Leandro author encourages all sides of NC education funding debate

There’s a clear clash of opinions about the recent end of North Carolina’s three-decade-old Leandro education funding lawsuit.

On one side, the state Supreme Court’s April 2 decision to void every Leandro ruling since 2017 has been labeled a glaring failure. Critics claim the decision will harm schoolchildren across North Carolina. On the other side, the high court earned praise for respecting the judiciary’s traditional constitutional role. The court’s majority recognized that judges are not elected to write education policy.

Of all responses to the Leandro decision, perhaps the most interesting is former Chief Justice Burley Mitchell’s analysis. Now 85 years old, Mitchell wrote the original Leandro decision back in 1997. Twenty-nine years later, he offered Raleigh News and Observer readers his assessment of his successors’ work.

The decision to shut down Leandro litigation split the current Supreme Court largely along party lines. Four Republican justices made up the majority, with one Republican and both Democrats dissenting.

Mitchell, a Democrat, could have followed the party line. He could have excoriated Republicans. He could have lamented their impact on one of his most significant rulings.

Instead he offered observations that could bolster both proponents and critics of the Leandro case’s end.

Those who see a role for the judiciary in enforcing students’ educational rights will appreciate portions of Mitchell’s commentary.

The “constitutional right to the opportunity for a sound basic education,” Mitchell wrote, “is still binding precedent.”

The right “can still be enforced in a proper case,” he added. Affected plaintiffs would need to target “all necessary defendants,” perhaps signaling that the policymaking legislative branch should be named in any future litigation.

Mitchell read the April 2 decision as suggesting that a class action suit could be pursued on behalf of all children in the state. “I think that is correct and that such an action not only could but should be brought by supporters of our public schools,” he wrote.

The former chief justice recommended that a new case should focus on “educational adequacy” rather than “school funding.”

While Mitchell expressed support for a new lawsuit, he offered no criticism of the decision to end the Leandro case.

“In her dissent, Justice Allison Riggs succinctly described the case as having become ‘a mess,’” Mitchell wrote. Few would disagree with that assessment.

The former chief justice quoted no other portion of the decision, including none of the dissenters’ critiques of the Republican majority.

Mitchell noted that, since his initial Leandro opinion, “the laws relating to school funding have totally changed, and the state has adopted a series of new comprehensive state education plans to replace the ‘Basic Education Plan’ that was in effect” in the late 1990s.

The funding system and education plan in place in Leandro’s early days “no longer exist.” A trial judge’s decision that those earlier plans failed to meet state constitutional obligations “is no longer relevant.”

One would not expect such remarks from an observer seeking to prolong the Leandro litigation.

Mitchell also tackled the argument that North Carolina schools need more money.

“Certainly, funding of our state school system is vital,” he wrote. “As just one example, our schools are losing competent teachers to the schools of surrounding states who pay them more.”

“But school funding is not the only, or probably even the best, measure of whether the state is meeting its constitutional responsibility under Leandro,” Mitchell continued. “As the State Supreme Court noted in 1997, ‘output’ measurements such as ‘the level of student performance on standard achievement tests’ may be more reliable than measurements of ‘inputs such as per-pupil funding or general educational funding provided by the state.’”

A greater focus on outcomes rather than inputs remains one of the least-reported elements of the Leandro litigation’s long history. Mitchell returned outcomes to the center of the discussion.

He also put forward a bipartisan appeal. He praised school performance outcomes achieved under his old boss, Democratic North Carolina Gov. Jim Hunt, while pointing toward similar success for schools overseen by Texas governor and future Republican President George W. Bush.

“Education must not be a partisan matter,” Mitchell wrote. He urged North Carolinians to “encourage and inspire the legislative and executive branches of our government to rise to the challenge providing all the children of the state the opportunity to achieve a sound basic education as guaranteed by Leandro.”

That outcome likely depends on policymakers’ willingness to focus on facts, not partisan rhetoric. They would be wise to model the measured approach offered by the original Leandro ruling’s author.

Mitch Kokai is senior political analyst for the John Locke Foundation.