## Facts

- Hartford-area public school students sued Connecticut state officials, alleging that severe racial, ethnic, and economic isolation in Hartford public schools denied them a substantially equal educational opportunity under the Connecticut Constitution and violated equal protection.
- Connecticut law organized school districts along municipal boundary lines and generally required students to attend school in the district of residence.
- Hartford’s student population was overwhelmingly Black and Latino, while surrounding suburban districts were overwhelmingly white.
- Hartford schools exhibited markedly worse educational outcomes than surrounding districts, alongside concentrated poverty and fewer resources.
- The state did not intentionally create segregation; the town-based districting system was adopted for non-discriminatory reasons, but its continued operation, combined with residential patterns, produced extreme racial and ethnic isolation.
- After trial, the Superior Court ruled for the state, reasoning that absent governmental causation of racial isolation, courts could not require changes to the racial composition of schools.
- The plaintiffs appealed, and the Connecticut Supreme Court reviewed the case.

## Issues

1. Whether claims seeking judicial enforcement of the state constitutional right to a substantially equal educational opportunity are justiciable despite separation-of-powers concerns.
2. Whether the Connecticut Constitution imposes an affirmative obligation on the state to remedy extreme racial and ethnic isolation in public schools absent proof of intentional discrimination.
3. Whether the severe racial and ethnic isolation in Hartford public schools materially impaired students’ educational opportunity so as to violate the state constitution.
4. If a violation exists, what roles the judiciary and political branches have in shaping a remedy.

## Decision

- The Connecticut Supreme Court reversed the trial court in a 4–3 decision and remanded.
- The court held the claims were justiciable and that adjudicating alleged constitutional violations is a judicial function even when the subject is education policy.
- The court held the Connecticut Constitution imposes an affirmative duty to provide a substantially equal educational opportunity that cannot be avoided by characterizing the state’s failure to act as non-actionable.
- The court held that extreme racial and ethnic isolation in Hartford public schools materially impaired educational opportunity and therefore violated the state constitutional guarantee, even without de jure segregation.
- The court left primary responsibility for devising and implementing a remedy to the legislature (with the executive), while requiring the state to assume affirmative responsibility to correct the constitutional violation.

## Legal Principles

- Article Eighth, § 1 imposes an affirmative obligation on the state to implement and maintain free public schools that provide a substantially equal educational opportunity.
- Education is treated as a fundamental interest under the Connecticut Constitution; substantial inequalities in educational opportunity trigger strict scrutiny under state constitutional analysis.
- A constitutional violation may be shown by the condition of extreme racial and ethnic isolation that substantially and materially impairs educational opportunity; proof of intentional, de jure segregation is not required.
- Where the state has an affirmative constitutional duty, its knowing failure to remedy grossly unequal educational opportunity may constitute constitutionally cognizable state responsibility.
- Separation of powers permits courts to identify constitutional violations while leaving policy design and operational details of the remedy primarily to the political branches.

## Conclusion

The Connecticut Supreme Court held that the state constitution guarantees Hartford students a substantially equal educational opportunity and that extreme racial and ethnic isolation in Hartford public schools materially impaired that right, requiring the state to take remedial action even absent intentional segregation, with the legislature bearing primary responsibility for the remedy.


Sheff v. O’Neill, 238 Conn. 1, 678 A.2d 1267 (Conn. 1996)