Connecticut to challenge constitutionality of No Child Left Behind Act News
Connecticut to challenge constitutionality of No Child Left Behind Act

[JURIST] Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal [official profile] announced Tuesday that his office is preparing the first state-sponsored federal lawsuit [CT AG press release] against the US Department of Education [official website] for imposing millions of dollars worth of illegal unfunded mandates under the No Child Left Behind Act [PDF text; executive summary; US Dept. Ed. fact sheet]. In order to comply with NCLB testing mandates, Connecticut will be required to spend $8 million above what federal funding provides. Blumenthal contends that this forced spending violates the Unfunded Mandates Provision of the NCLB, 20 USC Sec. 7907(a), and the spending clause in the US Constitution. A Department of Education statement criticized the announcement, saying "The basis for the state's lawsuit appears to rest on a flawed cost study of the No Child Left Behind Act that creates inflated projections built upon questionable estimates and misallocation of costs." AP has more. Earlier this year, the National Conference of State Legislatures issued a statement [PDF text] joined by all 50 state legislatures attacking the constitutionality [JURIST report] of NCLB. The state legislatures said that the education program unconstitutionally extends federal power in an area traditionally left up to state control and accused the government of coercing states into compliance.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.