South Carolina Parents Can’t Pay Public Money for Private Schools Anymore
South Carolina law allowing parents to spend taxpayer money on private schools is unconstitutional, highest court of the state verdict on Wednesday.
The 3-2 ruling prohibits paying tuition or fees with the “Educational Scholarship Trust Fund,” but allows parents to use the money for indirect personal expenses such as tutoring, textbooks and other educational materials.
Nearly 3,000 students were awarded $1,500 each under the program. The court will not require the money to be paid back if it is spent on private school tuition or fees. The case went to trial in the Supreme Court in March, before the money was distributed.
South Carolina’s law is part of a nationwide movement. Program research groups report that at least 16 states have some form of certification.
The South Carolina case focused on a section of the state constitution that states “no money may be paid from the public funds and no credit of the State or any political subdivision of the State may be used for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution.”
Lawyer thinks This program is illegal said providing public money to private schools is a direct benefit even if the program allows students to pay tuition or transportation costs to attend a public school outside their district.
“Parents who choose to use scholarships to pay for their children’s private school tuition are certainly using public money to directly benefit the private school,” Justice Gary Hill wrote in his first major opinion since joining the court a year ago.
Hill’s sharply written ruling reflected the history of why South Carolina voters had to amend their constitution in 1972 to affirm the right to a free public school education for all children after state lawmakers had spent two decades trying to keep black children from attending school with white children through a series of moves and proposals, including abolishing public schools altogether.
“Our General Assembly knew how to draft an amendment to present to the people to allow public funding for private schools, but they did not do it,” Hill wrote of lawmakers more than 50 years ago.
The supporters have now been ousted. law said putting the money into a trust fund was key. The money would be passed to parents, who would decide where to spend it, rather than the state paying private schools directly.
In his dissent, Chief Justice John Kittredge said the ruling ignored the South Carolina Legislature’s broad authority to create policy.
“The literary style of the majority opinion may be appealing, but its underlying reasoning is contrary to the rule of law,” Kittredge wrote.
The chief justice also proposed other programs in which private money would be channeled to public education institutions, such as college scholarships paid for with money from the state lottery or the First Steps preschool program.
Hill responded in his decision that those programs were structured differently from trust-run vouchers.
Supporters of the law could appeal. They could also try to put a constitutional amendment before voters in 2025 or later to remove the constitutional provision, but concerns that winning a majority might be difficult have prevented them from trying that in the first place.
“Families shed tears of joy when scholarship funds for their children were awarded, and today’s Supreme Court ruling leaves those families in tears of grief,” Republican State Education Superintendent Ellen Weaver said in a statement promising to find a way to restart the program.
Republican Governor Henry McMaster said the state would ask the Supreme Court to reconsider its ruling because it “could have devastating consequences for thousands of low-income families.”
Senate Republican Majority Leader Shane Massey said the decision was in contrast to what lawmakers saw in previous court opinions.
“The court changed the rules and poor children lost,” Massey said in a statement.
The new law allows vouchers of up to $6,000 to be awarded to up to 5,000 students a year, eventually expanding to about 15,000 students, or about 2 percent of the state’s school-age population. Only families with incomes below about $120,000 can receive assistance.
Allowing parents to spend public money on private schools has been a two-decade effort, working through three governors, four House speakers and five education directors in a state where Republicans are consolidating and expanding their power.
