Murphy v. School Committee of Brimfield

• Decision Date: 07 May 1979
• Citation: 378 Mass. 31,389 N.E.2d 399
• Parties: Roderick P. MURPHY et al. v. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF BRIMFIELD. (and two companion cases 1 ).
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 399

389 N.E.2d 399

378 Mass. 31

Roderick P. MURPHY et al. v. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF BRIMFIELD (and two companion cases ¹).

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Hampden and Plymouth.

Argued Jan. 5, 1979.

Decided May 7, 1979.

Matthew R. McCann, Worcester (James F. Cosgrove, Worcester, with him), for the School Committee of Brimfield.

Albert B. Cook, Worcester, for Roderick P. Murphy & others.

James A. Toomey and Mary W. Nelson, Cambridge, for the Whitman-Hanson Regional School Committee & others.

Thomas F. Quinn, Plymouth, for Michael J. Regan & others.

Austin Broadhurst and Wendell Robert Carr, Boston, for the Massachusetts Ass'n of School Committees, Inc., amicus curiae, submitted a brief.

Edward P. Ryan, Town Counsel, for the School Committee of Scituate.

Francis B. J. Badger, North Scituate, for Nancy Norberg and another, submitted a brief.

Before HENNESSEY, C. J., and QUIRICO, BRAUCHER, WILKINS and LIACOS, JJ.

LIACOS, Justice.

The school committees of Brimfield, the Whitman-Hanson Regional District, and Scituate furnish school transportation to resident students attending public schools. They have declined, however, to furnish transportation to resident students attending private schools which are located outside their school districts. Relying on G.L. c. 76, § 1, as amended through St.1971, c. 875, the compulsory attendance law, several parents of the pupils denied transportation brought actions against their respective school committees. Finding that the public school students travelled at public expense over distances comparable to those travelled by the private school students, each trial judge directed the school committee before him to provide the transportation requested. The three committees have taken appeals, each of which we have transferred here either on our own initiative or at the request of one of the parties. Although the cases were tried and appealed separately, we scheduled oral argument of all three for the same day. Now we consolidate them for decision. For the reasons set forth below, we reverse. ²

In each case, the judge made detailed findings of fact. For the most part, these findings rested on the stipulations of the respective parties. Indeed, only in the case against the School Committee of Brimfield did the parties introduce additional testimony. The record reveals that these cases share several salient features. In each, the defendant school committee has elected to provide resident public school students with school transportation. In none was transportation furnished to pupils enrolled in a regular day program located outside the town or school district of their residence. ³ In each, the plaintiffs sought transportation for their children to schools located outside the town or district of their residence. All their children attended regular day programs offered at private sectarian schools that have appropriate approval. See G.L. c. 76, § 1. All travelled distances comparable to those travelled by their public school counterparts. In each case there was evidence that the expected per pupil cost of transporting the plaintiffs' children at public expense exceeded the per pupil cost expended in transporting public school pupils.

General Laws c. 76, § 1, as amended through St.1971, c. 875, provides in part that "in order to protect children from the hazards of traffic and promote their safety, cities and towns may appropriate money for conveying pupils to and from any schools approved under this section. Pupils who, in fulfillment of the compulsory attendance requirements of this section, attend private schools of elementary and high school grades so approved shall be entitled to the same rights and privileges as to transportation to and from school as are provided by law for pupils of public schools and shall not be denied such transportation because their attendance is in a school which is conducted under religious auspices or includes religious instruction in its curriculum, nor because pupils of the public schools in a particular city or town are not actually receiving such transportation." ⁴

