Case Title: Gray v. Attorney General

Citation: 

Docket Number: SJC-12064

State: massachusetts

Court: Massachusetts Supreme Court

Date: 2016-07-01T00:00:00Z

Document:
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SJC-12064 
 
STEPHANIE GRAY & others1  vs.  ATTORNEY GENERAL & another.2 
 
 
 
Suffolk.     May 2, 2016. - July 1, 2016. 
 
Present:  Gants, C.J., Spina, Cordy, Botsford, Duffly, Lenk, & 
Hines, JJ. 
 
 
Initiative.  Constitutional Law, Initiative petition.  Attorney 
General.  Education, Standards. 
 
 
 
 
Civil action commenced in the Supreme Judicial Court for 
the county of Suffolk on January 22, 2016. 
 
 
The case was reported by Cordy, J. 
 
 
 
Thaddeus A. Heuer (Andrew M. London with him) for the 
plaintiffs. 
 
Juliana deHaan Rice, Assistant Attorney General (Michael B. 
Firestone, Assistant Attorney General, with her) for the 
defendants. 
 
 
 
BOTSFORD, J.  The Attorney General has certified an 
initiative petition that concerns, and seeks to end, the use of 
                     
 
1 Robert Antonucci, Bill Walczak, Dianne Kelly, B. John 
Dill, Kalimah Rahim, April West, Beverly Holmes, Jacinthe 
Albani, and Vanessa Calderon-Rosado. 
 
 
2 Secretary of the Commonwealth. 
2 
 
 
 
the Common Core State Standards (common core standards) in 
defining the educational curriculum of publicly funded 
elementary and secondary students in the Commonwealth.  The 
petition also concerns the standardized testing process used in 
Massachusetts school districts:  it would require the 
Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education 
(commissioner) to publicly release each year all of the 
questions and other "test items" included in the prior year's 
comprehensive assessment tests that all publicly funded students 
in elementary and secondary schools are required to take.  The 
plaintiffs, a group of Massachusetts voters, challenge the 
Attorney General's certification of the petition and seek to 
enjoin the Secretary of the Commonwealth (Secretary) from 
placing the proposed measure on the 2016 Statewide ballot on a 
number of grounds.  We conclude, as the plaintiffs argue, that 
the Attorney General's certification of Initiative Petition 15-
12 did not comply with art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 3, of the 
Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution because it contains 
provisions that are not related or mutually dependent.3  It is 
therefore unnecessary to consider the plaintiffs' other 
challenges. 
                     
 
3 All references in this opinion to art. 48, The Initiative, 
II, § 3, of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution 
refer to art. 48 as amended by art. 74 of those amendments. 
3 
 
 
 
 
1.  Background.4  The common core standards were developed 
in 2009 as part of a State-led initiative that included 
governors and commissioners of education from forty-eight 
States, two territories, and the District of Columbia working as 
members of the National Governors Association Center for Best 
Practices and the Council of Chief State School Officers.  The 
purpose of the initiative was to create consistent learning 
goals to ensure that all students graduate from high school with 
the requisite preparation for "college, career, and life."  See 
Development Process, Common Core State Standards Initiative, 
http://www.corestandards.org/about-the-standards/development-
process/ [https://perma.cc/ULU2-CG62].  The common core 
standards define learning objectives for each elementary and 
secondary school grade level through the final year of high 
school, with the goal that every student will be able to meet 
expectations for what every child should know by the time he or 
she graduates from high school.  See Frequently Asked Questions, 
Common Core State Standards Initiative, 
http://www.corestandards.org/wp-content/uploads/FAQ.pdf 
[https://perma.cc/W3VR-PQLN]. 
 
On July 21, 2010, the Board of Elementary and Secondary 
Education (board) voted, pursuant to its authority under G. L. 
                     
