Posted at May 14, 2020
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The San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez

 

   

The Supreme Court’s school desegregation case law has been a complicated network of halts and starts. In the span of over 75 years, we have seen numerous social movements advocating for an equal education come to a complete halt due to a lack of community interest. Some movements managed to find themselves a spot in court, but the results were never beneficial.  In 1954, a unanimous Supreme court declared in Brown v. Board of Education that education “must be made available to all on equal terms (“Brown v. Board of Education”) Yet, fewer than 20 years later, the court found a Texas education financing plan that granted significant inequalities in funding among school districts to be constitutional. The San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez court case was brought on behalf of students and parents throughout the state of Texas who were part of the minority community, or who were poor and attended schools that were financed by a low property tax base. Rodriguez argued that due to the poor communities in the district, the state injected less property tax revenue to schools which gave them much less money to invest in their education than that allocated for the education of children in more affluent districts who paid more for their homes.  Rodriguez affirmed that the inequality in public education funding and quality of education among school districts violated their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the fourteenth amendment of the constitution, but the court settled that there is no constitutional right to an equal education.  This is extremely hypocritical since the Supreme Court declared  “equal justice under the law,” and made education “equal” several years before that occurred. Once again, the Supreme court has failed to live up to its own promise unrightfully oppressing millions of people and taking zero responsibility for it. The court case has contributed to the inequality of many Americans, and has discriminated against a population of people that are desperately in need of an education (“San Antonio Independent v Rodriguez 411 U.S”).

        Mexican American parents went to Rodriguez to command attention to the inequalities on behalf of themselves and their children, as well as on behalf of all other children throughout Texas who lived in school districts with low property valuations. They insisted on making it clear that modern methods of state financing for public elementary and secondary education deprived their class of the basic equal protection of the laws under the fourteenth amendment in the constitution. While the right to education may not be a “fundamental right” under the constitution, the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment mandates that when a state establishes a public school system, no child living in that state may be denied equal access to schooling. The fourteenth amendment states that,  “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws” (“U.S. Constitution Amendment 14”). Yet, the court declared that they do not grant privileges to high-income communities.  Justice Powell argued that on the question of wealth and education, “the Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality or precisely equal advantages” (Westbrook).  However, Rodriguez was seeking equal opportunities and not “advantages.” There was nothing constitutional about the system that they used to distribute funding to these schools. This made it remarkably challenging to climb up the socioeconomic statuses in their community (Petersen & Assanie).

This stripped Latino communities of natural rights they had of an education. As a result, this led to remarkably low graduation percentages and enormous drop out rates.   Nevertheless, the court disagreed and declared that “to the extent that the Texas system of school financing results in unequal expenditures between children who happen to reside in different districts, we cannot say that such disparities are the product of a system that is so irrational as to be invidiously discriminatory” (“San Antonio Independent Unified School District v Rodriguez”).  Though, the education trust reported that school districts with the greatest rates of poverty receive about $1,000 less money per student in state and local funding than those with the most profound rates of poverty (Camera).  That means that those students that are not financially burdened will receive more money than a student that is strictly in need. In wealthy neighborhoods with higher property value average, students have access to a more comprehensive range of books, SAT practice classes, music, and art classes. This exposes the wealthy children to a spectrum of innovative ideas that prompts them to advance in their education. Whereas in the poor communities, students perform over twenty-five percent lower in standardized exams than those in wealthier school districts (“Dallas Morning News Editorial”).

Poverty has affected children in many ways, a 2009 study states,“ Poverty also has an adverse effect on student performance and students in poverty typically perform lower academically and have poor or average grades.”(POVERTY IN EDUCATION).   They stated that educational deficits are a result of lower levels of nutritionally beneficial foods that will result but lower cognitive functioning, as well as limited vocabulary exposure. (Childhood Nutrition Facts)  This clearly illustrates the effects of poverty in one’s educational success, yet these people were denied the opportunities that people in surrounding neighborhoods had.  The obstacles that these minority communities were already facing were hindering their progress in their educational progress. 

       In Texas, there were systematic mass deportations within 1929 and 1944 that “forcefully deported” or “forcefully persuaded” many out of the country and back to Mexico. Beyond one million Mexicans were deported, even legal residents who were able to prove their residency were deported. For those millions of children that remained in Texas after the mass deportations, it became extremely challenging to develop the sense that they were an essential part of the society, notably because from 1909 to 1965, that cultural diversity was strictly denied. The Blackwell school was a segregated elementary and middle school for Mexican American children and they had only one rule, “no speaking Spanish.”  This once again goes against the equal justice under law that the Supreme court orders (“Bacigalupo”).  In the most intense cases, students had to unwillingly write down “I will not speak Spanish” and bury the message in the ground in front of all of their classmates (Glenn). This stripped Latino children from their roots removing their equal justice that the Supreme court lives by. These kids in Texas will now allocate more numerous hours of work attempting to get cleared of their culture instead of allocating more time to their studies.

