Supreme Court of tf)c United, Schemes and Mind Maps of Literature

Download Supreme Court of tf)c United and more Schemes and Mind Maps Literature in PDF only on Docsity! In the Li oftrt Supreme Coy; Hi GOT 1 Supreme Court of tf)c United SAN ANTONIO INDEPENDENT ) SCHOOL DISTRICT, et al., ) ) Appellants, ) ) vs. ) ) DEMETRIO P. RODRIGUEZ, et al., ) ) Appellees. ) No. 71-1332 Pages 1 thru l\? October 12, 1972 Duplication or copying of this transcript by photographic, electrostatic or other facsimile means is prohibited under the order form agreement. HOOVER REPORTING COMPANY, INC. Official Reporters Washington, D. C. 546-6666 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES SAN ANTONIO INDEPENDENT s SCHOOL DISTRICT, efc al., s Appellants, : v. DEMETRIO P. RODRIGUEZ, et al., Appellees. No. 71-1332 The above entitled matter at 11:42 o'clock a.m. x Washington, D. C. Thursday, October 12, came cn for argument 1972 BEFORE: WARREN E. BURGER, Chief Justice of the United States WILLIAM 0. DOUGLAS, Associate Justice WILLIAM J. BRENNAN, JR., Associate Justice POTTER STEWART, Associate Justice BYRON R„. WHITE, Associate Justice HARRY A. BLACKMUN, Associate Justice LEWIS F. POWELL, JR., Associate Justice WILLIAM ii. REHNQUIST, Associate Justice APPEARANCES: CHARLES ALAN WRIGHT, ESQ., 2500 Red River Street, Austin, Texas 78705, for the Appellants. ARTHUR GOCHMAN, 331 Travis Park West, San Antonio, Texas 78205, for the Appellees. 4 of course in a moment our view that the rational basis test is the appropriate test. % The view adopted by the district court that there is a rigid constitutional mandate that the quality of education may not be a function of wealth, except the wealth of the state as a whole, in my submission, is based on educational assumptions about matters that are today not understood and which educators are not ready to form firm judgments, and it would seriously inhibit, if it would not destroy altogether, the possibilities for local variety, experimentation and independence, of which Messrs. Coons, et al., quite properly speak so warmly. Proposition One, the proposition adopted by the district court in this case, would impose a constitutional strait jacket on the public schools of 50 states. It would mean that hereafter and permanently, or at least until a new book is written and the Constitution changes again, that all measurements in terms of education, the public schools, must be in terms of per capita or per pupil student expenditures, even though there may be many other things that we ought to be worrying about in an effort to cure the problems of public education. It would not necessarily destroy all local control. There is the variation presented by Professor Coons and his associates described as district power equalising. If 5 district power equalising is consistent with the mandate of the court below, and the court did not undertake to speak to that question at all--it left it completely open—-then it would still be possible for an individual school district to decide that we want to spend more money here than that other school district to spend it, and there would be an elaborate system so that this could be done; and its ability to do so would simply depend on the tax rate the district was willing to impose on itself. It would not depend on the taxable property in the district. That would leave local control still in the schools. To that extent, it is far better than any notion of centralised state funding on a single statewide formula. But, as we pointed out both in our brief and particularly in our reply brief, it seems to us if district power equalising is a viable alternative, that this case has ceased to ba a case about education at all, that we are no longer concerned with whether the children in the Edgewood School District have an education inferior.to those -in Alamo Heights, because this would still be possible if the voters of Alamo Heights decided that they would assume a larger tax burden, tax rate, than the voters in Edgewood. On the district power equalizing solution, this becomes a case for the relief of taxpayers rather than a case to help out school children. Many of the. writers who 6 support drastic reform and who support reform as a matter of constitutional judgment have said that the district power \ equalizing solution would itself be unconstitutional, because it would make the number of dollars spent on a child dependent on what friends and neighbors think. I must say that in view of what this— Q So, there would still be an equal import, there could be into that? MR, WRIGHT; There certainly could be. In fact, a whole reason for having district power equalizing would be to make unequal input possible. Q But under the Texas system it is impossible for some districts to have a sufficient input, even if they are willing to tax themselves more. MR. WRIGHT; To have a sufficient input? was that your word, Justice White? Q Yes. MR. WRIGHT; I would not agree with that, sir, no. Q Why is that? MR. WRIGHT; Because we believe that our state foundation program has assured to every district a sufficient, input for an adequate education, and that