 
4 The facts are taken from the statement of agreed facts and 
exhibits submitted by the parties pursuant to the single 
justice's reservation and report. 
4 
 
 
 
c. 69, §§ 1D and 1E, to adopt the common core standards and 
replace the then-current Massachusetts curriculum frameworks in 
English language arts and mathematics; the vote to adopt was 
contingent on "augmenting and customizing" the common core 
standards "within the [fifteen] percent allowance"5 for State-
specific content (July vote).  The board directed the 
commissioner to present recommendations for modifying and 
augmenting the common core standards with State-specific content 
within the permissible fifteen per cent range no later than 
October, 2010, after which the commissioner was to solicit 
public comment.  The commissioner also was directed to propose 
to the board a final version of the standards, including State-
specific content, and upon the board's approval, they would 
become the new "Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks for English 
Language Arts and Mathematics."  On December 21, 2010, following 
a public comment period, the board voted unanimously to adopt 
the proposed new "Massachusetts Curriculum Framework for English 
Language Arts and Literacy, Incorporating the Common Core State 
Standards," and the proposed new "Massachusetts Curriculum 
                     
5 If a State, through an authorized governmental entity 
(here, the board) adopts the Common Core State Standards (common 
core standards), the State has agreed that they will account for 
eighty-five per cent of the total number of standards in a 
particular subject area, which provides the State with the 
option to adopt up to fifteen per cent in additional standards.  
See State Adoption of the Common Core State Standards: the 15 
Percent Rule, at 1 (Mar. 2012), available at http://files.eric. 
ed.gov/fulltext/ED544664.pdf [https://perma.cc/2UFD-NKVX]. 
5 
 
 
 
Framework for Mathematics, Incorporating the Common Core State 
Standards" (December vote). 
 
On or before August 5, 2015, sixteen qualified voters 
(petitioners) submitted Initiative Petition 15-12 to the 
Attorney General.  On September 2, 2015, the Attorney General 
certified to the Secretary that the petition is in the proper 
form and meets the requirements of art. 48; that the measure is 
not substantially the same as any measure that had been 
qualified for submission to the people at either of the two 
preceding biennial State elections; and that the initiative 
petition contains only subjects that are related or mutually 
dependent and which are not excluded from the initiative process 
pursuant to art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 2.  The Attorney 
General also prepared a summary of the initiative petition to be 
used in the process for gathering additional signatures, and 
provided the summary to the Secretary.  On or before December 2, 
2015, the petitioners submitted to the Secretary forms 
containing sufficient additional signatures to require that the 
Secretary transmit the petition to the Legislature.  The 
Secretary then transmitted the petition to the Clerk of the 
House of Representatives, and the petition was assigned bill No. 
H.3929, entitled "An Act relative to ending common core 
education standards."  The Legislature has not enacted the 
measure that the petition proposes.  If the petitioners submit 
6 
 
 
 
the requisite number of signatures to the Secretary by July 6, 
2016, the Secretary intends to include the petition in the 
Information for Voters Guide and to include the substance of the 
proposed measure on the November, 2016, ballot. 
 
On January 22, 2016, the plaintiffs filed their complaint 
in the county court, seeking relief in the nature of certiorari 
and mandamus; specifically, they seek to quash the certification 
of the petition and to enjoin the Secretary from including the 
substance of the proposed measure on the November, 2016, 
Statewide ballot.  After the parties filed a statement of agreed 
facts, the single justice reserved and reported the case for 
consideration by the full court. 
 
The petition contains six sections.6  Section 1 would 
rescind the board's July vote to adopt, contingently, the common 
core standards, and would immediately "restore" the 
Massachusetts curriculum frameworks in English language arts and 
mathematics that were in effect prior to July 21, 2010.  Section 
2 of the petition would amend the second paragraph of G. L. 
c. 69, § 1D (§ 1D),7 to require that (1) the board include, in 
                     
 
6 The full text of Initiative Petition 15-12 is set forth in 
the Appendix to this opinion. 
 
 
7 The second paragraph of G. L. c. 69, § 1D (§ 1D), as 
currently in effect, provides: 
 
 
"The board shall direct the commissioner to institute 
a process to develop academic standards for the core 
7 
 
 
 
the process for developing academic standards, committees 
comprised of "teachers and academics" from Massachusetts public 
and private colleges and universities; and (2) the commissioner 
copyright the "frameworks," granting permission for use only for 
noncommercial, educational uses. 
Section 3 of the petition would further amend the second 
paragraph of § 1D by adding a provision that would (1) require 
the board to create three review committees -- one for 
mathematics, one for science and technology, and one for English 
-- with the members of each committee to be appointed by the 
Governor from public and private research universities in 
Massachusetts; and (2) prohibit the board from approving any 
"frameworks" unless the pertinent review committee "warrant[s] 
                                                                  
