Susan Tave Zelman, Superintendent of Public Instruction of Ohio, et al. v. Doris Simmons-harris et al. (536 U.S. 639)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 27, 2002 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 536 U.S. 639 · 122 S. Ct. 2460
- Decided
- June 27, 2002
- Term
- October Term 2001
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Rehnquist
- Issue area
- First Amendment
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. The State of Ohio has established a pilot program designed to provide educational choices to families with children who reside in the Cleveland City School District. The question presented is whether this program offends the Establishment Clause of the United States Constitution. We hold that it does not. There are more than 75,000 children enrolled in the Cleveland City School District. The majority of these children are from low-income and minority families. Few of these families enjoy the means to send their children to any school other than an inner-city public school. For more than a generation, however, Cleveland’s public schools have been among the worst performing public schools in the Nation. In 1995, a Federal District Court declared a “crisis of magnitude” and placed the entire Cleveland school district under state control. See Reed v. Rhodes, No. 1:73 CV 1300 (ND Ohio, Mar. 3, 1995). Shortly thereafter, the state auditor found that Cleveland’s public schools were in the midst of a “crisis that is perhaps unprecedented in the history of American education.” Cleveland City School District Performance Audit 2-1 (Mar. 1996). The district had failed to meet any of the 18 state standards for minimal acceptable performance. Only 1 in 10 ninth graders could pass a basic proficiency examination, and students at…
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