268 U.S. 510 (1925)
In November 1922, voters in Oregon adopted the Compulsory Education Act under the initiative provision of the state constitution.1
The Act, effective September 1, 1926, requires every parent, guardian, or other person having control or charge or custody of a child between eight and sixteen years to send him to a public school for the period of time a public school shall be held during the current year in the district where the child resides, with failure to do so declared a misdemeanor.2 Exemptions exist for children who are not normal, have completed the eighth grade, reside at considerable distances from any public school, or whose parents or guardians hold special permits from the County Superintendent.3
The Society of the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary is an Oregon corporation organized in 1880 with power to care for orphans, educate and instruct the youth, establish and maintain academies or schools, and acquire necessary real and personal property.4 It has long devoted its property and effort to the secular and religious education and care of children, and has acquired the valuable good will of many parents and guardians.5 It conducts interdependent primary and high schools and junior colleges, and maintains orphanages for the custody and control of children between eight and sixteen.6 In its primary schools many children between those ages are taught the subjects usually pursued in Oregon public schools during the first eight years.7 Systematic religious instruction and moral training according to the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church are also regularly provided.8 The corporation owns valuable buildings, especially constructed and equipped, for school purposes.9 The business is remunerative—the annual income from primary schools exceeds thirty thousand dollars—and the successful conduct of this requires long time contracts with teachers and parents.10 The Compulsory Education Act of 1922 has already caused the withdrawal from its schools of children who would otherwise continue, and their income has steadily declined.11
Hill Military Academy is a private corporation organized in 1908 under the laws of Oregon, engaged in owning, operating and conducting for profit an elementary, college preparatory and military training school for boys between the ages of five and twenty-one years.12 The average attendance is one hundred, and the annual fees received for each student amount to some eight hundred dollars.13 The elementary department is divided into eight grades, as in the public schools.14 The college preparatory department has four grades, similar to those of the public high schools.15 The courses of study conform to the requirements of the State Board of Education.16 Military instruction and training are also given, under the supervision of an Army officer.17 It owns considerable real and personal property; some useful only for school purposes.18 The business and incident good will are very valuable.19 To conduct its affairs long time contracts must be made for supplies, equipment, teachers and pupils.20 Parents and guardians are refusing to make contracts for the future instruction of their sons, and some are being withdrawn.21
The Society of the Sisters and Hill Military Academy each filed bills in federal district court setting out the foregoing facts and alleging that the enactment conflicts with rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.22 No answer was interposed in either cause, and after proper notices the causes were heard by three judges on motions for preliminary injunctions upon the specifically alleged facts.23 The court granted decrees based upon the undenied allegations restraining appellants from threatening or attempting to enforce the Act.24 Appeals from those decrees were taken to the Supreme Court of the United States.25
Whether the Oregon Compulsory Education Act of 1922 unreasonably interferes with the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children?26
Under the doctrine of Meyer v. Nebraska, legislation which has no reasonable relation to some purpose within the competency of the State may not abridge rights guaranteed by the Constitution.27 The fundamental theory of liberty upon which all governments in this Union repose excludes any general power of the State to standardize its children by forcing them to accept instruction from public teachers only.28 The child is not the mere creature of the State; those who nurture him and direct his destiny have the right, coupled with the high duty, to recognize and prepare him for additional obligations.29
Yes. The Compulsory Education Act requires every parent, guardian, or other person having control of a child between eight and sixteen years to send that child to a public school for the period a public school is held during the current year in the district where the child resides, with only narrow exemptions for abnormal children, those who have completed the eighth grade, or those living at considerable distances.30 Its primary schools teach the subjects usually pursued in Oregon public schools during the first eight years along with systematic religious instruction according to the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church.31 Its annual income from those schools has already declined because children have withdrawn.32 Its elementary department follows the same eight-grade structure as the public schools.33 Its parents and guardians have begun refusing future contracts while some students have been withdrawn.34
The Act bears no reasonable relation to any proper state purpose in the records before the court.35 The private schools conduct a useful and meritorious undertaking.36 They maintain long-term contracts with teachers and parents.37 They have discharged their obligations to patrons, students, and the State without any showing of peculiar circumstances or emergencies that would demand the destruction of all such primary schools.38 The state retains ample authority to inspect, supervise, and regulate the schools, to require attendance at some school, and to ensure that essential subjects are taught by teachers of good moral character.39 Yet the statute goes further by compelling attendance exclusively at public schools.40 Enforcement would therefore destroy the profitable features of the appellees' businesses and eliminate the valuable good will they have acquired over decades of operation.41
The Oregon Compulsory Education Act of 1922 unreasonably interferes with the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children.42
Whether the Act deprives the appellee private school corporations of their property without due process of law by interfering with the free choice of present and prospective patrons?43
Corporations engaged in the business of operating schools possess business and property interests that receive protection under the Fourteenth Amendment.44 These interests are threatened with destruction through unwarranted compulsion exercised over present and prospective patrons, and courts have long extended protection against loss threatened by such governmental action.45
Yes. The Society of the Sisters owns valuable buildings specially constructed and equipped for school purposes, maintains interdependent primary schools, high schools, and junior colleges, and derives annual income exceeding thirty thousand dollars from its primary schools while relying on long-term contracts with teachers and parents.46 The Act has already produced steady declines in that income through the withdrawal of children who would otherwise have continued.47 Hill Military Academy owns considerable real and personal property useful only for school purposes, receives average annual fees of eight hundred dollars per student from an average attendance of one hundred boys, and depends on long-term contracts for supplies, equipment, teachers, and pupils.48 Parents and guardians have refused to make future contracts and some students have already been withdrawn because of the statute and the announced intention of state officers to enforce it.49
The district court correctly recognized that the right to conduct schools constitutes property and that parents and guardians possess liberty to direct the education of their children by selecting reputable teachers and places.50 The Act compels attendance only at public schools.51 This eliminates the free choice of patrons and necessarily deprives the corporations of their established patronage, destroying the value of their businesses and property without due process of law.52 No answer was interposed to the bills, and the three-judge court therefore properly granted preliminary injunctions on the undenied allegations.53
The Act deprives the appellee private school corporations of their property without due process of law by interfering with the free choice of present and prospective patrons.54
Whether the suits brought by the corporations to restrain enforcement of the Act were premature?55
No. The Society of the Sisters has already experienced the withdrawal of children who would otherwise have continued in its schools and has suffered a steady decline in income from its primary schools.58 Hill Military Academy has already seen parents and guardians refuse to enter contracts for future instruction and has already lost some students.59 These concrete, ongoing harms demonstrate that the injury is present and very real, not merely speculative.60
If no relief had been available prior to the Act's effective date of September 1, 1926, the destruction of the appellees' businesses and the depreciation of their property would have become irreparable.61 The appellants, as public officers, have publicly proclaimed their purpose to enforce the statute strictly, and the district court found after proper notice and hearing that these threats would continue to cause irreparable injury.62 The suits therefore satisfy the requirements for equitable intervention, and the three-judge court properly proceeded to grant preliminary injunctions restraining enforcement.63
The suits brought by the corporations to restrain enforcement of the Act were not premature.64