it has left every district to decide for itself what if anything more— Q So, you think this is really power equalization that you have now? 9 mouths of my friends. But their pleading is not drawn on the theory that the foundation program does not give Edgewood enough. Their theory is that it does not give Edgewood as much as hlamo Heights and that there is the constitutional violation. And that is certainly the constitutional violation found by the district court. The district court raade no finding that we fall below whatever the constitutional minimum may be, Q One difference, though, between the power equalization and your system is that under power equalization if a district chose to tax itself at a higher rate, it could get more money even if it was poor in property? MR. WRIGHT: That is right. Q Not so under the Texas system now? MR. WRIGHT: That is right. Q Each district would have the same,row to hoe, so to speak, in raising that additional money under power equalization, which it does not have now? MR. WRIGHT: I,would not want to accept that entirely, Justice Rehnquist, because power equalizing is *always put in terms of the taxable property par pupil. And it seems to me that in terms of what row you have to hoe in order to put a tax rate on yourself, it is really your inccxne, your ability to pay, that is important. In a wealthy district, the same rate would foe a much smaller proportion of 10 income. So that in that sense, in terms of the marginal utility of the dollar, it would still be easier for wealthy people to vote to spend more money than it would for poor people to do so. But, as Professor Coons says in his book, this is a point on which pragmatism must triumph over principle. Q Do you know of any case in this Court which Sias ever held that it would be unconstitutional for a state simply to get out of the business of public education bag and baggage? ME. WRIGHT: I know of no such case, and I would say there were certainly strong implications in the Prince Edward County case that a state could do exactly that if it— Q Then why do you say that a minimum education may be a constitutional requirement if a state could get out of it entirely? MR. WRIGHT: X, of course, you recall, sir, made my concession entirely in terms of this case. X think r can safely concede it here, but I do not have to take on that argument in order to win this case? even if a minimum is constitutionally required, Texas wins here. I must say I am attracted, Justice Rehnquist, as a scholar to the argument that if might be, despite the intimations of your previous cases, that today the failure of a state to provide an education altogether would inhibit the First Amendment rights, II that a state has an obligation to teach children to read and to write. I do not know that I would accept that argument, but I can see the possibilities of sketching out an argument of that kind. Q In the past two or three years, did not Mr. Justice Black in one opinion, whether part of the holding or not, did he not say pretty flatly a state could close all its schools if it wanted to? MR. WRIGHTs I think he said something of the sort in Palmer \r, Thompson, the swimming pool case— Q Is there a question, hox/ever, that once the state undertakes to furnish education, then it must furnish a certain minimal adequate education for everybody? Once they start to go dawn that row, they must follow through. MR.. WRIGHT: We certainly must do it for everybody, yes. If we are going to do it for any, then we must do if for every young person in the state. Q Would tliat mean that if a county in a state decided to provide public education, then as a constitutional matter every county in that state had to do it? / MR. WRIGHT: I would not think so. Wo. Unless we can implicate the state in seme v/ay and find that this is .state action that is doing it in county A and denying it iki covxnty-—■■ j Q Constitutionally, as you know, there are many, l, t t 14 say that a higher salaried school teacher is more fundamental to a poor child than food or a sound roof over his head. X ss8f Mr. Chief Justice,, that the lunch hour is here. MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGER: We will resume. [Whereupon, at 12:00 o'clock noon, a luncheon recess was taken.] 15 AFTERNOON SESSION - 1:00 o'clock [Same appearances as heretofore noted,3 MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGES: Mr. Wright, you may continue. You have 13 minutes remaining altogether. MR. WRIGHT; Thank you, Mr. Chief-Justice. In the time that remains to ms, I would like to turn for a moment to the factual assumptions that underlie the judgment below and the arguments of the appellees. And I would like to make perfectly clear what our position is with regard to those, because there is soma suggestion, particularly in some or the amicus briefs in support of the appellees, that Texas is asking this Court to resolve the very vexing questions on the relation of money to quality and education and on whether or not persons who are individually poor are likely to be found in school districts that are, in terms of taxable property, collectively poor. We, of course, are not asking you to settle those questions. Our submission is that these are intensely difficult questions on which no answers, in the present state of knowledge, are possible and that this Court should not undertake to resolve matters on which educators and social scientists cannot come up with any answers. We have felt it necessary to discuss the questions because, as we understand it, the position of our friends would require to resolve these issues. 