subjects of mathematics, science and technology, history 
and social science, English, foreign languages and the 
arts.  The standards shall cover grades kindergarten 
through twelve and shall clearly set forth the skills, 
competencies and knowledge expected to be possessed by all 
students at the conclusion of individual grades or clusters 
of grades.  The standards shall be formulated so as to set 
high expectations of student performance and to provide 
clear and specific examples that embody and reflect these 
high expectations, and shall be constructed with due regard 
to the work and recommendations of national organizations, 
to the best of similar efforts in other states, and to the 
level of skills, competencies and knowledge possessed by 
typical students in the most educationally advanced 
nations.  The skills, competencies and knowledge set forth 
in the standards shall be expressed in terms which lend 
themselves to objective measurement, define the performance 
outcomes expected of both students directly entering the 
workforce and of students pursuing higher education, and 
facilitate comparisons with students of other states and 
other nations." 
8 
 
 
 
by a two-thirds vote that the frameworks are equivalent to the 
standards of the most educationally advanced nations as 
determined by the Trends in Mathematics and Sciences Study."8 
 
Section 4 of the petition would amend the third paragraph 
of G. L. c. 69, § 1I (§ 1I),9 to require, with respect to the 
                     
8 The Trends in International Mathematics and Sciences Study 
(TIMSS) is a series of international assessments of the 
mathematics and science knowledge of students in several 
countries.  The National Center for Education Statistics of the 
United States Department of Education administers the TIMSS in 
the United States.  See Institute of Education Sciences, 
National Center for Education Statistics, Trends in 
International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), Overview, 
http://nces.ed.gov/timss/ [https://perma.cc/7D5S-FEPC].  
Although section 3 of the initiative petition does not include 
the word "international," we assume that the petition intends to 
refer to TIMSS as the proposed benchmark for academic standards. 
 
 
9 General Laws c. 69, § 1I (§ 1I), provides in relevant 
part: 
 
 
"The board shall adopt a system for evaluating on an 
annual basis the performance of both public school 
districts and individual public schools. . . . 
 
 
"The system shall be designed both to measure outcomes 
and results regarding student performance, and to improve 
the effectiveness of curriculum and instruction.  In its 
design and application, the system shall strike a balance 
among considerations of accuracy, fairness, expense and 
administration.  The system shall employ a variety of 
assessment instruments on either a comprehensive or 
statistically valid sampling basis.  Such instruments shall 
be criterion referenced, assessing whether students are 
meeting the academic standards described in this 
chapter. . . .  Such instruments shall provide the means to 
compare student performance among the various school 
systems and communities in the commonwealth, and between 
students in other states and in other nations, especially 
those nations which compete with the commonwealth for 
employment and economic opportunities. . . . 
9 
 
 
 
comprehensive diagnostic assessments of individual students 
conducted on an annual basis,10 the annual release, before the 
start of each school year, of all of the previous academic 
year's test items, including all test questions, all constructed 
responses, and all essays, for each grade in which the 
diagnostic assessment tests were administered and for each 
subject tested, "[i]n order to better inform the teachers and 
administrators about the diagnostic assessments."11 
                                                                  
 
 
"In addition, comprehensive diagnostic assessment of 
individual students shall be conducted at least in the 
fourth, eighth and tenth grades.  Said diagnostic 
assessments shall identify academic achievement levels of 
all students in order to inform teachers, parents, 
administrators and the students themselves, as to 
individual academic performance.  The board shall develop 
procedures for updating, improving or refining the 
assessment system." 
 
 
10 The Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) 
test qualifies as a "comprehensive diagnostic assessment" and is 
"used as the high school competency determination, or graduation 
requirement."  Student No. 9 v. Board of Educ., 440 Mass. 752, 
759 (2004).  The MCAS test was administered initially in 1998, 
and, beginning with the graduating class of 2003, high school 
students must achieve a set minimum scaled score on the English 
language arts and mathematics grade 10 MCAS test as a graduation 
requirement.  Id. 
 
11 The final sections of the initiative petition provide 
that "the several provisions of this Act" are independent and 
severable (section 5), and that "[t]his Act" is to take effect 
"immediately upon coming law" (section 6).  We do not discuss 
either of these sections further except to note that the 
severability provision in section 5 is part of the measure 
proposed in the petition, and would only be operative if enacted 
into law.  This severability provision does not authorize this 
10 
 
 
 
 
The plaintiffs allege in their complaint that Initiative 
Petition 15-12 was improperly certified by the Attorney General 
because the petition does not comply with art. 48 in several 
respects.  In particular, the plaintiffs claim that (1) the 
petition contains subjects that are neither related nor mutually 
dependent in violation of art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 3; (2) 
the petition does not propose a "law" as required by art. 48, 
The Initiative, II, § 1, insofar as it proposes to rescind the 
board's July vote, a vote that had no operative effect because 
final board approval of the common core standards did not occur 
until the December vote; and (3) it does not include the 
requisite enacting language prescribed by G. L. c. 4, § 3. 
 
