Why One Tennessee Lawmaker Wants To Change What The State Constitution Says About Education Funding

Another change to the Tennessee constitution could be in the works.

Less than two years after voters approved amendments that stripped out abortion rights and changed how the state picks its judges, a Knoxville lawmaker has proposed a measure that would deal with school funding and whether judges should have a role in deciding when it’s not enough.

State Rep. Bill Dunn says the change is needed to prevent “activist judges” from imposing spending requirements from the bench. He points to other states, such as Washington and Kansas, where courts have used public-education requirements embedded in their state constitutions to order more funding.

“This will prevent judicial tyranny,” the Republican lawmaker says.

Since the 1970s, the state’s constitution has guaranteed Tennesseans “free public schools.” But just what that means can be a matter of debate. In the 1980s, a group of
rural school districts sued the state, saying they weren’t getting enough money to deliver on that promise.

Kevin Dunlap, a Democratic lawmaker and schoolteacher from Warren County, says the Tennessee Supreme Court ruling in the small schools’ favor was one of the best things to have happened in public education.

“The rural schools today have better opportunities, more resources, more equity across the state,” he says.

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Dunn says the small-schools ruling was a good one, because it equalized funding between districts, rather than demanded a tax increase.

But Dunn wants to discourage courts from getting involved again in school funding. He says it’s only a matter of time before a court decides that too little is being spent and forces the legislature to find more money.

Calls about how much to spend on schools should be left to lawmakers who come up for election every two years, as state representatives do. Not judges who are appointed to eight-year terms, then stand in retention elections in which they’re unopposed.

His proposal,
House Joint Resolution 493, would make a small but substantial change. It calls on the system of free public schools to be funded “in such manner as the General Assembly may determine.” That clause is currently absent from the state constitution.

Dunn’s critics respond that Tennessee judges have been reluctant to get involved in school funding.

Foes argue the proposed amendment would actually trigger lawsuits as courts try to hash out its meaning. That, they say, is the very thing that Dunn says he wants to avoid.

The House Education Administration & Planning Committee approved the proposed amendment Tuesday on a narrow 7-5 vote. It now has to pass through the House Finance Committee before making its way to the floor of the state House.

Once there, the road toward adoption remains long. It has to pass both chambers of the General Assembly twice — the second time by two-thirds margins — then it has to go before the voters. The earliest that could happen is November 2018