Responsible for federal programs which promote the economic and social well-being of families, children, individuals, and communities.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), for matching grants to states to provide abstinence education and, at state option, mentoring, counseling, and adult supervision to promote abstinence from sexual activity, with a focus on groups that are most likely to bear children out-of-wedlock.

The Roundtable on Religion & Social Welfare Policy’s analysis of ACLU of Massachusetts v. Leavitt.

The History of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. Read a history of abstinence-only sex education and government funding from the National Coalition to Support Sexuality Education.

ACLU of Massachusetts v. Secretary of U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: The ACLU filed a 2005 lawsuit against the U.S. government, accusing it of financing the religious activities of Silver Ring Thing, a national program that provides abstinence-only education. In 2002, the state of Louisiana settled a lawsuit in which the ACLU asked […]

A Stateline.org story. The U.S. government continues to increase funding for abstinence-only education and requires states to teach abstinence only in order to receive funds. In November 2005, Maine joined California and Pennsylvania in rejecting thousands of federal dollars in favor of teaching comprehensive sex education.

Martha May McCarthy is a professor emeritus of educational leadership and policy studies at Indiana University in Bloomington. She is an expert on religion and public education and wrote “Religious Influences in Public Education: Political and Judicial Developments” in Educational Forum (2000) and “People of Faith as Political Activists in Public Schools” in Education and Urban Society (1996).

Edward J. Larson is a professor of law at Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu, Calif. He is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author of several books dealing with the controversy of evolution versus creationism, including Trial and Error: The American Controversy Over Creation and Evolution and Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America’s Continuing Debate Over […]

Randy Brinson is founder of Redeem the Vote and an advocate of “The Bible and Its Influence.” Contact Don Stillman.