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Neeley v. West Orange-Cove Consolidated Independent School Dist.11/22/2005
ruction and application of article VII, section 1 persist. But such disagreements are not unique to article VII, section 1; they persist as to the meanings and applications of due course of law, equal protection, and many other constitutional provisions. Indeed, those provisions have inspired far more litigation than article VII, section 1, which has been at the heart of only a few lawsuits in two decades. Moreover, the continued litigation over public school finance cannot fairly be blamed on constitutional standards that are not judicially manageable; the principal cause of continued litigation, as we see it, is the difficulty the Legislature has in designing and funding public education in the face of strong and divergent political pressures.
To this point, we have assessed the State defendants' arguments as if the tests of Baker v. Carr would apply under the Texas Constitution. If they do - a question we need not reach - their application is limited. In the federal system, political questions are a rarity. The United States Supreme Court has held only two issues to be non-justiciable political questions: whether the military was properly trained, and whether the impeachment trial of a federal judge may be conducted before a Senate committee instead of the entire Senate. The Court did not hold the one-man-one-vote congressional apportionment issue in Baker v. Carr to be a political question, and it has refused to hold issues to be political questions in at least seven other cases. The Court did not even discuss the doctrine in Bush v. Palm Beach County Canvassing Board and Bush v. Gore, cases in which the winner of the 2000 national presidential election was at stake, certainly a "political issue" as conventionally understood, if not within the meaning of Baker v. Carr. Some have questioned whether the political question doctrine has any real vitality at all. This Court has never held an issue to be a non-justiciable political question, and we have referred to the doctrine only in passing. The courts of appeals have applied the doctrine only rarely.
A few state supreme courts have refused to adjudicate constitutional challenges to public school finance on the ground that the issues were non-justiciable political questions, but many others have rejected the argument. Like the majority of these states, we conclude that the separation of powers does not preclude the judiciary from determining whether the Legislature has met its constitutional obligation to the people to provide for public education.
C.
The State defendants' third challenge to the district court's jurisdiction is that article VII, section 1 is not self-executing and thus does not allow for court action to enforce its provisions. The concept of a constitutional provision as self-executing, long-recognized in the law, was restated by this Court in 1898 in Mitchell County v. City National Bank of Paducah, Ky.:
"A constitutional provision may be said to be self-executing if it supplies a sufficient rule by means of which the right given may be enjoyed and protected, or the duty imposed may be enforced; and it is not self-executing when it merely indicates principles, without laying down rules by means of which these principles may be given the force of law."
In that case, Mitchell County issued bonds to obtain funds for building bridges and a courthouse and jail. When the county refused to pay on the bonds, the holder sued. Article XI, section 2 of the Texas Constitution states that " he construction of jails, court-houses and bridges . . . shall be provided for by general laws", and section 7 of the same article prohibited certain cities and counties from incurring debt for certa
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