In a trio of rulings that can teach Americans a lot about the U.S. Constitution, federal judges in Maryland, New Hampshire, and Washington, DC, temporarily have blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to curb so-called Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs in K-12 schools by threatening to withhold federal funding.
These decisions, handed down on April 24, 2025, expose not only the entrenched collectivist mindset of the judiciary but also the deeper, unaddressed issue: the federal government has no constitutional authority to meddle in education funding at all. Worse, the collectivist structure of public education itself fosters a Tragedy of the Commons, where taxpayers are forced to foot the bill for a system that often disregards their values and priorities.
The Trump administration’s policy, outlined in a February 14, 2025, “Dear Colleague” letter from the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), sought to enforce compliance with the Constitution-insulting Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by prohibiting schools from using race-based criteria in areas like admissions, hiring, scholarships, and even graduation ceremonies. The letter, followed by an April 3 directive, required state education agencies to certify within days that their schools were free of such practices or risk losing federal funds—particularly Title I grants, which are critical for low-income districts. The administration argued that many DEI initiatives violate federal anti-discrimination laws by prioritizing certain racial groups over others, a position grounded in the 2023 Supreme Court ruling against race-based college admissions that cited Harvard and University of North Carolina for their race-focused policies.
Enter U.S. District Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher in Maryland, a Trump appointee, and Judge Landya B. McCafferty in New Hampshire, an Obama appointee. Both issued preliminary injunctions, with Gallagher’s ruling focusing on procedure. Specifically, Gallagher cited the 1946 Administrative Procedure Act, which requires “public notices” and “periods of public commentary” that, typically don’t stop the feds from doing whatever unconstitutional thing they want.
Gallagher’s determination that Trump’s DOE skirted the process kinda misses the larger rules of the US Constitution regarding overall operations of the US, but, on its statutory level, it is sound, and sees her decision broadly prohibiting the Education Department from enforcing its anti-DEI memo nationwide.
In New Hampshire, McCafferty’s decision cited the Trump DOE rule for “infringing on teachers’ right to free speech”. No mention of the right to free speech for the taxpayers, whose money is taken to fund school plans and ideology with which they might disagree.
Compelled speech is not free speech, but, evidently, McCafferty slept through that portion of law school.
As the Southern Maryland Chronicle reports:
“The preliminary injunction by McCafferty… is nationwide as well, but only in effect at schools where plaintiffs in her case… are represented.”
And, as Politico reports, the DC case saw a ruling along similar lines.
“A third ruling issued in the District of Columbia by Judge Dabney Friedrich, a Trump appointee, further blocked the department from demanding schools certify their compliance with the Trump administration. The government’s threats, the judge said, likely violate the Constitution.”
But, since this pertains to local and state education, let’s derive two long-term lessons from the bickering and the rulings.
First, the U.S. Constitution grants the federal government no authority to fund education, and the Tenth Amendment explicitly reserves powers not delegated to the federal government to the states or the people. Education is not among the enumerated powers in Article I, Section 8, nor anywhere else in the document. No “Secret Decoder Ring" lets people read invisible text allowing for Jimmy Carter’s pet creation of the Department of Education, established in 1979, and its practical effect has been to siphon billions from taxpayers to impose centralized mandates on local schools.
Title I funds for arbitrarily defined “poor” kids and “under-achieving” students -- funds which the Trump administration threatened to withhold -- exemplify this egregious anti-constitutional, emotion-fueled attack, dangling federal dollars as a carrot to enforce compliance with Washington’s edicts.
Second, we see the deeper flaw of the public education system itself: it’s a textbook case of the Tragedy of the Commons. In a free world, politicians would not be forcing people to pay for anything, and, as it was until the 1880s, education would be provided by private entities and churches, competing to meet parental and student demands, with costs borne directly by those who benefit.
In the Battle Royale of our current collectivist model, nearly everyone is taxed to fund schools, yet control over curricula and policies is centralized, leaving many parents and taxpayers voiceless. As economist Ludwig von Mises observed, “The essence of the interventionist policy is to take from one group to give to another.” In this case, the state extracts wealth from all to fund a system that reflects the pedagogical preferences of a select few—often bureaucrats, unions, or ideologues pushing DEI.
The Tragedy of the Commons manifests with disastrous consequences for children in the DEI debate. Proponents argue these programs foster inclusion, but critics, including the Trump administration, contend they often discriminate by prioritizing certain groups over others, violating the equal “treatment” principles of the Civil Rights Act.
And that is a final lesson, because the Civil Rights Act purportedly helps enforce the “Equal Protection” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Related: Supreme Court Upholds Block on DEI Grants, Sparks Constitutional Debate
But equal treatment is not equal protection. The Fourteenth Amendment is being misread, and does not promise “equal treatment” -- as much as Americans might want government to treat people equally.
This contemporary misreading of the amendment shows us the extent to which contemporary citizens believe the government is a machine that hands welfare, education, and other supposed treats to people, rather than offering mere protection against human aggression.
What is the takeaway?
These judicial rulings, while temporary, underscore a troubling reality: the courts, like much of the federal apparatus, are complicit in perpetuating an unconstitutional system. By focusing on procedural minutiae and focusing only on the effect the order might have on teachers, Judges Gallagher and McCafferty sidestep the larger question of whether the federal government has any business funding education. Their decisions protect the status quo, ensuring that taxpayers continue to fund a collectivist system that often disregards their preferences.
The solution is not to tweak federal mandates or refine DEI policies but to dismantle the federal education leviathan altogether. Return education to the states, or better yet, to the free market, where competition and choice can flourish. Until then, we’re trapped in a cycle of judicial wrangling and ideological tug-of-war, with kids, the Constitution, individual liberty, and market choice, as the ultimate casualties.