The dissenting opinions disagreed, and Stevens wrote that "the voluntary character of the private choice to prefer a parochial education over an education in the public school system seems to me quite irrelevant to the question whether the government's choice to pay for religious indoctrination is constitutionally permissible." Souter questioned how the Court could both keep "Everson" as precedent and decide the case as it did. He also found that religious education and secular education could not be separated, which would automatically violate the Establishment Clause. The establishment clause claims that State are passing laws in correlation to religion.