Grumet v. Cuomo

• Citation: 681 N.E.2d 340,659 N.Y.S.2d 173,90 N.Y.2d 57
• Parties: , 681 N.E.2d 340, 119 Ed. Law Rep. 603 Louis GRUMET et al., Respondents, v. Mario CUOMO, as Governor of the State of New York, et al., Appellants.
• Decision Date: 06 May 1997
• Court: New York Court of Appeals

Page 173

659 N.Y.S.2d 173

90 N.Y.2d 57, 681 N.E.2d 340, 119 Ed.

Law Rep. 603

Louis GRUMET et al., Respondents, v. Mario CUOMO, as Governor of the State of New York, et al., Appellants.

Court of Appeals of New York.

May 6, 1997.

Dennis C. Vacco, Attorney-General, Albany (Julie S. Mereson, Barbara G. Billet and Peter H. Schiff, of counsel), for Mario Cuomo and others, appellants.

Ingerman Smith, L.L.P., Northport (Lawrence W. Reich, of counsel), for Board of Education of the Monroe-Woodbury Central School District, appellant.

George H. Barber, Albany, for Board of Education of the Kiryas Joel Village School District, appellant.

Jay Worona, Albany, and Shaw & Perelson, L.L.P., Poughkeepsie (Pilar Sokol, of counsel), for respondents.

Donna M.C. Giliberto, Albany, for New York State Conference of Mayors and Municipal Officials, amicus curiae.

Marc D. Stern, New York City, and Lois C. Waldman, for American Jewish Congress, amicus curiae.

Covington & Burling (David B. Isbell and Michael L. Rosenthal, of the District of Columbia Bar, admitted pro hac vice, of counsel), for National Pearl, amicus curiae.

George Shebitz & Associates, P.C., New York City (George Shebitz, Nahal Motamed

and Julia Cohen, of counsel), for Kiryas Joel Parents and Teachers Association and others, amici curiae

Willkie Farr & Gallagher, New York City (Eliott M. Berman, of counsel), and Dennis Rapps, for National Jewish Commission on Law and Public Affairs (COLPA), amicus curiae.

OPINION OF THE COURT

CIPARICK, Judge.

In this case, the Court is called upon to adjudicate yet another facet of a continuing public controversy involving at its center the provision of educational services to the disabled children of the Village of Kiryas Joel in Orange County. Last time, the Court invalidated chapter 748 of the Laws of 1989, which carved out a separate school district for the Village. We held that chapter 748 violated the Establishment Clause of the United States Constitution, and the United States Supreme Court affirmed.

The Legislature then enacted chapter 241 of the Laws of 1994 in an effort to establish a religion-neutral law of general applicability authorizing any municipality meeting specified criteria to create its own school district. The Village of Kiryas Joel invoked the procedure established by chapter 241 and formed the school district at issue here. On this appeal, we hold that chapter 241 violates the Establishment Clause by effectively singling out the Village of Kiryas Joel for special treatment and thereby demonstrating impermissible governmental endorsement of this religious community.

I.

The pertinent history is recounted in this Court's prior decisions and only the salient facts will be repeated here (see generally, Grumet v. Board of Educ., 81 N.Y.2d 518, 522-526, 601 N.Y.S.2d 61, 618 N.E.2d 94; Board of Educ. v. Wieder, 72 N.Y.2d 174, 178-182, 531 N.Y.S.2d 889, 527 N.E.2d 767). The Village of Kiryas Joel, situated in the Town of Monroe, Orange County, is a religious enclave whose residents are all members of the Satmar Hasidic sect. The Village was formed by the Satmars pursuant to the religion-neutral and generally applicable terms of Village Law article 2, and its boundaries were drawn to include only property inhabited by the Satmars. While most of the Satmar children attend religious schools in the Village, these private schools do not have the resources needed to provide adequate educational services to the Satmars' disabled children. For these children, the Satmars rely on the government-subsidized special education services to which all are legally entitled (see, 20 USC § 1400 et seq.; Education Law art 89).

In response to two 1985 decisions by the United States Supreme Court holding that publicly funded classes on religious school premises violate the Establishment Clause (see, Aguilar v. Felton, 473 U.S. 402, 105 S.Ct. 3232, 87 L.Ed.2d 290; Grand Rapids School Dist. v. Ball, 473 U.S. 373, 105 S.Ct. 3216, 87 L.Ed.2d 267), the Monroe-Woodbury Central School District discontinued its practice of providing educational services to the Satmars' disabled children in an annex at one of the Kiryas Joel religious schools. As a result, these children were required to attend secular schools outside the Village, but most of them eventually withdrew due to the difficulties they experienced in the unfamiliar surroundings. The Legislature responded by enacting chapter 748 of the Laws of 1989, which created a Kiryas Joel School District coterminous with the boundaries of the Village of Kiryas Joel. Although empowered to provide for the education of all school-aged children in the Village (see, Education Law § 3202), the school district operated only a special education program for disabled children.