In Quinn v. School Comm. of Plymouth, 332 Mass. 410, 125 N.E.2d 410 (1955), the only case to date to construe this language, ⁵ this court determined "that by its enactment the Legislature intended to make available to children in private schools transportation to the same extent as a school committee within its statutory powers should make transportation available to children in public schools. . . . The question is not what the committee can be made to do. The requirement imposed is that there be no discrimination against private school children in what the committee in its discretion decides to do." Id. at 412, 125 N.E.2d at 412. The trial judge in the Brimfield case determined that this language controlled the case before him. He further determined that rather than establish fixed standards for assessing transportation rights and privileges, Quinn suggested a case-by-case consideration of several factors among which are the relative home-to-school distance for public and private school students, geographical boundaries, the cost of private school transportation, and the presence or absence of safety considerations. Of these, relative distance appears to have been the determining factor in the judge's mind. He noted that "(i)f the distance involved is approximately the same as the distance public school pupils are being transported, then I think it matters not that town boundaries are crossed. If the per capita cost is not unduly excessive, then I find that distance and safety still control." On the basis of this interpretation of Quinn the judge ordered the School Committee of Brimfield to transport the plaintiffs' children to schools located outside the region to which the town of Brimfield belonged, even though it transported public school students in comparable programs only to schools located inside the region. The judge who heard both the Whitman-Hanson and Scituate cases adopted the reasoning developed in the Brimfield decision and applied it to reach similar results.

It is not disputed that a town, through its school committee, generally has no obligation to provide school transportation to any of its residents. ⁶ Newcomb v. Rockport, 183 Mass. 74, 79, 66 N.E. 587 (1903). See Graves v. Fairhaven, 338 Mass. 290, 292, 155 N.E.2d 178 (1959), and cases cited. Rather, this controversy involves the scope of a school committee's obligation once it adopts a practice, as here, of providing some school transportation. The same controversy faced this court in Quinn, and therefore the judges below were right to look to that case for guidance in resolving the current disputes.

Quinn was heard on a petition for a writ of mandamus. The petitioners were residents of the town of Plymouth and the parents of children who attended private school in either Plymouth or the adjoining town of Kingston. Those children in grades one and two attended the Sacred Heart School in Plymouth; those in grades three through six attended the Sacred Heart School in Kingston. The school committee of Plymouth generally furnished all resident students with transportation to local schools. ⁷ The only public school students in regular day programs who received transportation to schools located outside town were four elementary school pupils living twenty or more miles from the center of Plymouth who attended a public school in Bourne. Based on these facts, the court fashioned the following order: "A peremptory writ of mandamus is to issue commanding the committee (1) to provide transportation to the Sacred Heart School in Plymouth for pupils in grades I and II to the extent that transportation is provided by the committee for pupils in grades I and II in the public schools in Plymouth; and (2) to provide transportation to the Sacred Heart School in Kingston for pupils in grades III through VI to the extent that transportation is provided by the committee for elementary school pupils in the public school is Bourne." Quinn v. School Comm. of Plymouth, 332 Mass. at 414, 125 N.E.2d at 413. On the basis of this order, it appears that to assess a school committee's transportation obligation, one first examines what occurs inside the district, then turns to consider what occurs outside the district. In terms of the facts here, the holding of Quinn is that, apart from rights explicitly conferred by statute, see note 6 Supra, private school students are entitled to receive transportation to schools located outside their district of residence only if, and to the extent that, public school students enrolled in comparable programs receive transportation to schools located outside their district of residence. See Rep. A. G., Pub.Doc. No. 12, 183 (1976). Contrary to the decisions below then, district lines and not relative distance travelled are the primary consideration under the Quinn interpretation of c. 76, § 1.

Reviewing the relevant statutory provisions and considering the intervening years since the Quinn decision, we find no reason to depart from the interpretation of c. 76, § 1, rendered there. We acknowledge that c. 76, § 1, is silent on the significance of the district line to a school committee's transportation obligation. Chapter 76, § 1, must, however, be read in context with a town and its school committee's general educational obligations. Cities and towns are the fundamental geographical units charged with administering elementary and secondary education in the Commonwealth. Chapter 71, § 1, as amended, provides in part that "(e)very town shall maintain . . . a sufficient number of schools for the instruction of all children who may legally attend a public school therein." Chapter 71, § 68, as amended, provides that "(e)very town shall provide and maintain a sufficient number of schoolhouses, properly furnished and conveniently situated for the accommodation of all children...