Seattle School District No. 1 v. The State of Washington

633 F.2d 1338 SEATTLE SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 1 et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. The STATE OF WASHINGTON et al., Defendants-Appellants. Nos. 79-4643, 79-4655, 79-4676, 79-4740, 79-4801 and 79-4802. United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit. Argued and Submitted June 30, 1980. Decided Dec. 16, 1980. Camden M. Hall, Foster, Pepper & Riviera, Seattle, Wash., for Seattle School Dist. Hall Baetz, Davis, Wright, Todd, Riese & Jones, et al., Seattle, Wash., for Pasco Neighborhood Council. Slade Gorton, Atty. Gen. & Thomas F. Carr, Asst. Atty. Gen., Olympia, Wash., Michael W. Hoge, Seattle, Wash., for State of Washington. Frederick Noland, MacDonald, Hoague & Bayless, Seattle, Wash., Robert J. Reinstein, Dept. of Justice, Washington, D.C., for Civ. Liberties. Stew Cogan, Seattle, Wash., for Pasco Neighborhood Council. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. Before ELY, WRIGHT and NELSON, Circuit Judges. ELY, Circuit Judge: 1 This cause comes before the Court in an unusual posture. Local elected school authorities, who so often in the past in other jurisdictions have resisted court-ordered integration, have in this instance…

dissenting:

The issue in this appeal is whether Initiative 350 violates the Fourteenth Amendment. The initiative was adopted overwhelmingly, passing in each of the 39 counties, and had a statewide affirmative vote in excess of 65%. By enacting the law, Washington’s voters chose to adopt a neighborhood schools policy, and to limit the use of mandatory busing as a means of desegregating schools.

It is not our function to assess the wisdom of that choice. We must decide only whether the choice was constitutionally permissible.

We need not determine at this stage of the litigation whether Seattle or any Washington school district operates or maintains a de jure segregated school system. The initiative expressly refrains from interfering with constitutionally mandated remedial actions. To date, no court has said that any Washington district operates a dual system.

In the absence of a duty to desegregate, I find no constitutional barrier to the voters’ adoption of a neighborhood schools policy. Although the choice made by the voters may have been controversial, it was not one they were precluded from making.

The district court held Initiative 350 unconstitutional on three…

This cause comes before the Court in an unusual posture. Local elected school authorities, who so often in the past in other jurisdictions have resisted court-ordered integration, have in this instance invoked the jurisdiction of the federal courts because their self-generated efforts to achieve racial balance in the public schools have been hindered by governmental action. Successful, locally-formulated public school desegregation programs in Washington are today threatened with extinction through enforcement of a Washington State statute by State officials.

The Seattle, Tacoma, and Pasco, Washington, school boards, in an effort to correct substantial racial imbalance in the public schools in those communities, have in recent years implemented a series of voluntary and mandatory desegregation programs. Because of persistently segregated residential housing patterns in the three metropolitan areas, these desegregation plans have necessarily entailed some assignment of students to schools other than those closest to their homes. The success of these programs has been manifest, and the “Seattle Plan” in particular has been hailed as a model for other large cities.

The continued…