Since 1982, American law has held that all children living in the United States, regardless of immigration status, have had a right to a free public education. In the Supreme Court decision of Plyler vs Doe, the justices held by a narrow 5-4 margin that under the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, no person living within the boundaries of a particular state may be treated differently under the law. As ‘person’ denotes no automatic immigration status, the justices found that such children would attend public school alongside their American counterparts. There was also a practical issue at hand of whether a country filled with illiterate individuals would be anything to strive towards and the cost to the rest of America created by not providing basic education.
However, in his dissenting opinion, then-Chief Justice Warren Burger claimed that the issue itself was not for the judiciary to decide but rather ought to be a matter of legislative authority. As immigration law- and therefore status- is controlled by Congress, so too should the designation and treatment of individuals defined by such legislation. Rising from the ashes of Roe v Wade, the revisiting of Plyler v Doe may indeed return the issue of illegal immigrants receiving public education to the states and their legislatures, likely resulting in a patchwork of wildly different regulations. Some, particularly border states such as Texas and Arizona, have already begun to challenge the restrictions on public school admissions imposed by the federal government. Tennessee actually passed legislation that allows school districts to opt out of enrolling undocumented children, of whom there are an estimated 10,000 in the state. The bill resulted in the current issue before SCOTUS.
Regardless of opinions on immigration, the fact remains that there exist legitimate boundaries around access to education, and public schooling is not an automatic right even for citizens. In 2011, a homeless woman was arrested in Connecticut for sending her six-year-old son to a school he wasn’t geographically entitled to attend. Even though Tanya McDowell did not have a permanent address and lived between shelters and friends’ apartments with her child, she was prosecuted for using a former babysitter’s address to fit within a favorable district. She was to five years in prison for first-degree larceny.
Ironically, the state of Connecticut is one of many that have begun to issue guidance on shielding residents, including schoolchildren, from contact with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. As it did following the reversal of Roe v Wade and its guaranteed access to abortion, Connecticut statute already extends the same protections as the SCOTUS decision; therefore, its overturn would make little difference within such jurisdiction. Other states, however, could begin to decide whether to enroll undocumented students- potentially even on a district-by-district basis. With the conservative makeup of the court, Plyler v Doe will likely be overturned in favor of individual states' decisions, particularly with the ongoing Trump administration's challenges to the federal Department of Education.
How do you feel about the push to make public education accessible only to United States citizens? How will this impact both education and immigration?
Hilary Gunn is a Connecticut native with a degree in Criminal Justice from the George Washington University. She works for a nonprofit and has previously collaborated with the CT GOP as an activist, political campaign manager and field director, and social media organizer. She is currently serving in her fourth term of municipal office and has previously acted as a delegate on the Republican Town Committee.