Opinion ID: 1680628
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The State's Obligation Under Article IX, Section 1(a)

Text: This Court has long recognized the constitutional obligation that Florida's education article places upon the Legislature: Article XII, section 1, constitution [the predecessor to article IX, section 1] commands that the Legislature shall provide for a uniform system of public free schools and for the liberal maintenance of such system of free schools. This means that a system of public free schools ... shall be established upon principles that are of uniform operation throughout the State and that such system shall be liberally maintained. State ex rel. Clark v. Henderson, 137 Fla. 666, 188 So. 351, 352 (1939). Currently, article IX, section 1(a), which is stronger than the provision discussed in Henderson, contains three critical components with regard to public education. The provision (1) declares that the education of children is a fundamental value of the people of the State of Florida, (2) sets forth an education mandate that provides that it is a paramount duty of the state to make adequate provision for the education of all children residing within its borders, and (3) sets forth how the state is to carry out this education mandate, specifically, that [a]dequate provision shall be made by law for a uniform, efficient, safe, secure, and high quality system of free public schools. (Emphasis supplied.) Justice Overton explained in his concurring opinion in Coalition for Adequacy & Fairness that [t]his education provision was placed in our constitution in recognition of the fact that education is absolutely essential to a free society under our governmental structure. 680 So.2d at 409. Justice Overton also noted that [t]he authors of our United States Constitution and our general governmental structure have acknowledged the importance of education as well. As James Madison said: Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governours must arm themselves with the power that knowledge gives.... Learned institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people. They throw that light over the public mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous encroachments on the public liberty. Robert S. Peck, The Constitution and American Values, in The Blessings of Liberty: Bicentennial Lectures At The National Archives 133 (Robert S. Peck & Ralph S. Pollock eds., 1989). Thomas Jefferson said it even more succinctly: If a nation expects to be ignorant and free ... it expects what never was and never will be. Letter from Thomas Jefferson to Colonel Charles Yancey (Jan. 6, 1816). Further, in one of the most important cases ever decided by the United States Supreme Court, Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 493, 74 S.Ct. 686, 691, 98 L.Ed. 873, 880 (1954), the Court stated that education is important to our democratic society. It is required in the performance of our most basic public responsibilities.... It is the very foundation of good citizenship. Id. (alterations in original).