Matthew Tilley, Womble Bond Dickinson Team Secure Landmark Ruling for N.C. General Assembly in Decades-Long School Litigation

On April 2, a Womble Bond Dickinson team led by Matthew Tilley secured a victory for the North Carolina General Assembly from the N.C. Supreme Court.  The landmark decision puts an end to decades of litigation in a case commonly known as Leandro.  The Supreme Court held trial court judges exceeded their jurisdiction when they ordered the State to implement and fund a multi-billion-dollar plan to rework the State’s educational system. The Court concluded those orders went beyond the Plaintiffs’ claims, which challenged only the conditions in their individual school districts.  

In writing for the majority, Chief Justice Paul Newby said, “Judges are not experts on education policy. We cannot account for the various policy alternatives or public opinion. Our consideration of cases is limited to the facts and evidence in the record and the dispassionate application of the law. In short, the judicial branch is not the venue in which to seek education policy reform.”

The Leandro case began as a dispute regarding the educational programs in five low-income school districts in eastern North Carolina. But over the years, the Plaintiffs and trial court expanded the case to involve all 115 school districts across the State.  After the trial court issued orders in 2021 directing the State to transfer billions to fund a statewide plan proposed by the Plaintiffs, the General Assembly intervened, arguing that the court had exceeded its authority.

Specifically, the General Assembly argued the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction to issue a statewide remedy because the only claims were district-specific. Though the case is more than 30 years old, the only trial conducted focused on a single school district—Hoke County— and the only judgment ever entered was thus limited to that district. The Supreme Court agreed, concluding the plaintiffs had improperly sought to transform their as-applied challenges into a facial challenge to the State’s educational system as a whole, without ever amending their pleadings or seeking a trial on conditions anywhere else. The Court then dismissed the case with prejudice.

Mike Ingersoll and Emmett Whelan joined Tilley in bringing the case before the N.C. Supreme Court. Former Womble attorneys Clark Goodman and Russ Ferguson also contributed to this successful effort.