If you haven’t been following North Carolina’s school-equity litigation over the past 15 years, then you have no idea how flabbergasted the state’s politicians and political scribes were last week when Wake Superior Court Judge Howard Manning issued his long-awaited final ruling in the Leandro case.
You see, this lawsuit was supposed to do what previous legal efforts had failed to do: declare North Carolina’s system of school funding unconstitutional and mandate a massive influx of new dollars into local school districts. Essentially, those who think that education in our state would take a quantum leap forward if we just spent billions of dollars more were hoping that a court would take care of business for them. The result was supposed to be a total restructuring of the funding system, and inevitably a big tax increase to pay for it.
It’s happened elsewhere. But not here, not with this judge, not in this contrarian decision (with which I do not wholly agree, but then again my judicial experience is somewhat less extensive than his). In a ruling that deserves careful reading, Manning argued that schools should spent existing dollars better, criticizing expenditures outside of the core function of public education.
Yes, the state lost its weakest argument, that local school districts bear the responsibility for educating students. The state constitution says otherwise. But it does not say anything remotely justifying a judicial order to overturn financial decisions made by elected representatives. Moreover, the facts have changed on the ground beneath the legal standoff. Poor school districts in North Carolina today get about as much money per person as the wealthy districts did when the equity litigation began. Unless all school districts were underfunded 15 years ago, an argument that would make no legal sense (though one could certainly make it in the political arena), the case has already collapsed under the weight of time and changing conditions.
Judging by the odd coverage given to Manning’s decision over the weekend, many commentators haven’t yet comprehended the basic fact that the Leandro plaintiffs lost. They wanted a court order granting them big increases in state funding. They didn’t get it. They did win confirmation that ensuring educational opportunity is a constitutional duty of the state, butManning did not (and should not have) equated this duty with increased expenditure.
Editorialists are attempting to spin the Leandro case into what they wanted to see happen (see, for example, the Fayetteville Observer and the Raleigh News and Observer.) Nice try, but no way. The result was akin to a personal injury lawyer proving negligence but receiving a jury award of $1 in damages. Now it’s time to move on, to debate real policy choices that might expand educational opportunity without worsening the state’s already weakening economy with yet another tax increase.
North Carolina already spends plenty of money on education. As Manning wrote in his decision, though not in so many words, it’s the productivity of that investment that should command the attention of state officials.