Which U.S. Supreme Court case held that the Equal Protection Clause does not require equal school funding across districts?

San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez held that the Equal Protection Clause does not require equal school funding across districts.

Decided in 1973, the case challenged Texas’s reliance on local property taxes to fund public schools. Families from the Edgewood district argued that the system disadvantaged poorer, predominantly Mexican American communities because wealthy districts could raise more money from a larger tax base.

The Supreme Court, in a 5–4 decision, ruled that education is not a fundamental right explicitly or implicitly guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. It also rejected the argument that poverty created a constitutionally suspect classification in this context. The financing system therefore needed only a rational relationship to a legitimate state interest, such as preserving local control.

A common mix-up is assuming Rodriguez required identical educational resources everywhere. It did not. The ruling concerned the federal Equal Protection Clause; state constitutions and later state-court decisions have sometimes imposed stronger school-funding requirements.