Green blocks state Common Core payments

Cole County Circuit Judge Dan Green has blocked state government from making payments to the Common Core consortium for at least the next two weeks.

Green issued a temporary restraining order Tuesday morning in a lawsuit filed in September by three St. Louis area taxpayers, including Fred N. Sauer, who heads the Missouri Roundtable for Life and has had some success in previous lawsuits against Missouri government officials.

In their 31-page lawsuit, Sauer, Anne Gassel and Gretchen Logue accused state officials of disbursing state taxpayers' money "to the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium ("SBAC'), an illegal interstate compact not authorized by the U.S. Congress."

The "Common Core" education standards have been pushed by education officials and governors around the nation as a response to years of complaints that it's been hard to compare test scores and students' knowledge from one state to another.

The standards are designed to be the same for the states that adopt them.

Opponents argue the standards are an unnecessary and unneeded federal intrusion into states' rights and abilities to set and control their own classrooms.

As Green noted in his three-page order Tuesday, the Sauer lawsuit's challenge to the state's payment of membership fees to the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium included an argument "that the Consortium is an illegal interstate compact under the Compact Clause of the U.S. Constitution."

After hearing arguments on Nov. 5, Green determined "that Plaintiffs have shown that they will suffer immediate and irreparable harm in the absence of a temporary restraining order and that they are entitled to a temporary restraining order."

He said the plaintiffs "have made a preliminary showing of likelihood of success on the merits on their claim that the Consortium is an unconstitutional interstate compact to which Congress has never consented," while the state "has failed to show irreparable harm from the issuance of a temporary restraining order."

Green said his restraining order "will expire fifteen days from" Tuesday, "unless otherwise provided by this Court."

Defendants in the Sauer lawsuit include Gov. Jay Nixon, Education Commissioner Chris Nicastro, State Treasurer Clint Zweifel, Commissioner of Administration Doug Nelson and the state Board of Education.