16 The decision below, though it never discusses the issuef makes the implicit assumption that, in education money is quality. The assumption is explicit in the writings of Professor Coons and his associates and others who have written on that. The district court never spoke to it. But the district court, looked at figures about numbers of dollars spent and then announced a constitutional requirement that the quality of education cannot be allowed to vary except as a function of the wealth of the state as a whole and thus implicitly assumed what v/e think no court can safely assume, because in fact we are very skeptical that it is even true « that beyond some minimum quality is money. The district court did explicitly find that there is a correlation between poor people and poor school districts. The finding of the district court in that regard is based on the reading of the extremes of the chart that was offered in evidence. Its determination in that regard has been criticized not only in our briefs and in our testimony at the trial but in the literature. In our brief we set out the discussion of the finding on that point by Professor Goldstein in his article in the Pennsylvania Lav/ Review, and in the issue of the Yale Lav? Journal that was published on Tuesday of this v/eak there is a lengthy student note that is again very critical of the finding in Rodriguez on that point that appears at page 1312, notes 40 and 41,of the Yale 19 literature" in the broader sense of state of the human knowledge on this? MR, WRIGHT: Ye3, yes. That is exactly the sense in which I use it, Mr. Chief Justice. 1 think, with the Court's permission, I will reserve my remaining time for rebuttal. MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGER: Very well. Mr. Gochman. ORAL ARGUMENT OF ARTHUR GOCHMAN, ESQ., ON BEHALF OF THE APPELLEES Mr. Gochman. Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court: The court below he3.d the Texas system unconstitu­ tional because it distributes educational benefits on the basis of district wealth. The court said, as might be expected, those districts most rich in property also have the highest median family income and the lowest percentage of minority pupils, while the poorer districts are poorer in income and predominantly minority in composition. And the court cites one of the exhibits. Another one is on page 98 of the Appendix, Plaintiffs' Exhibit 3, which shows that the correlation is not only on a district basis of minority discrimination but on statewide, on a statewide basis. The court further found that there was no rational or compelling reason that could be offered for this 20 invidious discriminatione This Court is to decide whether or not to reverse the lower court and approve District 12 as a proper basis for distributing public school education., The defendants admit that there is a perfect correlation between the property tax base per student and the amount of dollars each child gets for his education. Yes, Mr. Justice Brennan, tax rates do vary in Texas. But the district taxing at the highest rates in Texas get the lowest dollars per pupil, and the districts taxing at the lowest rate get the highest dollars per pupil; and we showed it in exhibits in Bexar County where my clients live, a metropolitan area, and we showed it statewide. Q Mr. Gochman, let me be sure I understand you. Do you say that there is an inevitable correlation between district wealth and income of families? MR. GOCHMAN: That is not what I just said a moment ago, but there is. The record shows it to this extent, that as to the poorest districts—as to the poorest districts and the richest districts, the poorest people live in the poorest districts and the richest people live in the richest districts, and in Bexar County it perfectly correlates. Q My question is whether this is a necessary correlation. MR. GOCHMAN: No, Your Honor, it is not. But we probably would not have a lawsuit if it was not that way, 21 because this kind of discrimination falls most heavily on the poor. The poor have nowhere to go. Q I ask my question—-and it is an unfair one— I ask it from personal experience. I come from a state of %j,arie& economic areas. The Minnesota iron range was the most comparatively poor range as far as family income was concerned. And yet in my day it was the iron range that had the best schools. They were the ones with the swimming pools and the tennis courts and the extra facilities and the highest paid teachers. The reason was that the tax rates up there hit the— MR. GOCHM&Ns There are probably some accidents like that in Texas. But in the West Orange case, which we cite in our motion to affirm, we show how they