Sticking with Edgewood
On the subject of school finance, the Texas Supreme Court doggedly refuses to overturn an activist precedent from a prior era.
In San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez (1973), a lawsuit brought by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) challenging spending disparities among school districts in Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court astutely refused to become embroiled in disputes involving the adequacy or equity of public-school funding, correctly acknowledging that the justices on the Court lacked the expertise “so necessary to the making of wise decisions with respect to the raising and disposition of public revenues.” Further, the Court in Rodriguez conceded it lacked “specialized knowledge and experience” in matters of educational policy, counseling deference to the legislature. Thus, concluded Justice Powell’s opinion for the majority, “We are unwilling to assume for ourselves a level of wisdom superior to that of legislators. . . . [T]he ultimate solutions must come from the lawmakers and from the democratic pressures of those who elect them.”
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