Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 536 U.S. 639 (2002), was a 5–4 decision of the United States Supreme Court that upheld an Ohio program that used school vouchers. The Court decided that the program did not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, even if the vouchers could be used for private religious schools. Background The public schools in many of the poorer parts of Cleveland were deemed failures, and the legislature enacted the Pilot Project Scholarship Program in an effort to address the problem. Ohio had been running the program, which allowed parents of qualified students in the Cleveland School District, from the 1996–97 school year, to use public money to pay for tuition at private schools in the program, which included religious schools. Of the 56 private schools that agreed to the program, 46 were sectarian. The program aimed to improve the low educational performance of the students in the school district. The program provided tuition vouchers for up to $2,250 a year to some parents of students in the school district to attend participating public or private schools in the city and neighboring suburbs. The program also allocated tutorial aid for students who remained in public schools. The vouchers were distributed to parents according to their financial need. The parents chose where to enroll their children. Since the number of students applying to the program greatly exceeded the number of vouchers available, recipients were chosen by lottery from among the eligible families. In the 1999–2000 school year, 82% of the participating private schools had a religious affiliation. None of the adjacent suburban public schools joined the program. 96% of the students receiving vouchers were enrolled in religiously affiliated schools and 60% were from low-income families, at or below the poverty line. Participating schools were not permitted to discriminate on the basis of race, religion, or ethnic background. They are also not allowed to "advocate or foster unlawful behavior or teach hatred of any person or group on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion." A group of Ohio taxpayers then filed an action against Susan Zelman, the superintendent of public education in Ohio, by pleading that the program violated the Establishment Clause. Simmons-Harris, along with other residents of the Cleveland area, argued that the government "could not pay tuition for students to attend religious school." The local federal district court, in addition to the Court of