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Voters Largely Reject Funding, Policy Shifts

Voters showed caution about sending more money to public schools or dramatically changing course on education policy, as they decided school-related questions on state ballots last week.

In Washington state, voters killed a nascent charter school law and resoundingly rejected a tax hike designed to yield a major infusion of cash for the education system. And in a closely contested Alabama campaign, it was unclear as of press time whether voters had agreed to delete Jim Crow-era language in the state constitution requiring racially segregated public schools. Critics of the change had argued that removal of some of the language marked for omission would indirectly make the state vulnerable to school finance litigation.

Voters in Oklahoma and North Carolina, meanwhile, approved measures that will open up new revenue sources for schools. But overall, efforts to increase education spending through the ballot box encountered...