2.  Discussion.12  a.  Standard of review.  A challenge to 
the decision by the Attorney General to certify an initiative 
petition is reviewed de novo.  See Abdow v. Attorney Gen., 468 
Mass. 478, 487 (2014).  See also Opinion of the Justices, 262 
Mass. 603, 606 (1928) ("The certificate of the Attorney General 
                                                                  
court to approve the Attorney General's certification of some 
sections of Initiative Petition 15-12 while disapproving others. 
 
 
12 In Bogertman v. Attorney Gen., 474 Mass. 607, 610-612 
(2016), we summarized the process and standards for enactment of 
a measure by popular initiative petition and the duty of the 
Attorney General under art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 3, to 
review and certify that the petition meets the criteria set 
forth in art. 48, The Initiative, II, §§ 1-2.  There is no need 
to repeat the discussion in this case, but it provides the 
necessary framework for our consideration of the plaintiffs' 
challenges to the initiative petition before us here. 
11 
 
 
 
concerns merely matters of form. . . .  Whatever fails to 
possess elements indispensable for enactment or for submission 
to the people cannot be made into a 'law' by such certificate").  
In conducting our review, we bear in mind "the firmly 
established principle that art. 48 is to be construed to support 
the people's prerogative to initiate and adopt laws."  Carney v. 
Attorney Gen., 451 Mass. 803, 814 (2008) (Carney II), quoting 
Yankee Atomic Elec. Co. v. Secretary of the Commonwealth, 403 
Mass. 203, 211 (1988). 
 
b.  Relatedness.  Pursuant to art. 48, The Initiative, II, 
§ 3, the Attorney General may only certify petitions that 
contain subjects "which are related or which are mutually 
dependent" (related subjects requirement).  The plaintiffs argue 
that the petition does not comply with this requirement.  We 
agree.  In Carney v. Attorney Gen., 447 Mass. 218, 225-232 
(2006) (Carney I), the court, informed by review of the 
proceedings of the State Constitutional Convention of 1917-1918, 
summarized the purpose of the related subjects requirement.  We 
stated: 
 
"The relatedness limitation requires the Attorney 
General to scrutinize the aggregation of laws proposed in 
the initiative petition for its impact at the polls.  At 
some high level of abstraction, any two laws may be said to 
share a 'common purpose.'  The salient inquiry is:  Do the 
similarities of an initiative's provisions dominate what 
each segment provides separately so that the petition is 
sufficiently coherent to be voted on 'yes' or 'no' by the 
voters? 
12 
 
 
 
 
 
". . . 
 
 
"The language, structure, and history of art. 48 all 
suggest that any initiative presenting multiple subjects 
may not operate to deprive the people of a 'meaningful way' 
to express their will. . . .  It is not enough that the 
provisions in an initiative petition all 'relate' to some 
same broad topic at some conceivable level of 
abstraction. . . .  To clear the relatedness hurdle, the 
initiative petition must express an operational relatedness 
among its substantive parts that would permit a reasonable 
voter to affirm or reject the entire petition as a unified 
statement of public policy.  A broader interpretation of 
the common purpose requirement would undercut the very 
foundations of the relatedness limitation."  (Emphases 
added; citations omitted.) 
 
Id. at 226, 230-231.  See Abdow, 468 Mass. at 499.13  See also 
Albano v. Attorney Gen., 437 Mass. 156, 161 (2002); Mazzone v. 
                     
