SD Supreme Court School Funding Decision: Taxpayers are Servants of Government

According to KELO and other sources, the South Dakota Supreme Court today overturned a previous decision by Circuit Judge Lori Wilbur that South Dakota school districts did not have standing to join a lawsuit to milk the taxpayers for more education funding.

Over the past couple of years, several school districts across the state have, using taxpayer money, joined a lawsuit against the state of South Dakota because they feel the legislature isn’t providing as much money as they want for education.

When Judge Wilbur shot them down last year, some of the educrats turned to private sources of funding like walk-a-thons and brat-feeds to raise money (something they should be been doing all along, if they felt this strongly about it), but kept up their efforts to send the taxpayers the bill for their greed.

Now, according to yesterday’s decision from the South Dakota Supreme Court, while the outcome of the lawsuit still remains to be settled, the supreme judges have at least ruled that the taxpayers can be billed for the efforts of government employees to tax them even more.

The decision outlines how South Dakota schools are funded:

The South Dakota Constitution specifies four sources of funding that go to the local school districts for public education. The first source is the interest from a permanent trust fund, whose principal derives from the sale of public school lands acquired from the United States government, property escheated to the State, gifts and donations, and other property “acquired for public schools.”

The second source:

The Constitution establishes a second education funding source from “[t]he proceeds of all fines collected from violations of state laws[.]” SD Const art VIII, §3. The county treasurers collect the fines and distribute them “among and between all of the several public schools incorporated in such county in proportion to the number of children in each, of school age, as may be fixed by law.”

Is it being alleged that these funds are not being allocated to the state properly? Not according to Justice Zinter:

The principal allegation in the underlying school funding litigation is that the Legislature is failing to perform its duty of appropriating sufficient general funds, derived from taxation, to maintain a thorough and efficient system of schools as required by article VIII, section 15 of the South Dakota Constitution. The plaintiffs in the underlying litigation do not allege any improper use of the two educational trust funds that were created by article VIII, sections 2 and 3 and are relied upon by the majority.

The last two sources of education funding:

The Constitution also provides two other funding sources for public education – general taxation and local taxation. Article VIII, section 15 requires the legislature to “make such provision by general taxation and by authorizing the school corporations to levy such additional taxes as with the income from the permanent school fund shall secure a thorough and efficient system of common schools throughout the state.”

This is all fine and wonderful, but I know of no provision in the state constitution or statute which requires a specific taxation level or rate to be allocated to public education. The state of South Dakota is only required to provide education funding “adequate to allow students to be responsible and intelligent citizens.” No dollar amount whatsoever is set and no performance.

The latest information available from the American Legislative Exchange Council in their 2008 “Report Card on American Education” finds South Dakota ranked 5th in the nation for academic achievement and 39th in per-pupil spending ($7,790). Washington D.C. is ranked 51st in academic achievement even though they are #3 in per-pupil spending at a whopping $13,848 per student. South Dakota also beats the national average of a 70.2% graduation rate at 79.6%. Obviously spending has very little to do with achieving funding “adequate to allow students to be responsible and intelligent citizens.”

If the state is required to distribute all money from the sale of school lands, and all money from fines…and this is not being done, then there is standing for the people (not government institutions) to file a grievance against their government for not adhering to the law and thus not providing the service to the people which is proscribed by law.

I’ll say it again: the people would have standing here, not government agencies which already have the taxpayer on the hook for cash. It is the taxpayer who is theoretically being wronged by “inadequate” funding, not the schools or school officials–they are government entities.

But that is not even at issue. The first two methods of education funding are not being contested, and there is no specific amount set in the South Dakota Constitution or state law. Meanwhile, the evidence shows there is no deficiency in academic achievement for our state.

It is insane to allow government to sue government using taxpayer money to put the taxpayers on the hook for still more money. Yet that is what these mental giants in the state Supreme Court have ruled:

The school districts’ interest in discharging their constitutional duty is not simply based on their status as representatives of constituent students and taxpayers. In this constitutional challenge, the school districts are not mere creatures of statute. Instead, they are creations of the Constitution via Article VIII. Because of the constitutional provisions and the vital position school districts hold as beneficiaries and recipients of public K-12 education funding, we recognize that school districts have standing to challenge the constitutionality of K-12 public school funding in the limited context of a declaratory judgment action.

We are a nation of government of the people, by the people and for the people. We are not a nation under the authority of a government, but a nation where government is under the authority of the people. And in our republican form of government, the people determine what government will and will not do through their vote for members of the legislative branch.

Even the Supreme Court members recognize that any standing the school districts have is, at best, limited, but their justification for even limited standing for the school districts–as opposed to the people, the taxpayers–is dangerously “creative” and sets a dangerous precedent.

Chief Justice Gilbertson concurs with Justice Sabers, Konenkamp and Zinter, but states and admits in his provisional concurrence that the school districts are not seeking a specific dollar-amount appropriation, the school districts concede that the court has no “super school board” authority to run the South Dakota education system, and that even if a declaratory judgment is made in their favor, the legislature cannot be forced to appropriate a specific dollar amount to the school system.

So essentially the school districts want to waste taxpayer money in both filing suit against the state (using taxpayer funds) and forcing the state to defend itself (again using taxpayer funds)…when at best even a favorable outcome will do absolutely nothing to garner them one more penny in education funding!

How stupid is that?! How wasteful of taxpayer money is that?!

If the school districts are “creatures of the Constitution” as this ruling says, and in the implied sense gives that creature the power to force it’s creator (the people) to cough up cash on demand, then we have allowed our state constitution to create a monster.

This ruling essentially gives rights to Frankenstein’s monster. Because Dr. Frankenstein created his monster, his monster has legal standing to demand from his creator a salary commensurate with what the monster thinks is fair. And since in this case Dr. Frankenstein works for the taxpayers, the monster has legal standing to extort the taxpayers for cash.

What an asinine line of reasoning!

With this kind of muddled, convoluted thinking passing itself of as “legal wisdom,” the people have for all intents and purposes become servants of their own creations!

The South Dakota Supreme Court has basically ruled that the taxpayers, the people, are subjects of government. The people have been made into serfs to serve the dictates of government entities.

Any time the taxpayers–through their elected representatives–authorize the creation of a new government department, office or function, they have made themselves servant to a new government entity. The people do not have control over the flow of their own money to that organization; that organization has been empowered by the lords in black robes to dictate terms to the people.

This might be one to remember during the next judicial retention election.

Note: Reader comments are reviewed before publishing, and only salient comments that add to the topic will be published. Profanity is absolutely not allowed and will be summarily deleted. Spam, copied statements and other material not comprised of the reader’s own opinion will also be deleted.