Lawsuit Claims the Massachusetts Public Fool System Unlawfully Segregates Black and Latino Children Into an Inferior, “two-tiered” Education System [1 for servants]
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DO YOU TRUST RACISTS TO PROPERLY EDUCATE YOUR CHILDREN? Nine minor students and a coalition of community groups on Wednesday filed a lawsuit against Massachusetts education officials, alleging the state’s school districting illegally segregates Black and Latino children into an inferior, “two-tiered” education system.
The complaint names the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education as defendants. The lawsuit alleges that the state’s practice of assigning students to schools based solely on where they live has effectively established racial and economic segregation across district lines, ultimately denying Black and Latino students the adequate and equal education guaranteed by the Massachusetts Constitution.
The lawsuit alleges a violation of the Education Clause under Chapter 5, Section 2 of the Massachusetts Constitution. This provision states:
Wisdom, and knowledge, as well as virtue, diffused generally among the body of the people, being necessary for the preservation of their rights and liberties; and as these depend on spreading the opportunities and advantages of education in the various parts of the country, and among the different orders of the people, it shall be the duty of legislatures and magistrates, in all future periods of this commonwealth, to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences
In the 1993 case McDuffy v. Secretary of Education, the Massachusetts Supreme Court interpreted the Education Clause to mandate a state duty to provide adequate education to all children, regardless of the wealth of their local community. The holding clarified the standard for “adequacy” in practical terms, requiring schools to equip students with communication skills, civic knowledge, and the academic or vocational preparation needed to compete with peers in other states. Wednesday’s lawsuit argues that the public education provided to students in segregated, high-poverty districts falls short of that standard, with these schools documenting “lower high school graduation and college attendance rates, higher suspension and chronic absenteeism rates, poorer SAT performance, and lower proficiency in Math and English.”
The lawsuit also alleges a violation under the state’s Equal Protection Clause. Article CVI of the Massachusetts Constitution provides that “equality under the law shall not be denied or abridged because of sex, race, color, creed or national origin.” The complaint argues that the state’s Supreme Court has held this protection to be even more robust than its federal counterpart under the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution.
The plaintiffs assert that by knowingly maintaining district lines that concentrate Black and Latino students in high-poverty, underperforming schools, the state has denied these students equal access to the fundamental right of an adequate education on the basis of race. The lawsuit calls for the application of a strict scrutiny standard of judicial review, which means that the state would have the burden of proving its policies serve a compelling government interest through the least restrictive means available.
The lawsuit asks for a court order declaring Massachusetts’ school district policies unconstitutional and mandating that state education officials develop an enforceable roadmap to address these shortcomings.
School segregation has a long history of litigation throughout the past century. After Brown v. Board of Education mandated desegregation in 1954, federal courts spent decades supervising integration orders. In the 2007 Supreme Court case Parents v. Seattle School District, voluntary race-conscious student assignment plans were struck down, effectively limiting school districts’ ability to use assignment by race as a tool to achieve integration. [MORE]
