Massachusetts News

The House has failed to adopt an amendment to the METCO statute that would save the program from constitutional challenges, says Citizens for the Preservation of Constitutional Rights, Inc., a non-profit law firm which forced Boston to abandon twenty-five years of racial busing last year.

The organization says it is currently seeking to force Massachusetts to stop coercing cities and towns to bus children by race in return for state education aid.

It warns that the current version of the METCO statute is jeopardized both by current litigation in federal court in Boston or by a possible direct legal challenge. The New York program upon which METCO was based was recently declared unconstitutional by a federal court in New York.

CPCR fears that it will need to take direct legal action to force METCO to open up to all children.

There is an ongoing risk that the federal courts will cause disruption in METCO services, says Attorney Chester Darling, President of the organization. He says that his current suit against the Lynn school committee and against the Commonwealth challenges the validity of the state’s Racial Imbalance Act, which rewards race-based student assignments with state education aid and also forms the foundation of the current METCO statute. If it had amended the METCO statute, he says the Commonwealth could have avoided disruption in METCO services when the federal courts strike down the Racial Imbalance Act. The amendment would have saved METCO from the effects of the current litigation against the Racial Imbalance Act by removing METCO funding from under the challenged statute.

The amendment would have saved the Commonwealth potentially over a million dollars in attorneys’ fees, says Darling. In its three failed attempts to defend race-based student assignment plans, the taxpayers of Boston have paid out well over a million dollars in fees to attorneys for their losing efforts. They have also had to pay the fees of the attorneys and experts of the plaintiffs as required by the federal Civil Rights Act. The Commonwealth faces similar costs for a defense of the current METCO statute, says Darling. He believes these millions should be spent on schools, not lawyers. The money should be spent providing better education to all children, regardless of their skin color.

METCO must change to survive, Darling believes. He says that as currently written, the METCO statute is clearly unconstitutional. He has been contemplating an action in federal court to have the current racial restrictions on METCO declared unconstitutional. Recently in upstate New York, an urban/suburban student transfer program identical to METCO was declared unconstitutional. The federal court in Brewer v. West Irondequoit Central School District held that the Rochester, New York’s program identical to METCO violated the Fourteenth Amendment rights of the white children who were excluded based on their skin color.

Background Information:

Courts have been striking down similar programs around the country. There have been several racial restrictions on student transfers similar to METCO that have recently come under successful attack in the federal courts. Below are brief discussions of a few of the most recent.

• Brewer v. West Irondequoit Central School District, 32 F.Supp. 619 (W.D.N.Y. 1999), appeal pending, No. 99-7186 (2nd Cir.). Recently a federal court in New York struck down as violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment a plan identical to METCO. This Rochester, New York program provided for urban minority students to be bussed to suburban school districts and white students to be bussed to racially imbalanced urban schools.

• Eisenberg v. Montgomery County Public Schools, 197 F.3d 123 (4th Cir. 1999), cert denied, _ U.S. _ (No. 99-1069 March 20, 2000). Just two weeks ago, on March 20, 2000, the United States Supreme Court let stand a decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. In Eisenberg the Fourth Circuit, for the second time in as many months, declared that restrictions on student transfers based on race violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

• Wessmann v. Gittens, 160 F.3d 790 (1st Cir. 1998). Just two years ago the First Circuit Court of Appeals here in Boston invalidated race-based restrictions on admissions to Boston’s exam schools in Wessmann v. Gittens. The Wessmann Court held, "[t]he Policy is, at bottom, a mechanism for racial balancing - and placing our imprimatur on racial balancing risks setting a precedent that is both dangerous to our democratic ideals and almost always constitutionally forbidden."

The METCO statute is Massachusetts General Laws chapter 76 sections 12A, 12B and12C.

The Racial Imbalance Act is Massachusetts General Laws chapter 71 section 37D.

Currently over 3,500 Boston Public School children are bused to suburban schools through METCO.

METCO receiving communities: Arlington, Bedford, Belmont, Brookline, Carlisle, Cohasset, Concord, Dover, Foxborough, Framingham, Hingham, Lexington, Lincoln, Lynnfield, Marblehead, Melrose, Natick, Needham, Newton, Reading, Scituate, Sharon, Sherborn, Sudbury, Swampscott, Wakefield, Walpole, Wayland, Wellesley, Weston, Westwood.

The CPCR case challenging the validity of the Racial Imbalance Act, which forms the basis for METCO’s current policy, is Comfort v. Lynn School Committee and Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Federal Civil Action No. 99cv11811-NG.

The CPCR case that ended busing in Boston is Boston’s Children FIRST v. Boston School Committee, Federal Civil Action No. 99cv11330-NG.

Governor Proposes To Remove Race From School Construction

Governor Cellucci’s proposed budget which would end the coercion of local schools into using racial busing in order to qualify for state aid in school construction should be approved, says Citizens for the Preservation of Constitutional Rights.

The Governor’s proposal was made after the organization filed suit on behalf of a multiethnic group of Lynn parents whose children have been assigned to Lynn public schools based on race. Lynn added the Commonwealth as a defendant, arguing that the state forces them to discriminate. Under the current scheme, in order for Lynn and other communities to receive a 90% reimbursement for school construction they must adopt a racial balancing plan.

The Governor’s proposal will change the reimbursement rate from being race-based to a need-based system under which poorer communities will receive more state aid. The citizens’ group hopes the House of Representatives will see the need for such a change. The current challenge to the existing race-based funding scheme will eventually force such a change anyway, says Attorney Chester Darling, President of the organization. By acting now and approving the Governor’s amendment, the Commonwealth can save itself the need to continue the costly defense of the clearly unconstitutional scheme, he says.

Background Information

• The Racial Imbalance Act is Massachusetts General Laws chapter 71 section 37D.

• The CPCR case challenging the validity of the Racial Imbalance Act and the current scheme for School Building Assistance is Comfort v. Lynn School Committee and Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Federal Civil Action No. 99cv11811-NG.

• The CPCR case that ended 25 years of busing in Boston is Boston’s Children FIRST v. Boston School Committee, Federal Civil Action No. 99cv11330-NG.

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