do away with that happening in Texas by poor people being in a district that gets all the oil refineries. What happened in Orange, the big majority district dissolved itself and then got itself attached to the poor district, the poor people, with the great wealth, and attached itself to the district with poor families and great wealth. There is some of that in Texas, but as a whole, and especially at the top and the bottom, the richest districts have the least poor people and the least minorities, and the poorest districts have the most people and the most minorities. Q It does not hold true in the middle, does it, poor 24 and Palmer says--pools are nice to have, but you cannot coxapare them to education. Q How about publi.c health facilities to education? MR. GOCHMAN: Public health, food, lodging, those things are of great economic importance. But they are not matters that are related to those things guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. And in importance, education lies at the apex up and down the ladder. It is important to the free enterprise system, to the individual not to be poor. It is important to fulfill individual potential. It is universally relevant. And it is the only thing the state provides that it compels you to utilise for this period of time. In fact, I don’t know of anything it compels you to utilise for any length of time. But a child has to go to school for ten years. That is the importance that the state puts on it. It molds the character and the personality of the individual. And it is vital for the United States to compete in the world. But they seek to rationalize this and say it is all right on the basis of local control, on the basis of diversity, variety, independence. The one tiling the Texas system does not have, because those that tax at the highest rates, as I said a moment ago, have the lowest expenditures per pupil. And those that tax at the lowest rate have the highest expenditures per pupil* There is just the reverse of local control* In San Antonio, Edgewood taxes at a rate 20 percent higher than Alamo Heights,. But they raise thirty some-odd dollars a pupil* Alamo Heights raises over $400 a pupil. It is the property tax base that determines how much you have for a child's education. And who set that base and who set that standard? The state. And they agree that this is a state system of public school education. And these school districts were set up by the state for the convenience of the state in affording public school education. They also agree that these district boundaries serve no educational function, and they have no rational basis. Q What is your answer to Mr. White's suggestion ■ that the state foundation contribution is sufficient to provide an adequate education? MR. GOCHMAN: We show that it really does not provide any minimum. The minimum is what the school at the bottom gets. For example, he says it guarantees you instructional media. But if you look at Section K of the statute, it says if you put up the matching funds it guarantees it. And that is why Edgewood gets less funds from the state program than Alamo Heights. But, in addition to that, what is a minimum? 26 What kind of a morass is Mr. Wright asking you to get into? What is a minimum? Is a minimum giving him the second grade or giving him 12 years when he comes out at the end equal to an Alamo Heights second grade? Are we going to have two classes of citizens, minimum opportunity citizens and first- class citizens? I think in Sweatt we took care of that, and I think in McLaurin we took care of that» If we are going to apply equal protection of the lav; to get into minimums, it is going to get us into a thicket that we have to work our wav out— Q Your answer is,the state contribution does not provide an adequate education? MR. GOCHMAN: Yes. And I say that and I pled that and we proved that. But, additionally, it does not make any difference?once the state provides the service, it has to provide it all on equal terms. Q Your position then is just straight out that the state must provide equal input every school district in the state. Whatever system they have, whether it is property tax or any other system, or whatever schema you have, it has got to have equal input dollarwise per student. MR. GOCHMAN: No, Your Honor. In fact, for example, take— Q You can have an overall unequal input into two districts? 