Barry Lynn, executive director of the Washington-based advocacy group Americans United For Separation of Church and State, which brought the lawsuit, said the ruling would have major implications for the Bush administration's policies of allowing faith-based groups to offer services to government institutions.

"This is an enormously significant case on the whole question of how government can, or in this case, cannot aid religious ministries," Lynn said.

"I think this has implications far broader than a prison in a single state because the basic framework of this decision, the way they reached the conclusion is that government can't pay for these religious social services nor can they turn over functions of government essentially to religious operations," he said.

Prison Fellowship Ministries, which contracts with InnerChange Freedom Initiatives Inc. and other organizations to conduct faith-based programs, must repay about $160,000 to the state for money received between June 2006 and June 2007, said Mark Early, the group's president.

He said the ruling would clarify how faith-based programs could work with government agencies.

"We're pleased because in this opinion there are some clarifying guidelines to help us and other faith-based organizations working in government settings, such as prisons, to be able to fashion a program and make sure they do comply with current understanding of constitutional law in this area."

Prison Fellowship operates nine programs in six states: Iowa, Arkansas, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri and Texas. All are now privately funded through donations from individuals and foundations, he said.

The 24-hour a day, seven-day a week program at Newton immerses inmates in evangelical Christianity. Inmates who complete the 18-month program also get help after they're released from prison.

Fred Scaletta, a spokesman for the Iowa Department of Corrections, said corrections officials were reviewing the ruling with the attorney general's office to determine how the state would proceed with the operation of the program.

Bob Brammer, a spokesman for the Iowa attorney general's office, said attorneys were reviewing the ruling and considering whether to appeal.

An appeal could include asking the three-member 8th Circuit panel for clarification on issues or could seek consideration by the full 8th Circuit Court. The ruling also could be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court reversed a ruling from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that prohibited the railroad, a subsidiary of CSX Corp., from challenging the method the state used to determine the value of the railroad's property.

A federal law bars states from discriminating against railroads by taxing their property more heavily than other commercial property. Chief Justice John Roberts said the law allows a railroad to go to court to try to show that the state's way of calculating market value is unfair.

Snyder was convicted of first-degree murder in August 1996 by an all-white jury in Jefferson Parish. The jury also recommended the death sentence. He was found guilty of slashing his estranged wife and a man when he found them in a car outside her mother's home in August 1995.

Lawyers for Snyder said the state illegally struck all five qualified black members from the jury pool using preemptory challenges, or challenges for which a reason does not have to be given.

Under a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, attorneys are not allowed to exclude people from a jury solely because of their race.

A split Louisiana Supreme Court rejected Snyder's challenge, with the majority saying that race had no part in the state's decisions involving potential jurors.

Michael Newdow, a Sacramento doctor and lawyer, sued the Elk Grove Unified School District in 2000 for forcing public school children to recite the pledge, saying it was unconstitutional.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Newdow's favor in 2002, but two years later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Newdow lacked standing to sue because he didn't have custody of the daughter on whose behalf he brought the case. He immediately filed a second lawsuit on behalf of three unidentified parents and their children.

In 2005, a federal judge in Sacramento found in favor of Newdow, ruling the pledge was unconstitutional because its reference to "one nation under God" violates children's rights to be "free from a coercive requirement to affirm God." The judge said he was following the precedent set by the 9th Circuit Court's ruling in Newdow's first case.

A three-judge panel from that court was to hear arguments in the case on Tuesday. The same panel also was to hear arguments in Newdow's case against the national motto, "In God We Trust."

In 2005, Newdow sued Congress and several federal officials, arguing that making money with the motto on it violated the First Amendment clause requiring the separation of church and state.

Last year, a federal judge in Sacramento disagreed, saying the words did not violate Newdow's atheism. Newdow appealed.

Congress first authorized a reference to God on a two-cent piece in 1864. In 1955, the year after lawmakers added the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance, Congress passed a law requiring all U.S. currency to carry the motto "In God We Trust."

U.S. Rep. Jim McDermott says he's disappointed the U.S. Supreme Court has declined to consider his appeal.

He says he believes he had a First Amendment free speech case.

Today's decision leaves a federal appeals court ruling in place. The court said that McDermott should not have leaked a tape-recorded phone call to newspapers. It recorded Republican leaders in 1996 discussing the ethics case against former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

The ruling upholds a previous decision ordering McDermott to pay House Minority Leader John Boehner, (BAY'-ner) of Ohio, who was one of the people on the call. The amount is still being determined but it could be more than $700,000.

Boehner's lawyer says he's gratified by the decision.