Agostini v. Felton
E180462
Agostini v. Felton is a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court case that reshaped Establishment Clause doctrine by allowing public school teachers to provide remedial instruction in religious schools under certain safeguards.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Agostini v. Felton canonical | 1 |
| Agostini, Superintendent of Schools of the Board of Education of the City of New York v. Felton | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T1584822 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Agostini v. Felton Context triple: [Lemon v. Kurtzman, overruledOrLimitedBy, Agostini v. Felton]
-
A.
Plyler v. Doe
Plyler v. Doe is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held states cannot deny free public education to children based on their immigration status, recognizing such exclusion as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
-
B.
Eisenstadt v. Baird
Eisenstadt v. Baird is a landmark 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision that extended the right to possess and use contraceptives to unmarried individuals, significantly advancing privacy and equal protection jurisprudence.
-
C.
Lee v. Weisman
Lee v. Weisman is a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held clergy-led prayer at public school graduation ceremonies unconstitutional under the Establishment Clause.
-
D.
Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser
Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser is a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that held public schools may discipline students for lewd or indecent speech, distinguishing such expression from the protected political speech recognized in Tinker.
-
E.
Doe v. Bolton
Doe v. Bolton is a 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that, alongside Roe v. Wade, expanded and defined the scope of abortion rights by striking down restrictive state regulations.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Agostini v. Felton Target entity description: Agostini v. Felton is a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court case that reshaped Establishment Clause doctrine by allowing public school teachers to provide remedial instruction in religious schools under certain safeguards.
-
A.
Plyler v. Doe
Plyler v. Doe is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held states cannot deny free public education to children based on their immigration status, recognizing such exclusion as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
-
B.
Eisenstadt v. Baird
Eisenstadt v. Baird is a landmark 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision that extended the right to possess and use contraceptives to unmarried individuals, significantly advancing privacy and equal protection jurisprudence.
-
C.
Lee v. Weisman
Lee v. Weisman is a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held clergy-led prayer at public school graduation ceremonies unconstitutional under the Establishment Clause.
-
D.
Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser
Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser is a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that held public schools may discipline students for lewd or indecent speech, distinguishing such expression from the protected political speech recognized in Tinker.
-
E.
Doe v. Bolton
Doe v. Bolton is a 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that, alongside Roe v. Wade, expanded and defined the scope of abortion rights by striking down restrictive state regulations.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
Establishment Clause case
ⓘ
United States Supreme Court case ⓘ |
| changedDoctrine |
Modified the Lemon test as applied to aid to religious schools
ⓘ
Reduced emphasis on the concept of symbolic union between church and state in aid cases ⓘ Relaxed the presumption that public employees in religious schools inevitably advance religion ⓘ |
| citation |
117 S. Ct. 1997
ⓘ
138 L. Ed. 2d 391 ⓘ 521 U.S. 203 ⓘ |
| clauseInterpreted | Establishment Clause ⓘ |
| constitutionalProvisionInterpreted | First Amendment to the United States Constitution ⓘ |
| country |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| court | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| decisionDate | 1997-06-23 ⓘ |
| dissentBy | David H. Souter ⓘ |
| dissentJoinedBy |
John Paul Stevens
ⓘ
Ruth Bader Ginsburg ⓘ Stephen G. Breyer ⓘ |
| docketNumber | 96-552 ⓘ |
| fullName |
Agostini v. Felton
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
Agostini, Superintendent of Schools of the Board of Education of the City of New York v. Felton
|
| holding |
Public school teachers may provide Title I remedial instruction in religious schools if safeguards prevent governmental indoctrination and excessive entanglement
ⓘ
Establishment Clause ⓘ
surface form:
The Establishment Clause is not violated by sending public employees into religious schools to provide neutral, secular aid under appropriate safeguards
|
| impact |
Expanded permissible government aid to students in religious schools
ⓘ
Signaled a shift toward greater accommodation of religion in Establishment Clause jurisprudence ⓘ |
| issue | Whether public school teachers may provide remedial instruction at religious schools using public funds ⓘ |
| keyConcept |
Neutrality toward religion in distribution of public benefits
ⓘ
No presumption of indoctrination from public employees in religious schools ⓘ Safeguards against religious indoctrination and excessive entanglement ⓘ |
| legalSubject |
Constitutional law
ⓘ
Establishment Clause ⓘ First Amendment to the United States Constitution ⓘ
surface form:
First Amendment
|
| location | New York City ⓘ |
| majorityJoinedBy |
Anthony M. Kennedy
ⓘ
Antonin Scalia ⓘ Clarence Thomas ⓘ William H. Rehnquist ⓘ |
| majorityOpinionBy |
Sandra Day O’Connor
ⓘ
surface form:
Sandra Day O'Connor
|
| overruledCase | Aguilar v. Felton ⓘ |
| overruledCaseCitation | 473 U.S. 402 ⓘ |
| party |
Agostini, Superintendent of Schools of the Board of Education of the City of New York
ⓘ
Felton ⓘ New York City Department of Education ⓘ
surface form:
New York City Board of Education
|
| proceduralPosture | Motion to vacate a permanent injunction issued after Aguilar v. Felton ⓘ |
| relatedProgram |
Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965
ⓘ
surface form:
Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965
|
| subsequentCitationIn |
Mitchell v. Helms
ⓘ
Zelman v. Simmons-Harris ⓘ |
| term | October Term 1996 ⓘ |
| testApplied | Lemon test ⓘ |
| testModified | Lemon test effects prong ⓘ |
| yearDecided | 1997 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Agostini v. Felton Description of subject: Agostini v. Felton is a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court case that reshaped Establishment Clause doctrine by allowing public school teachers to provide remedial instruction in religious schools under certain safeguards.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
Agostini, Superintendent of Schools of the Board of Education of the City of New York v. Felton