance campus groups that they opposed (The Chronicle, March 31, 2000).
Now, the Associated Press reports, a dispute has arisen over whether a Roman Catholic group can use those fees for expressly religious purposes, such as printing booklets about Lent and running a program of evangelical outreach.
The university wants to deny funds to the group to avoid breaching the church-state divide. The Catholic group sees anti-religious discrimination and warns it is ready to fight back in court.
