The Heartland Institute

On December 28, 2004, the Florida Supreme Court backed away from its December 24 order telling Gov. Jeb Bush he would have to file his initial appeal briefs by December 30 in a case challenging the constitutionality of the state’s Opportunity Scholarship program. Instead, the court gave all parties about three more weeks to ...

The Institute for Justice (IJ) has been kept busy defending newly enacted school choice programs ever since Clint Bolick and Chip Mellor formed the Washington, DC-based public interest law firm in 1991. It is currently involved in three such cases. However, IJ also is playing offense in two other cases as a result of a proactive ...

On December 2, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the matter of Locke v. Davey , a case whose outcome has significant implications for the future of publicly funded school vouchers. The case involves a lawsuit brought by Joshua Davey, who as an undergraduate at Washington’s Northwest College was denied a Promise ...

“I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Pledge, as originally written for 1892 Columbus Day “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with ...

After the U.S. Supreme Court awarded control of the constitutional battlefield to voucher advocates on June 27, the Institute for Justice didn’t waste time celebrating the victory. Instead, the Institute quickly redeployed resources from defense to offense in order to take advantage of the commanding position school choice forces ...

In an historic decision handed down on June 27, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the U.S. Constitution is not offended when parents choose to use publicly funded vouchers to pay tuition at religious schools, so long as the overall educational choice program is neutral towards religion. In a 5-4 decision in Zelman v. Simmons ...

On June 11, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered in a 6-3 decision that school districts must give children's Bible clubs the same access to public schools for after-school meetings they provide to other community groups. The case involved the Milford, New York school district, which allowed nonreligious groups to use its facilities ...

On May 23, Ohio Attorney General Betty Montgomery petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to provide a definitive ruling on the Cleveland Scholarship Program where conflicting decisions have been handed down by the state supreme court and the federal Sixth District Court. The next day, voucher families represented by the Washington ...

Th e Institute for Justice won an important victory for Illinois families on February 8 when the Appellate Court of Illinois for the Fourth Judicial District unanimously upheld the constitutionality of the state's 1999 law providing a tax credit for K-12 educational expenses. Opponents of the law--the Illinois Education Association ...

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The United States Supreme Court is likely to be called in to resolve a state-federal conflict that has arisen from disparate court rulings on the constitutionality of the Cleveland voucher program. The Ohio Supreme Court ruled the program constitutional in 1999, while the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the same program ...

The legislature makes the laws. The executive enforces the laws. The judiciary rules on the laws. Civics 101 When judges order the levying of taxes, they violate the separation of powers, undermine the democratic process, and subvert the legal system, according to Rockford attorney Michael F. O'Brien. While it may be ...

In a landmark decision handed down October 3, a three-judge panel of the Florida State District Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that the state constitution allows children to attend private schools using tax dollars. The decision reversed a March ruling issued by L. Ralph Smith, judge for the Circuit Court for Leon ...

In its most important ruling on school choice to date, the U.S. Supreme Court on June 28 handed down a splintered 6-3 ruling in the Mitchell v. Helms case that not only laid out the conditions under which direct financial aid may be given to religious schools, but also made it clear that indirect financial aid to religious ...

How have children fared following other lawsuits like Ohio's DeRolph , where courts have deemed unconstitutional disparities between public schools that result from different levels of local spending by districts? Do schools improve when judges take the responsibility for funding public education out of the hands of local communities ...

According to a slim state supreme court majority, Ohio's system of funding its public schools depends too much on local property taxes. On May 11, in a 4-3 decision, the court found the state’s education funding formula unconstitutional. The court assumed authority to veto further action by state lawmakers on education ...

In a decision widely applauded by school choice opponents, Leon County Circuit Court Judge L. Ralph Smith Jr. ruled on March 14 that the Florida law authorizing the nation's first statewide voucher program is unconstitutional. According to Smith, the state constitution's directive on public education is violated when public ...

Judge Solomon Oliver Jr.’s December 20, 1999, ruling on the Cleveland Scholarship Program apparently would give public schools the power to void future voucher programs by choosing not to participate in them. But it has also been suggested that Oliver's original injunction against the program might give parents a legal ...

School choice issues increasingly are being fought in the courts, as parents seek better educational options for their children and as establishment forces seek to maintain the status quo. For example, the Montgomery School Board in Maryland has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case involving the district's transfer ...

There was only one catch and that was Catch-22. Joseph Heller's WWII: You could get out of flying more combat missions if you were crazy, but if you wanted to get out then you couldn't be crazy and so you had to keep flying missions. Judge Oliver's Cleveland: You could use a voucher to get out of the public ...