 
13 Abdow v. Attorney Gen., 468 Mass. 478, 499 (2014), also 
discusses the related subjects requirement.  We stated: 
 
 
"The decisions of this court illustrate how we have 
endeavored to construe the related subjects requirement in 
a balanced manner that fairly accommodates both the 
interests of initiative petitioners and the interests of 
those who would ultimately vote on the petition.  On the 
one hand, the requirement must not be construed so narrowly 
as to frustrate the ability of voters to use the popular 
initiative as 'the people's process' to bring important 
matters of concern directly to the electorate; the 
delegates to the constitutional convention that approved 
art. 48 did, after all, permit more than one subject to be 
included in a petition, and we ought not be so restrictive 
in the definition of relatedness that we effectively 
eliminate that possibility and confine each petition to a 
single subject. . . .  On the other hand, relatedness 
cannot be defined so broadly that it allows the inclusion 
in a single petition of two or more subjects that have only 
a marginal relationship to one another, which might confuse 
or mislead voters, or which could place them in the 
untenable position of casting a single vote on two or more 
dissimilar subjects." 
13 
 
 
 
Attorney Gen., 432 Mass. 515, 528-529 (2000); Massachusetts 
Teachers Ass'n v. Secretary of the Commonwealth, 384 Mass. 209, 
219-220 (1981); Opinion of the Justices, 309 Mass. 555, 560-561 
(1941). 
These cases indicate that at the core of the related 
subjects requirement is the condition that the initiative 
petition's provisions share a "common purpose," see 
Massachusetts Teachers Ass'n, 384 Mass. at 219-220;14 put 
slightly differently but making the same point, the petition's 
provisions, considered together, must present a "unified 
statement of public policy" that the voters can accept or reject 
as a whole.  See Carney I, 447 Mass. at 231. 
                                                                  
 
Id. 
 
14 See also Abdow, 468 Mass. at 501-504 (common purpose 
found where petition's provisions all related to limiting scope 
of permissible gambling in Commonwealth); Albano v. Attorney 
Gen., 437 Mass. 156, 161-162 (2002) (common purpose found where 
constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage would result 
in uniform application to several different statutes); Mazzone 
v. Attorney Gen., 432 Mass. 515, 528-529 (2000) (common purpose 
found where "provisions of the petition relate directly or 
indirectly to expanding the scope of the Commonwealth's drug 
treatment programs and . . . 'fairly' funding those programs"); 
Massachusetts Teachers Ass'n v. Secretary of the Commonwealth, 
384 Mass. 209, 218-221 (1981) (related subjects requirement met 
where provisions of petition all related directly or indirectly 
to limitation of taxes); Opinion of the Justices, 309 Mass. 555, 
560-561 (1941) (where general subject of proposed law was 
prevention of pregnancy or conception, provisions seeking to 
provide for "treatment or prescription given to married person," 
"teaching in chartered medical schools," and "publication or 
sale of medical treatises or journals" deemed related as sharing 
common purpose). 
14 
 
 
 
 
In two cases, we have concluded that the provisions 
contained in a particular initiative petition do not share a 
common purpose or reflect a uniform statement of public policy, 
and, therefore, did not satisfy the related subjects 
requirement.  In Opinion of the Justices, 422 Mass. 1212, 1213, 
1220-1221 (1996), in response to questions propounded by the 
House of Representatives, we considered an initiative petition 
that included several provisions designed to reduce and limit 
compensation paid to Massachusetts legislators and also one that 
would permit the Inspector General to access the records of the 
General Court and records kept by the commissioner of veterans' 
services.  One of the questions posed to the court was whether 
the provision relating to the records of the commissioner of 
veterans' services was sufficiently related to a subject to 
which the initiative petition's other provisions also related.  
The petition's drafters asserted that the common purpose among 
the provisions was "to make Massachusetts government more 
accountable to the people"; counsel to the House of 
Representatives proposed that the common purpose might be 
legislative accountability.  Id. at 1220.  We determined that 
the common purpose asserted by the drafters was "unacceptably 
broad," given that "[o]ne could imagine a multitude of diverse 
subjects all of which would 'relate' to making government more 
accountable to the people."  Id. at 1221.  We accepted the 
15 
 
 
 
alternative proposed purpose of legislative accountability as 
reflecting a common purpose that also was consistent with the 
title of the initiative petition at issue, but concluded that 
"[p]ermitting the Inspector General access to the records of the 
commissioner of veterans' services does not relate in any 
meaningful way to improving legislative accountability."  Id.  
Accordingly, because these provisions were not "related or 
mutually dependent," the initiative petition did not satisfy the 
related subjects requirement.  Id. 
In the second case, Carney I, the petition proposed to (1) 
amend certain criminal statutes to punish those who abused or 
neglected dogs, and (2) ban parimutuel dog racing.  Carney I, 
447 Mass. at 219-220 & n.7.  We rejected as too broad the 
Attorney General's argument that these were sufficiently related 
subjects based on a mutual connection to the goal of promoting 
more humane treatment of dogs, see id. at 224, and concluded 
that these provisions lacked a sufficient "operational 
relationship" between them to permit a reasoned vote on a 
uniform public policy question.  See id. at 231-232.  In that 
regard, we observed: 
 
