http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2016/07/12/mississippi-charter-school-lawsuit/86984366/
The Southern Poverty Law Center is suing the state of Mississippi to block public funding of charter schools.
The Mississippi Constitution requires schools to be under the supervision of the state and local boards of education to receive public funding. But under the act, charter schools receive public funding even though they are exempt from the oversight of the state Board of Education, the Mississippi Department of Education and local boards of education.
Republican Gov. Phil Bryant called the lawsuit a frivolous attempt by “Democrats and their allies” to usurp decisions made by the GOP-majority Legislature.
You get the picture: the actions of the state legislature are not limited by the actual language of the state constitution.
But to no one’s surprise, a conservative policy group in the state has found charter school parents to intervene in the lawsuit.
Four parents with children in charter schools are seeking to be heard in a lawsuit that could overturn the way Mississippi pays for the alternative form of public education.
The parents, who also either have or had children in the Jackson Public School District, are represented by an attorney for the conservative Mississippi Justice Institute.
They said Wednesday that they’re requesting a chancery judge’s permission to intervene in a lawsuit filed last month by the liberal Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of seven parents whose children attend JPS.
So, here is an interesting situation. The conservatives who used to fight against court-ordered desegregation are now able to present themselves as defenders of black children who want to attend segregated charter schools.
School choice in Mississippi is accomplishing exactly what the segregationist of the mid-20th century wanted.
Meanwhile, the public schools of Mississippi are woefully underfunded, and the governor and legislature did their level best to defeat a proposition to require equitable funding. And they succeeded, assuring that the children of Mississippi will continue to be in schools that are lacking the resources they need.
So much for the civil rights movement of our time.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
The absurdity of the governor’s claim is that the GERM movement here and abroad is bi-partisan. When it comes to education, normal partisan politics pretty much goes out the window.
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“School choice in Mississippi is accomplishing exactly what the segregationist of the mid-20th century wanted.”
Not just in Mississippi.
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Exactly
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The message that conservatives need to hear is that charter schools are a Trojan Horse. In the end there will be no choice and no local control.
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The good news here is that the SPLC appears to have seen the light. There was a time when they had bought into the whole bogus “civil rights issue of our time” nonsense that was part of the choice sales pitch. I hope that the NAACP/BLM position on halting charters was part of what helped them correct their mistake.
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