経済的差別と教育の機会均等 --判例にみるアメリカの教育 (2) --

Abstract

This paper gives a brief consideration to the California Supreme Court's decision regarding Serrano v. Priest, 1971. The core of the decision, the Serrano first decision, was that a funding scheme which makes the quality of a child's education dependent upon the wealth of his parents and neighbours (i.e., the wealth of his school district) invidiously discriminates against the poor in contravention of the equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and parallel clauses in the California Constitution. The very striking features of the decision were that the high court applied "the suspect classification and fundamental interest" criteria to the wealth discrimination case in the sphere of education and held the principle of "fiscal neutrality", that is, the influence of the wealth mentioned above to be excluded from the public education, to be fashioned in remedying the California public school funding scheme. This paper, summarizing the decision, discusses the arguments about the application of these criteria and the availability of the fiscal neutral principle, and finally touches upon the aftermath of the first decision, i.e., the following legislative reforms and the Serrano second decision.