Supreme Court of Tennessee

The Tennessee Supreme Court has declined to reconsider its recent decision upholding the state’s 2019 private school voucher law.

In a brief order issued Monday, the high court stood by its 3-2 ruling on May 18 in favor of the state and against the governments of Metropolitan Nashville and Shelby County, the only two counties affected by the law.

The decision marks another legal win for Gov. Bill Lee’s education savings account program, the signature legislation of his first year in office, although other court challenges loom.

The program aims to provide taxpayer money to pay toward private education for eligible students in public school districts in Memphis and Nashville, but it has never launched because of the fierce legal battle.

In 2020, a judge overturned the law on the grounds that it violated the Tennessee Constitution’s “home rule” clause, since it was imposed on the two counties without their approval. But on appeal, the high court disagreed last month and said the home rule clause governs the actions of local school districts, not the counties that sued, even though they help fund those schools.

Attorneys for Nashville and Shelby County quickly asked for a rehearing, arguing in part that the home rule clause should apply because Nashville’s school system is part of a metropolitan form of government.

But the court declined to wade again into their claim.

“The court previously considered the issues raised in the petition in the course of its resolution of the appeal,” the court wrote in a four-sentence order.

A spokesman for Nashville Mayor John Cooper expressed disappointment over the order, while Nashville Law Director Wally Dietz said his office is “evaluating next steps for the remaining claims in our lawsuit.”

Meanwhile, Lee’s mothballed education savings account program remains stuck at the starting gate.

Litigants behind a second lawsuit in the case say they intend to press ahead with up to four remaining claims challenging the law’s constitutionality. And Dietz and his legal team are considering a similar move on behalf of local governments based in the state’s two largest cities.

In addition, a program with the complexities of vouchers requires significant preparation before a rollout and likely could not be ready before the start of the new school year in August.

Marta W. Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

Minutes before Nathan Bedford Forrest’s statue was removed from Health Sciences Park

The Supreme Court of Tennessee denied the Sons of Confederate Veterans’ (SCV) petition to review the dismissal of its case against the city of Memphis for the removal of three confederate monuments from former city-owned parks.

The SCV sought a temporary injunction in 2018 to preserve the monuments that were removed in 2017 by Memphis Greenspace, the nonprofit that purchased the two Memphis parks and subsequently removed the statues.

Last year, the Davidson County Chancery Court determined that the monuments were no longer on public property and therefore were not covered under the Tennessee Historical Protection Act (THPA) of 2013.

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The court also determined that the city acted legally in its efforts to remove the monuments.

That decision was upheld first in June by the Tennessee Court of Appeals and then again this week by the Tennessee Supreme Court.

Here is what the city’s chief legal officer, Bruce McMullen said about the court’s decision:

“We’re pleased with the Supreme Court’s denial of the application of the Sons of Confederate Veterans petition to review the dismissal of this case in the lower Courts. This decision effectively ends this litigation and allows Memphis Greenspace to relocate the statues to an appropriate venue outside of Shelby County. Every decision the city of Memphis has made throughout this process has been thoughtful and most importantly, legal.”