29 Q But that is only if the state guarantees a minimum? MR. GOCHMAN: No. I cannot say that there is any such thing as a minimam. I would say if it is an educational— Q I do not understand your position. But you go ahead with your argument. Q A student in Mr. Justice White's $500 district is going to be worse off than a student in Mr. Justice White’s $800 district for reasons quite beyond his control. MR. GOCHMAN: Yes, Your Honor. But this system, Edgewood as a body, for example, 95 percent Mexican-American, average per capita income under $1,000. In the other system you would not have a lawsuit. A person could move from one district to the other. But here the poor are stuck in the poor district and they have no mobility. • The Edgewood people would like to live in Alamo Heights, but they have no way to do it. And the only way they can get a fair education is to get out of Edgewood. Q There has got to be some consistent principle that governs the decision rather than just saying this is really bad and the other would not be quite so bad. MR. GOCHMAN: No. What I am saying is—and we are getting into the constitutionality or lack of constitutionality of this power equalising system— 30 Q Yes, but in deciding a case I suppose it is important to know, is there any system you can think of that would satisfy your objections to the present Testas system? MR. GOCHMAN: Yes, Your Honor. Q Other than just simply state control. You say you do not need to go to state control. MR. GOCHMAN: Yes, Your Honor. One thing they are looking at in Texas for example is, you take all the non™ residential wealth and you tax it statewide and you tax the residential wealth on a county-wide basis. In taxing this residential wealth on a county-wide basis each district, by improving its own tax rate, will get itself more money. But there is a basis, because pretty well, on a county-wide basis throughout the state, the residential tax basis will be equal or the variance will relate to the higher cost of living. Q As I get your position, it is not that just unequal inputs per se violate the equal protection clause. So far it sounds like you are saying that the fact that there are some districts that are locked in is what violates the equal protection clause. There is nothing they can do about having a better education either from the state foundation program or from taxing at higher rates. MR. GOCHMAN: Exactly. Q That seems to be your major point. 31 MR. GOCHMAN: Discrimination is based on wealth. Q And yet your answer to Justice White a few minutes ago leaves me with the impression that district power equalisation could produce precisely the picture of what y<?u complain today. MR. GOCHMAN: No, because the discrimination would not be based on wealth. And if you are going to justify power equalization—- Q Could power equalising ultimately produce precisely the picture of what you complain in Texas now? MR. GOCHMAN: The variances, Your Honor, under th*e present system are so vast that I cannot imagine any system , as Dr. Berke testified—-no one can imagine any system having vaster disparities. Over half the teachers in Edgewcod *re unqualified, according to state standards, to teach school. There are 28 teachers per student in Edgewood. Q Did Dr. Berke testify or did he submit an affidavit? * MR. GOCHMAN: He testified. Your Honor. What happened is, we filled out his direct testimony in narratives form and attached it to a question on interrogatory. All this evidence was taken by depositions and interrogatories, ard he actually testified by interrogatories. Q But it was not a question of being present ini court to testify? 34 Q You must think it is or you would not say that would he constitutional. HR, GOCHMAN: I think that has to he determined at a later time, I can tell the Court it will not be determined on the Texas financing system, because Texas, which has been working on a new system since the trial court decision, is novr considering this. Q Let me see if I correctly understand you now. You say even if you went to power equalization, Edgewood would have the opportunity to get itself out of the situation. If. it chose not to get out of it, the state, it would not be free to make that choice, did you not just say to me, that would still, if it chose not to, the choice not to would itself be a violation of equal protection; did you say that? MR. GOCHMAN: No. If the compelling interest of local control is that strong, then you could have that kind of discrimination, that the people in an area can decide for themselves whether they want to lock themselves into a poor school system. Q What is your position on that question about the compelling interest? I mean, that is really the question. Would it be constitutional or would it not for Edgewood to have the opportunity but choose not to exercise it? 35 MR. GOCHMMJs I would think it would be constitutional. Q In effect, your theory makes the districts equal but it may leave the students utterly unequal. MR. GQCHM&Ns Yes, but it would have a different basis at least. It would not lock onto the poor as it does now. And mobility is a serious factor in this case. If this is a rich guy in a poor district, we would not be in court. He would just move. But the poor had no way out of the present system. Q In your case does not a lot depend on the factual— MR. GGCHMAN: Yes, 1" think the factual situation supporting it—there would not be any lawsuit if the facts were not there. We say the discrimination is based upon the wealth of the districts. But we say that that discrimination falls most heavily upon the poor and the minorities. And in that regard and with regard to the racial discrimination, this is not segregation where you have to prove that the segregation discriminates. The discrimination is there on its face, that the minorities get less both in Bexar County and statewide. Q You do not contend, do you, that