06/10/2022
Today in Texas is known as "Leeper Day." The history behind the Leeper case is fascinating, and all Texas homeschoolers need to know the bravery of those that came before us!
"Back in 1981, the Texas Education Agency (TEA), the administrative arm for K-12 public education in the state headed up under the Commissioner of Education, banned homeschooling and treated it as a criminal offense, calling it “not an acceptable substitute.” TEA encouraged school districts to prosecute families for their failure to attend school.
Although Texas Attorney General Jim Mattox (1983-1991) was dubbed the “people’s lawyer” for his advocacy of what he deemed the everyday needs of Texans, he also publicly stated that he did not believe parents were qualified to raise their children, much less teach them at home.
In 1985, Texas home educators sued every school district in what became known as the Leeper case after approximately 150 homeschool parents were prosecuted as a direct result of school districts relying on the 1981 TEA policy.
In the court case, homeschooling was examined and ultimately, it was determined to be equivalent to private schools and thus, out of the jurisdiction of public compulsory education.
One year later, the state held hearings in an attempt to regulate homeschooling but in April 1987, Judge Charles Murray from the North Texas Tarrant County District Court ruled on Leeper that home schools were private schools.
It was an important victory but the state appealed this decision three times — at the local court, Court of Appeals and the Texas Supreme Court levels. Each time the decisions were in favor of the homeschoolers.
Following the Texas Supreme Court’s 1994 unanimous 9-0 pro-homeschool decision, there were no more appeals from the state."
"In 1994, House Resolution 6 was filed in the US House of Representatives to ban homeschooling nationwide. THSC “led the Texas response” as part of a national push that resulted in generating one million phone calls that literally shut down the Capitol switchboard,” according to Legacy of Freedom, a short THSC video, which encapsulated Texas homeschooling history, tracing over the far more hostile environment where the state attempted to either outlaw or regulate home education.
Similarly, Taking a Stand in Texas: The Battle for Home School Freedom is a 2007 documentary that tells the story of hardships and struggles of Texas families in the early days of the state’s homes school movement. It depicts those battles fought by home education pioneers that led to the legal victories and freedoms which Texas families now enjoy.
Most of today’s homeschoolers are beneficiaries of Leeper. They have no memory of these hard fought battles or of a Texas without educational choice. Noted Dankworth, “We hope that groups all over Texas will take this day to reflect on how far we have come in this short time.”
From the article: Texas Governor Honors State’s Homeschoolers Proclaiming June 9 ‘Leeper Day’ by Merrill Hope
http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2015/06/06/texas-governor-honors-states-homeschoolers-proclaiming-june-9-leeper-day/
More articles here:
http://texashomeeducators.org/celebrate-leeper-day-june-9th-2016/
https://thsc.org/?s=Leeper
https://tea.texas.gov/Texas_Schools/General_Information/Finding_a_School_for_your_Child/Home_Schooling/
http://www.ronpaulcurriculum.com/LeeperDecision.pdf
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