FRANKFORT, Ky.—State funding for a new pharmacy school at a private Baptist university violates the state constitution, a Franklin County (Kentucky) judge ruled March 6.

Kentucky lawmakers authorized the spending at the University of the Cumberlands shortly after it ousted a student in April 2006 for being gay. Plaintiffs had argued, among other things, that the student’s dismissal from the southeastern Kentucky university was evidence that the school would not guarantee equal protection.

Franklin County Circuit Court Special Judge Roger Crittenden, however, ruled the court did not have to decide on that issue. Instead, Crittenden ruled that funding for the school’s pharmacy building violated portions of the Kentucky Constitution that guarantee religious freedom and that public money for education should not be spent on any “church, sectarian or denominational school.”

Crittenden ruled it was unconstitutional for the General Assembly to appropriate $10 million in state funding for a new pharmacy school at University of the Cumberlands and $2 million for a permanent scholarship fund there.

He also ruled that funding a permanent scholarship program as part of the state’s two-year spending plan was unconstitutional.

Kentucky Fairness Alliance executive director Christina Gilgor said Crittenden’s ruling was a victory against “state-subsidized discrimination.”