Texas set up this system of district school financing with the purpose of discriminating against minorities, do you? 35 MR. GOCHMAN: I contend that objectively Texas did what it did, and it could have done something else. And what it did discriminates against minorities. Q Is that not a great deal like the findings we had in Jefferson against Hackney where you could say statistically minorities were discriminated against, but there was no finding of intent to discriminate? And as to welfare, we upheld that. MR. GOCHMAN: Exactly. We have to face Jefferson v. Hackney, and we say it is distinguished because the importance of education, because it falls on helpless children, and because the state created the discrimination. Q Does not welfare fall on helpless children too? MR. GOCHMAN: Yes, Your Honor. But on the other two grounds, the importance of education as it relates to the Constitution of the United States, and the fact that—I lost my train of thought on that one. The importance of ed^^oation to the Constitution of the United States and the fact that the state did it, the state made these districts poor, are two distinctions of Jefferson v. Hackney. Q The school districts are created solely by the state legislature, are they? That is, their meets and bounds? MR. GOCHMAN: No. The state set up the system for the convenience of the state. But the boundaries are 39 different if we didn't have it»" And the court said, "What the state did is what is important." I want to say, in concluding, that the San Antonio Independent School District, the central city district, is a main defendant in this case. And they fought us hard at the trial level, got out on a motion to dismiss; but on appeal of this case, after seeing the decision of the trial court, and the equity involved and the vast discrimination, filed a brief in support of the decision of the trial court. Thank you very much. MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURNER: Thank you, Mr. Gochman. Mr. Wright, you have six minutes remaining. REBUTTAL ARGUMENT OF CHARLES ALAN WRIGHT, ESQ., ON BEHALF OF THE APPELLANTS Mr. Wright. Thank you, Mr. Chief Justice. I would like to begin with a further word on the racial aspects that were posed by Justice Douglas in a question to me and also in Mr. Gochman's argument. In response to that simply quote from the book by Messrs. Coons, Sugarman, and Clune. They say—the quotation appears at page 24 of our initial brief—"It is not surprising that even the present litigation is understood by many of its close supporters as a racial struggle. The fact is otherwise. There is no reason to suppose that the system of district- 40 based school finance emobides racial bias..... No doubt there are poor districts which are basically Negro, but it is clear alraost by definition that the vast preponderance of such districts is white." Q Is Mr. Gochman bound by that comment? MR. WRIGHT: No, but I think that you are bound to take into account the findings of serious students, such as Professor Coons, in determining what the 14th Amendment means on a nationwide basis. Professor Coons and his associates have supported that statement, Justice Rehnquist, by figures showing that in California, for example, 59 percent of minority students live in districts in which the assessed values are above the median and therefore, if we would have strict equalization, they would get less than even. now. 0 If I had a case here from Texas and was claiming that Texas had denied the equal protection, I think that I 'would feel rather strongly that whatever the figures might show about California, I was entitled to stand on the record made in the Texas case. MR. WRIGHT: Rut I think, with respect, sir, that in determining the rule of law that the particular facts about the Edgewood School District or about California or any other particular place are all merely parts of the overall mosaic that you must appraise in deciding, Does the 41 Constitution or does it not require this?' Q Was it any part of the district court's rationale in this constitutional decision that this was racially discriminatory? MR. WRIGHTS No. Q 1 did not think so. MR. WRIHGT: No. There were allegations to that effect in the complaint. I am not here to apologize for the Texas school finance system, and I have said repeatedly that it seems to me far from perfect. I think that the Texas system does assure, as evidence in the record shows, more than merely a minimum; it insures a basic education to every school child in the state, and it then lets districts, if they have money and want to spend money, go beyond that. As I understand the argument of ray friend Mr. Gochman, it would not matter if Texas were giving each school district in the state $2,000 per student. If Alamo Heights were still free to tax, with its heavy resources, and spend more than Edgewood was, he would still find this to be impermissible, although, for reasons that are not persuasive to me, he regards the same result as quite different if it stems from district power equalizing than if it comes out of the mere facts as they are. I have said several times in my brief—and I want