The reason so many students failed to graduate was because of the lack of proper funding. The inequality in the Texas education system radiates through any source of evidence one reads.  The Supreme court stated that people need to be accustomed to take advantage of what the state is able to provide and not to imagine what they could have done if they received more money (“San Antonio Independent Unified School District v Rodriguez”).   However, it is extremely racist that even now, a white child’s education is worth seven thousand dollars more than a colored person. In February 2019, The Washington Post stated that “the gap was most dramatic in Arizona, where white districts were given $7,613 more per student than nonwhite districts. A dozen other states had gaps between $2,000 and $4,000 per student, with 10 of the states contributing more funding to students in majority-white districts”(Meckler).  This is one of the results of the San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez court case that was won by the school district. Normalizing this type of racism in the ’70s has made it clear to Texas politicians that it is acceptable to limit the opportunities that Latino communities have. As a result, racism in Texas has become normalized and undealt with making more students unable to pursue higher education and making it extremely difficult to graduate from high school.

     Since the Supreme court ruled against Rodriguez and sided with the district, this caused more activists to get involved to fight for equality in Texas education.  This case caused the rise of Latino activism in Texas, primarily Houston has helped funding. The rise of Latino political activism in places like Texas poses a great threat to the existing state power, which is dominated by Republicans in the governorship and State Legislature. With the ongoing activism in Texas communities, it places politicians in a complicated place, where any move can spark national awareness of the injustices that they have placed on the road of minority communities. Schools and school boards serve as the foundation for political empowerment for communities and are needed to improve the future of education. With the implementation of statewide activism graduation rates have increased however, a truly equal school system has yet to be found.  With much perseverance and obstinate work,  Texas will finally have “equal justice under the law”.

 

Works Cited

Assaine, Laila. “The Changing Face of Texas.” DallasFed, Oct. 2005, www.dallasfed.org/~/media/documents/research/pubs/fotexas/fotexaspetersen.pdf.

Bacigalupo, Chantelle. “No Spanish Allowed: Texas School Museum Revisits History of Segregation.” The World from PRX, 2019, www.pri.org/stories/2019-04-29/no-spanish-allowed-texas-school-museum-revisits-history-segregation.

Camera, Lauren. “In Most States, Poorest School Districts Get Less Funding.” U.S. News & World Report, U.S. News & World Report, 21 Feb. 2008, 12:01, www.usnews.com/news/best-states/articles/2018-02-27/in-most-states-poorest-school-districts-get-less-funding.

“Childhood Nutrition Facts.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 29 May 2019, www.cdc.gov/healthyschools/nutrition/facts.htm.

Editorial, Dallas. “What Does Data on Poverty Tell Us about Educational Outcomes in Texas Public Schools?” Dallas News, 12 Nov. 2019, www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/2019/11/12/what-does-data-on-poverty-tell-us-about-educational-outcomes-in-texas-public-schools/.

History.com Editors. “Brown v. Board of Education.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 27 Oct. 2009, www.history.com/topics/black-history/brown-v-board-of-education-of-topeka.

Meckler, Laura. “Report Finds $23 Billion Racial Funding Gap for Schools.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 26 Feb. 2019, www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/report-finds-23-billion-racial-funding-gap-for-schools/2019/02/25/d562b704-3915-11e9-a06c-3ec8ed509d15_story.html.

“San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez.” Legal Information Institute, Legal Information Institute, www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/411/1.

“SAN ANTONIO SCHOOL DISTRICT v. RODRIGUEZ.” University of Kentucky, www.uky.edu/~dsvoss/docs/ps461/rodrigz.htm.

Turner, Janine, and Cathy Gillespie. “Janine Turner and Cathy Gillespie.” Constituting America, Janine Turner and Cathy Gillespie Https://Constitutingamerica.org/Wp-Content/Uploads/2017/07/logo_web_360x80.Png, 9 Apr. 2020, constitutingamerica.org/san-antonio-v-rodriguez-1973-guest-essayist-gennie-westbrook/.

Warren, Mia, and Heidi Glenn. “The Day A Texas School Held A Funeral For The Spanish Language.” NPR, NPR, 20 Oct. 2017, www.npr.org/2017/10/20/558739863/the-day-a-texas-school-held-a-funeral-for-the-spanish-language.

Yu, Min. “POVERTY IN EDUCATION.” Poverty in Education, 2004, files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED564040.pdf.

 

 

 

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