Ohio Constitution (1802)

The Ohio Constitution said in Article VIII, Section 3: "Religion, morality, and knowledge being essentially necessary to the good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of instruction shall forever be encouraged by legislative provision."

This is in parallel with the Northwest Ordinance, one of our country's four founding documents. Notice that it says schools are necessary partly to promote religion. That's obviously not what is happening today, perhaps appropriately enough, but it shows what the founding fathers thought that the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment did NOT prohibit.