Court Opinion

ID: 9546374
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:28:32.556009+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:16:21.921354
License: Public Domain

MATTHEWS, Justice,
with whom RABINOWITZ, Justice, joins, concurring.
I concur in the result of today’s opinion.
No serious claim is made in this case that substantiahy different levels of per pupil expenditures (adjusted for cost of living differences) exist among the various school districts of Alaska. Similarly, there is here no claim that funds available to any Alaska school district are insufficient to pay for a level of education which meets standards of minimal adequacy. Such claims have been brought in other states with varying degrees of success. See, e.g., Shofstall v. Hollins, 110 Ariz. 88, 515 P.2d 590 (1973); Lujan v. Colorado State Bd. Of Educ., 649 P.2d 1005 (Colo.1982); McDaniel v. Thomas, 248 Ga. 632, 285 S.E.2d 156 (1981); Thompson v. Engelking, 96 Idaho 793, 537 P.2d 635 (1975); Reform Educational Financing Inequities Today (R.E.F.I.T.) v. Cuomo, 86 N.Y.2d 279, 631 N.Y.S.2d 551, 655 N.E.2d 647 (1995); Leandro v. State, 122 N.C.App. 1, 468 S.E.2d 543, rev. allowed, 343 N.C. 512, 472 S.E.2d 14 (1996); Fair School Finance Council of Oklahoma, Inc. v. State, 746 P.2d 1135 (Okla.1987); Tennessee Small School Systems v. McWherter, 851 S.W.2d 139 (Tenn.1993). Nothing in today’s opinion, or in this concurrence, should be read as suggesting that such claims might not be maintainable, if supported factually, based on the equal rights1 and public schools2 clauses of the Alaska Constitution.
Two claims are presented in this case. The first is a claim of unequal State spending. Individual plaintiffs argue that the State spends more money on education in other districts than in their district. Thus plaintiffs’ district must rely on local revenue sources, including taxes paid by plaintiffs, to partially fund the public schools. The second is a claim of inter-jurisdictional tax inequality. Individual taxpayers in one school district are complaining because the taxes they pay for their schools are greater than the taxes paid by other taxpayers in other districts for schools. For the reasons which I develop below, I do not think that either claim is cognizable.
Today’s opinion treats the individual plaintiffs’ claim of unequal State spending on its merits, holding that plaintiffs have not proven an overall disparity in benefits and burdens and thus have not shown a violation of the equal rights clause of the Alaska Constitution. Op. at 399-400. This may imply that if the plaintiffs had proven a substantial dis*406parity in State spending, disadvantaging their school district, a valid equal rights claim might exist. I do not think that such an argument would be valid. In my view, no claim of unequal State spending for public facilities or activities is justiciable.3 For example, the State may build roads in one area and not in another, may put a courthouse in one city and not in another, or put a job-training center in one community without providing a like center in another community, all without being answerable in court to claims of unconstitutionally unequal spending. The solution to unequal spending claims regarding public facilities and activities is exclusively political and legislative. This is to say, claims of this character pose a political question. See Malone v. Meekins, 650 P.2d 351, 356-57 (Alaska 1982). Political questions raise issues which are more properly dealt with by a coordinate branch of the State’s government. Id. They cannot be answered by judges. Abood v. Gorsuch, 703 P.2d 1158, 1160 (Alaska 1985).
The individual plaintiffs also claim that they pay more in property taxes than taxpayers in more economically favored communities and than property owners in REAAs (who pay no property taxes). Again, I do not think that this is a cognizable equal rights claim. There is no inter-jurisdictional right to tax equality. The people of one local government will want certain levels of fire and police protection and zoning enforcement, while the people of another local government will want other levels, and the tax rates will reflect these differences. Likewise, different municipalities will decide to support their schools at different levels, and their tax rates will again be different.
The following language from San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 53-54, 93 S.Ct. 1278, 1307-08, 36 L.Ed.2d 16 (1973), speaks to this point:
But any scheme of local taxation—indeed the very existence of identifiable local governmental units—requires the establishment of jurisdictional boundaries that are inevitably arbitrary. It is equally inevitable that some localities are going to be blessed with more taxable assets than others.* ...
Moreover, if local taxation for local expenditures were an unconstitutional method of providing for education then it might be an equally impermissible means of providing other necessary services customarily financed largely from local property taxes, including local police and fire protection, public health and hospitals, and public utility facilities of various kinds.... It has simply never been within the constitutional prerogative of this Court to nullify statewide measures for financing public services merely because the burdens or benefits thereof fall unevenly depending upon the relative wealth of the political subdivisions in which citizens live.
*This Court has never doubted the propriety of maintaining political subdivisions within the States and has never found in the Equal Protection Clause any per se rule of "territorial uniformity." ...
The individual taxpayers’ claim that they are being unfairly treated vis-a-vis property owners in REAAs is subject to the same observations. The State legislature acts as the local lawmaking body for unorganized areas such as REAAs. Further, if the State had a duty to tax property in REAAs, there would be no particular reason why the tax imposed should be measured by the rate paid by taxpayers in one particular municipality, rather than by lower or higher rates imposed by other municipalities. In my view the legislature can decide whether and how much to tax property in REAAs free from legally maintainable claims brought by taxpayers in other taxing jurisdictions that its decision is wrong. Here, as with State spending decisions, any available remedy must be pursued through majoritarian processes rather than through the courts.

. Article I, section 1 of the Alaska Constitution provides:
This constitution is dedicated to the principles that all persons have a natural right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and the enjoyment of the rewards of their own industry; that all persons are equal and entitled to equal rights, opportunities, and protection under the law; and that all persons have corresponding obligations to the people and to the State.

. Article VII, section 1 of the Alaska Constitution provides:
The legislature shall by general law establish and maintain a system of public schools open to all children of the State, and may provide for other public educational institutions. Schools and institutions so established shall be free from sectarian control. No money shall be paid from public funds for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution.

. To be distinguished are spending for individual benefits such as welfare programs or permanent fund dividends, which are subject to equal rights scrutiny. Sonneman v. Knight, 790 P.2d 702 (Alaska 1990); Williams v. Zobel, 619 P.2d 448 (Alaska 1980), rev’d, 457 U.S. 55, 102 S.Ct. 2309, 72 L.Ed.2d 672 (1982).