School choices are taking off. Over the past few years, many states have adopted programs to ensure parents direct their state funds to pay similar fees to their children’s private school tuition. Several state courts are now hearing about challenges to the constitutionality of these programs. The lawsuit argues that the state constitution limits state funding for education to public schools only.
These cases employ a litigation strategy that stems from the challenge of “substantial inter-district disparities in school spending” rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972. San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez K-12 Education is not a fundamental right under the federal constitution.
This result is notoriously leading a prominent litigator to demand that appropriate and fair school budgets be changed from federal courts to state courts. If NO is included in the US Constitution Federal Government The right to education. This means that federal courts will not apply strict scrutiny to financial disparities. state The court will correct violations of its own constitutions of guarantees of education rights. Efforts to induce state courts to do so gained momentum over the next few decades. San Antonio It is often referred to as the one that constitutes the second and third “waves” of school financial cases. It is likely that the plaintiffs won in about half of the states and influenced the school finance laws of additional states that fear litigation.
Today’s litigators are deploying the same strategy to beat school choices. They argue that school choices are inconsistent with the same “educational clauses” in the state constitutions, where second and third wave financial cases relied on. These clauses place the obligation on the state to create and maintain a system of “common” or “free” schools. This requirement can be combined implicitly or explicitly, with the requirement that schools so created must be funded and organized to provide a floor of quality and equity.
The argument that school selection programs violate such provisions is a requirement that Congress supports. public The school implies that they may not be able to provide public funds Not– Public school. Additionally, it uses public money to overturn the costs of private schools chosen by parents, and further unacceptably divert the funds needed for Congress to concentrate on public education. These arguments — including variations based on specific languages of individual national constitutions — have failed in some states, but have succeeded in the Supreme Court of South Carolina in 2024 and in the Spring and Summer of 2025 in court courts in Ohio, Utah and (pre-requested) Wyoming. These cases are highly likely to advance to the state’s Supreme Court. Tennessee courts are also considering the issue.
Litigators also focus on the characteristics of state education clauses that are not closely related to school financial cases. It is a language that directly prohibits funding for private schools.
To take three related examples, the South Carolina Constitution “requires that no money is paid from public funds or that the state’s credit should be paid. The Ohio Constitution states that “a religious or other denomination, or sect, has no exclusive right or control over a portion of the school funds in this state.” And the Montana Constitution prohibits Congress from making direct or indirect budgets or payments from public funds or money.
These provisions clearly address religion. This is relevant as most selection programs explicitly provide participation by religious and secular schools. This is the reason for the principle – many choice advocates believe parents should be allowed to receive the maximum educational options – but there is also practicality. The current private school market is dominated by religious providers, making it difficult to choose from the ground without participating. Thus, the recent success of school choice efforts has discovered both ideological and practical support from the boundaries of the US Supreme Court decision that requires private religious schools to participate in selection programs on an equal footing with secular schools. One of the court cases, Espinozav. Montana Department of Revenueheld that the application of the above cited no-aid clause in the Montana Constitution to the state’s school selection programme violates the Federal Freedom Movement Clause.
However, the above South Carolina and Ohio decisions focused on the specificity of non-aid causes in states that are not shared with that of Montana (or Utah). The South Carolina Supreme Court emphasized that its constitution bans public funding from “religious or other private education” institutions. The court’s view makes it clear that this is not a prohibiting religious participation (it is Espinoza (Not allowed) But fundraising Any Private school, religious or secular (this Espinoza ). Ohio court courts have made a similar move, referring to a ban on using school funds to provide “religious or other sects.” The word “or” is written by the court clearly indicates that the prohibition does not target religion, but rather prohibits receiving religious funds as well as religious “denominations.” Sprayer. (Wyoming school choice challengers rely on similar honorary ady provisions in the state’s constitution that are not specific to education.)
Today’s case clearly reflects the response San Antonio: Advocates of public education who discovered that the US Constitution relies on state constitutions for ignore or even disability. However, this incident illustrates a change in the style of interpretation of the national constitution since the 1970s and 1980s. The debate about whether giving money to private schools violates the obligation to support public schools is a considerable part of whether or not, and how to apply. Expression of exclusion of others Canon of interpretation of text provides for laws that explicitly mention that one thing should be read to rule out other things that are not mentioned. Does the constitution, which places the obligation to fund public schools, mean an incidental prohibition on funding to competitors?
Similarly, South Carolina and Ohio constitutional framers, whether they target religion with no assistance clauses, rely on competing applications of rules against surplus. On the one hand, there is no reason to say “religious or other sects” when it means only a religious sect. On the other hand, when it means private school at all, why don’t you say “denomination” or “school” and not refer to religion?
The case therefore shows how the plastic textist development of Canon would look like. We might say similar things about the broader discussion in Utah Court of Court of Justice regarding the drafting of a history of state education provisions, citing testimony from a pamphlet of contemporary legislative analysts and voters prepared for the public in their quest to determine the “original public meaning” of the 1986 amendment.
On the educational policy front, the pressing question is whether school choices are persisting, prospering and withering under state court scrutiny. Here, it appears likely that they are heading towards a replay of school financial cases in that different states emerge in different ways, and without agreeing to the obvious partisan patterns. This is probably a desirable outcome, but relying on small differences in the phraseology of unpaid clauses is a pain for many people with differences between states.
One thing that none of the current cases mentions is the one big federal bill law this summer that created the first ever federal tax credit program for private school tuition fees. Due to legislative compromise, credits will only be available in states that have chosen to participate “voluntarily.” Despite the high possibility that Washington will put a considerable amount of pressure on doing so, whether or not will generate robust debate in many states.
From a choice case perspective, a key feature of the new credit is that it is funded by increasing national debt, not by the state’s Treasury Department. Therefore, it is much more difficult to argue that state decisions to promote credit either divert state funds from public schools or constitute banned state support for private schools. Therefore, the availability of federal credits requires considerable recasting, and many of the important arguments about the choices currently being considered by state courts will require considerable refilling. Ultimately, the tax credit program could prove revocation of a strategy that relies on state courts to protect public schools. This is not because the U.S. Supreme Court chose federal doctrine, but because Congress and the Trump administration support the federal dollar.
Aaron Saiger He is a professor at Fordham University Law School and director of the Urban Law Centre at Fordham Law School.
Suggested Quote: Aaron Saiger, Does the state’s constitution require monopoly on public schools?sᴛᴛᴇcᴏᴜʀᴛrᴇᴘᴏʀᴛ (September 22, 2025), https://statecourtreport.org/our-work/analysisis-opinion/do-state-constions-demand-monopoly-public-