"The voter who favors increasing criminal penalties 
for animal abuse should be permitted to register that clear 
preference without also being required to favor eliminating 
parimutuel dog racing.  Conversely, the voter who thinks 
that the criminal penalties for animal abuse statutes are 
strong enough should not be required to vote in favor of 
16 
 
 
 
extending the reach of our criminal laws because he favors 
abolishing parimutuel dog racing." 
 
Id. at 231.  As a result, the related subjects requirement was 
not satisfied and the Attorney General's certification of the 
petition did not comply with art. 48.  Id. at 231-232. 
With this background in mind, we turn to Initiative 
Petition 15-12.  Sections 1 through 3 may be said to share a 
common purpose:  redefining the contents of the academic 
standards and curriculum frameworks for the Commonwealth's 
public schools.  Section 4, however, which would amend § 1I to 
require annual publication of all the previous year's questions, 
constructed responses, and essays for each grade and core 
subject included in the mandatory diagnostic assessment tests, 
has the explicitly stated purpose of better informing educators 
about the assessment tests.  Thus, the apparent goal of section 
4 is to make more transparent the standardized diagnostic 
assessment tests and testing process required to be used in 
public education, and it is a goal that comes with a significant 
price tag:  as the Attorney General agreed in oral argument 
before this court, implementing section 4 will require the 
development and creation of a completely new comprehensive 
diagnostic test every year, which means a substantial increase 
in annual expense for the board -- an expense to be borne by 
17 
 
 
 
taxpayers and to be weighed by voters in determining whether 
increased transparency is worth the cost.15 
An initiative petition properly may contain only subjects 
"which are related or which are mutually dependent."  Art. 48, 
The Initiative, II, § 3.  The two subjects in this petition are 
clearly not "mutually dependent."  In fact, the opposite seems 
true.  That is, whether the diagnostic assessment tests are 
based on the common core standards or some previous set of 
academic standards -- the focus of sections 1 through 3 of the 
petition -- will not affect in any way the commissioner's 
obligation under section 4 to release before the start of every 
school year all of the previous year's test items in order to 
inform educators about the testing process; the commissioner's 
obligation will exist independently of the specific curriculum 
content on which the tests are based. 
                     
15 The diagnostic assessment tests currently are embodied 
not only in the MCAS tests, see note 10, supra, but also in the 
Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers 
(PARCC) assessment tests currently administered as diagnostic 
assessments in some Massachusetts school districts.  See 
Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, 
Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, 
http://www.doe.mass.edu/parcc/ [https://perma.cc/56H8-X85Y].  
The record does not contain any information concerning whether 
there are legal constraints that would limit the commissioner's 
ability to publish information about the PARCC assessment tests, 
given that these tests are created and published by an entity 
that is independent of the board and the Department of 
Elementary and Secondary Education.  See http://www.parcconline. 
org/about/parcc-inc [https://perma.cc/Q83Y-T6ZY]. 
18 
 
 
 
Nor do the two subjects have sufficient operational 
connection, see Carney I, 447 Mass. at 230-231, to be "related" 
within the meaning of art. 48.  The Attorney General argues that 
sections 1 through 3 are "operationally related" to section 4 in 
that all four sections serve a common purpose of imposing "new 
procedural requirements on the development and implementation of 
educational standards," and because "the twin educational facets 
of curriculum and assessment are inextricably coupled:  
assessments exist to measure the extent to which students are 
learning and schools are teaching the material, concepts, and 
strategies set forth in the academic standards."  We agree that 
at a conceptual level, curriculum content and assessment are 
interconnected, but the related subjects requirement is not 
satisfied by a conceptual or abstract bond.  See Carney I, supra 
at 230-231.  At the operational level, this petition joins a 
proposed policy of rejecting a particular set of curriculum 
standards, common core, with a proposed policy of increasing 
transparency in the standardized testing process at what is 
likely to be a greatly increased cost, regardless of the content 
of the curriculum standards used.  These are two separate public 
policy issues. 
There is significant public debate in Massachusetts and the 
nation about the value of the common core standards; there is 
also a great deal of debate about the value of standardized 
19 
 
