Washington (State) Special Education Funding Challenge Fails

At the end of last week, the Washington Supreme Court issued its decision in School Districts' Alliance for Adequate Funding in Special Education v. State (link to majority opinion).  The court rejected a challenge to the adequacy of special education funding in the state, holding that any such inadequacy was not shown "beyond a reasonable doubt."  At first reading, this seems to be an odd standard for determining educational adequacy. 

However, the court took pains to note that the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard of unconstitutionality is not an evidentiary standard, but a way of calibrating the extreme deference that the court affords legislative policy judgments.  Thus, on a broader reading, the decision seems in line with the current trend in the adequacy cases to (1) reach the merits; but (2) apply a highly deferential standard of review (see my posts on Colorado, Connecticut, and Missouri). 

The court also hinted that the challege to the statute's constitutionality was an "as-applied" challenge, rather than a "facial" challenge.  Bill Thro's most recent article would argue agaist that characterization for state constitutional challeges to funding statutes, and I tend to agree normatively.  Nevertheless, descriptively, the way the case was presented to the Washington court, I think that the "as-applied" label might fit there. 

By way of shameless self-aggrandizement, I must also point out that two concurring justices saw fit to cite my recent Alabama Law Review piece in criticizing the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard of constitutionality.