## Facts

- Andrew S., a child with disabilities residing in the Manchester School District, was voluntarily enrolled by his parents in a private Catholic elementary school.
- Under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), public-school students with disabilities are entitled to a free appropriate public education (FAPE) and IDEA due-process hearing procedures.
- After 1997 amendments, IDEA did not give parentally placed private-school students an individually enforceable right to the same special-education services as public-school students; districts must instead spend only a proportionate share of IDEA funds on services for private-school students as a group.
- Andrew’s parents contended that the reduced services and lack of IDEA due-process hearings for children in private religious schools unlawfully burdened religious exercise and violated constitutional protections.
- The district court entered judgment for the school district, applying rational-basis review and rejecting the constitutional and statutory challenges.

## Issues

1. Whether IDEA’s reduced, non-individually enforceable services for parentally placed private-school students impose a burden on religious exercise in violation of the Free Exercise Clause or RFRA.
2. Whether the differential treatment between public-school students (FAPE and due process) and parentally placed private-school students (proportionate-share services) violates equal protection.
3. Whether denying IDEA due-process hearing procedures to parentally placed private-school students violates procedural or substantive due process.

## Decision

- The First Circuit affirmed judgment for the Manchester School District.
- The court held that IDEA’s scheme for parentally placed private-school students does not violate the Free Exercise Clause or RFRA because the statute declines to fund private-school services at the public-school level rather than coercing or penalizing religious choice.
- The court held there was no procedural due process violation because parentally placed private-school students lack an individually enforceable entitlement to FAPE-level services and associated IDEA hearing procedures.
- The court held the equal protection challenge failed under rational-basis review because the classification neither targets a suspect class nor burdens a fundamental right, and Congress had rational fiscal and administrative reasons for prioritizing FAPE obligations in the public system.
- The court rejected substantive due process claims because the legislative allocation of benefits was not arbitrary in a constitutional sense.

## Legal Principles

- Parentally placed private-school children with disabilities do not have an individually enforceable right under IDEA to receive the same services and procedural protections provided to public-school students; districts must provide only a proportionate-share allocation of IDEA funds for that group.
- A government’s refusal to subsidize private (including religious) schooling at the same level as public schooling, without coercion or penalties for religious choice, does not by itself constitute a Free Exercise burden.
- Procedural due process requires a protected liberty or property interest; when no individual statutory entitlement exists to a claimed benefit, denial of corresponding procedures does not violate procedural due process.
- Differential allocation of education benefits between public and parentally chosen private schooling is reviewed under rational-basis scrutiny absent a suspect classification or burden on a fundamental right, and is upheld if supported by rational fiscal or administrative reasons.

## Conclusion

The First Circuit upheld IDEA’s post-1997 framework limiting services for parentally placed private-school students to a proportionate-share model, holding that the resulting differences from public-school FAPE and IDEA procedures did not violate Free Exercise, RFRA, equal protection, or due process.


Gary S. v. Manchester Sch. Dist., 374 F.3d 15 (1st Cir. 2004)