 
 
testing.16  That both may be controversial public issues in the 
domain of elementary and secondary education, however, does not, 
by itself, bring them within the related subjects requirement of 
art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 3.  The combination of these two 
issues in one initiative petition does not offer the voters a 
"unified statement of public policy" (emphasis added).  See 
Carney I, 447 Mass. at 231.  In other words, we cannot say that 
"the similarities of [the petition's] provisions dominate what 
each [provision] provides separately" so that the petition, 
considered as a whole, "is sufficiently coherent to be voted on 
'yes' or 'no' by the voters."  Id. at 226.  Rather, because the 
issues combined in the petition are substantively distinct, it 
is more likely that voters would be in the "untenable position 
of casting a single vote on two or more dissimilar subjects," 
Abdow, 468 Mass. at 499, which is the specific misuse of the 
initiative process that the related subjects requirement was 
intended to avoid.  See Carney I, supra at 229-231. 
 
Our conclusion that Initiative Petition 15-12 fails to 
satisfy the related subjects requirement of art. 48 will prevent 
the proposed measure in the petition from being placed on the 
2016 Statewide ballot.  Because this is so, we need not consider 
the plaintiffs' additional claims that the petition fails to 
                     
 
16 See If the MCAS Is So Good, Why Are We Ditching It?, 
Boston Globe Magazine, June 12, 2016; Leaked Questions Rekindle 
Debate Over Common Core Tests, N.Y. Times, May 24, 2016. 
20 
 
 
 
propose a "law," see art. 48, The Initiative, II, § 1, and that 
the necessary enacting language required by G. L. c. 4, § 3, is 
absent. 
 
3.  Conclusion.  We remand the case to the county court for 
entry of a judgment declaring that the Attorney General's 
certification of Initiative Petition 15-12 is not in compliance 
with the limitations of art. 48 and enjoining the Secretary from 
taking steps to place the measure on the ballot in the 2016 
Statewide election. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
So ordered. 
 
 
Appendix. 
 
Initiative Petition for a Law Relative to Ending Common Core 
Education Standards 
 
 
"Be it enacted by the people and their authority: 
 
 
"SECTION 1.  Notwithstanding the provisions of any general or 
special law to the contrary, the vote taken by the Massachusetts 
Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on July 21, 2010, to 
adopt the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics and 
English Language Arts is hereby rescinded.  The curriculum 
frameworks in Mathematics and English Language Arts that were in 
effect prior to that date are hereby restored. 
 
"SECTION 2.  Section 1D of Chapter 69 is hereby amended in the 
second paragraph by inserting after the first sentence, the 
following new sentences: 
 
The process shall include committees made up exclusively of 
public school teachers and academics from private and 
public colleges and universities established and operated 
in Massachusetts.  The commissioner shall copyright the 
frameworks, which shall be wholly owned by the department; 
permission shall be granted to copy any or all parts of 
these frameworks for non-commercial educational purposes. 
 
"SECTION 3.  Said section 1D of chapter 69 is hereby further 
amended in the second paragraph by inserting after the third 
sentence the following new sentences: 
 
There shall be three review committees, one for each 
discipline of math, science and technology and English.  
Each review committee shall have three members appointed by 
the governor who shall choose said members from private or 
public research universities established and operated in 
Massachusetts for each of the disciplines.  For the 
purposes of this section, a 'research university' is any 
university that awards doctoral degrees in the arts and 
sciences.  Each review committee shall warrant by a two-
thirds vote that the frameworks are equivalent to the 
standards of the most educationally advanced nations as 
determined by the Trends in Mathematics and Sciences Study.  
2 
 
 
 
No framework shall be approved by the board without such a 
warrant. 
 
"SECTION 4.  Section 1I of Chapter 69 is hereby amended in the 
third paragraph by inserting after the second sentence, the 
following new sentence: 
 
In order to better inform the teachers and administrators 
about the diagnostic assessments, after the administration 
of the assessments but before the start of the new school 
year, the commissioner shall release all of the test items, 
including questions, constructed responses and essays, for 
each grade and every subject. 
 
"SECTION 5.  The several provisions of this Act are independent 
and severable and the invalidity, if any, of any part or feature 
thereof shall not affect or render the remainder of the Act 
invalid or inoperative. 
 
"SECTION 6.  This act shall take effect immediately upon 
becoming law."