The same plaintiffs who instituted the present action challenged chapter 748 on Establishment Clause and State Constitution grounds. This Court ruled that chapter 748 violated the Establishment Clause (see, Grumet v. Board of Educ., supra, 81 N.Y.2d, at 528-529, 601 N.Y.S.2d 61, 618 N.E.2d 94). Applying the second prong of the Lemon test, the Court held that chapter 748 manifested a "symbolic union of church and State" and thus had the impermissible primary effect of advancing religion (id., at 529, 601 N.Y.S.2d 61, 618 N.E.2d 94; see, Lemon v Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 612, 91 S.Ct. 2105, 2111, 29 L.Ed.2d 745).

II.

The United States Supreme Court granted defendants' petition for a writ of certiorari and affirmed our ruling (see, Board of Educ. of Kiryas Joel Vil. School Dist. v. Grumet, 512 U.S. 687, 114 S.Ct. 2481, 129 L.Ed.2d 546 [Kiryas Joel I ] ). A majority of the Court held that the Legislature, in creating a Kiryas Joel School District pursuant to chapter 748 of the Laws of 1989, had "single[d] out a particular religious sect for special treatment" in a "manner that fails to foreclose religious favoritism," thereby contravening Establishment Clause neutrality principles (512 U.S., at 706, 710, 114 S.Ct., at 2492-2493, 2494, supra ).

The Court reasoned that the Legislature had deviated from the requisite course of "governmental neutrality by extending the benefit of a special franchise" to the Village of Kiryas Joel, a self-identified religious enclave (id., at 705, 114 S.Ct., at 2492). Specifically, the Court concluded that the "anomalously case-specific nature of the legislature's exercise of state authority in creating this district for a religious community" failed to provide assurance that "the benefit received by the Satmar community is one that the legislature will provide equally to other religious (and nonreligious) groups" (id., at 702, 703, 114 S.Ct., at 2490, 2491). Contrasting the constitutionally suspect creation of the Kiryas Joel School District with the process by which the Village itself had been formed pursuant to a religion-neutral State law of general applicability (see, Village Law § 2-202), the Court concluded: "Because the religious community of Kiryas Joel did not receive its new governmental authority simply as one of many communities eligible for equal treatment under a general law, we have no assurance that the next similarly situated group seeking a school district of its own will receive one" (id., at 703, 114 S.Ct., at 2491 [footnote omitted] ).

In concurrence, Justice O'Connor reiterated that chapter 748 violated the Establishment Clause because it singled out the Village of Kiryas Joel for favorable treatment, and she provided a blueprint for a law that in her view might survive constitutional challenge:

"There is nothing improper about a legislative intention to accommodate a religious group, so long as it is implemented through generally applicable legislation. New York may, for instance, allow all villages to operate their own school districts. If it does not want to act so broadly, it may set forth neutral criteria that a village must meet to have a school district of its own; these criteria can then be applied by a state agency, and the decision would then be reviewable by the judiciary. A district created under a generally applicable scheme would be acceptable even though it coincides with a village that was consciously created by its voters as an enclave for their religious group. I do not think the Court's opinion holds the contrary" (id., at 717, 114 S.Ct., at 2498 [O'Connor, J., concurring] ).

III.

Four days after the Supreme Court issued its decision in Kiryas Joel I, the New York State Legislature passed chapters 241 and 279 of the Laws of 1994, which were signed into law one week later. Chapter 279 repeals chapter 748 of the Laws of 1989 and abolishes the Kiryas Joel School District. However, the law permits the school district to remain operational under the aegis of the Monroe-Woodbury Central School District until either a State court issues a mandate implementing the decision of the Supreme Court in Kiryas Joel I, or until the school district is merged with or replaced by another school district established pursuant to article 31 of the Education Law, whichever occurs first (L 1994, ch 279, §§ 2, 3).

Chapter 241 amends article 31 of the Education Law by adding a new subdivision (3) to Education Law § 1504. The new subdivision provides a mechanism by which any municipality meeting certain qualifications may form its own school district without the need for legislative intervention, and represents, according to defendants, the sort of generally applicable law alluded to by the Supreme Court majority and prescribed by Justice O'Connor in her concurrence in Kiryas Joel I.

Pursuant to chapter 241, any municipality located wholly within a single central or union free school district but whose boundaries are not coterminous with the boundaries of the preexisting school district, may establish its own school district "whenever the educational interests of the community require it" (Education Law § 1504[3], as added by L 1994, ch 241), provided that the following...