Supreme Court election
In response to the Aug. 21 letter in Peninsula Voices, “Justice election,” the Washington State Constitution, Article IX, Section 2, says:
“The legislature shall provide for a general and uniform system of public schools.
“The public school system shall include common schools, and such high schools, normal schools, and technical schools as may hereafter be established.
“But the entire revenue derived from the common school fund and the state tax for common schools shall be exclusively applied to the support of the common schools.”
Thus, the Supreme Court justices who ruled that it is unconstitutional to fund charter schools as common schools were correct.
The present attack on those justices who are up for re-election is totally unwarranted.
They did their jobs and read the constitution — I would add, unlike the state Legislature and governor, who chose to ignore it.
The real issue in education is our state funding the schools according to the requirements of the McCleary decision.
It has been four years since the decision was handed down, and our state Legislature still has not adequately complied and in fact prefers to be fined $100,000 per day since August 2015 rather than do its job and fund education.
Privatization of our public schools by the for-profit corporations that are pushing charter schools and funding our politicians (as well as a breakfast for national delegates at this year’s Democratic National Convention) should be opposed.
Fund our public schools at the appropriate court-ordered level and stop trying to change the narrative.
Linda Sutton,
Port Townsend
Sutton was a member of the Democratic National Convention’s Rules Committee and attended the convention.
