Editing Shelby County, Tennessee (section)

===School board===

Until 1996, the Shelby County Commission appointed members to the [[Shelby County Schools (Tennessee)|Shelby County School Board]]. This system was changed to comply with interpretation by the state that its constitution required that county officials, including school board members, should be elected by all residents of the county, and provisions of the state Education Improvement Act. In 1996 under what was known as Plan C, the Shelby County Commission established seven single-member special election districts for election of county school board members by all residents of the county. This was challenged in the case known as ''Board of County Commissioners of Shelby County Tennessee v. Burson''.<ref name="burson">[https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-6th-circuit/1297214.html ''Board of County Commissioners of Shelby County Tennessee v. Burson''] (1997), Findlaw</ref> Shelby County and its Board of Commissioners as plaintiffs, joined by mayors of the six suburban municipalities, filed suit in 1996 against Plan C, arguing that their rights were violated under the "one person, one vote" principle embodied in the [[Equal Protection Clause]] of the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution, as their vote would be diluted. Although Memphis City had its own school system, the Memphis population made up 74.8% of the county's population in the 1990 census, so its representatives would dominate an elected county school board, with six of seven positions. Thus Memphis representatives would dominate a system intended to serve only county residents and students who lived outside the city.<ref name="burson"/>

The US district court found in this case:
*the City of Memphis did not provide significant financial support to the Shelby County School District, and received money from the county; 
*the overwhelming voting power of the out-of-district Memphis residents virtually guaranteed that out-of-district residents would control the Shelby County Board of Education;  
*the number of actual crossover students was minimal, and the potential for additional crossovers was severely limited by a longstanding desegregation order;  and 
*there were, at most, a few relatively minor joint programs between the districts. Accordingly, the district court concluded that the county-wide election of local school board members under Plan C was unconstitutional as applied in Shelby County and enjoined its implementation."<ref name="burson"/> The lower court noted that in a similar case of ''Duncan'' (1995), it had held that "the relevant geopolitical entity for purposes of the "one person, one vote" analysis in cases such as this is the school district, not the entire county."<ref name="burson"/><ref>Duncan, 69 F.3d at 93.4</ref> When appealed, the lower court's decision was upheld, saying the "Constitution prevented the State of Tennessee from including Memphis voters in the electorate for the Shelby County Board of Education."<ref name="burson"/>

As a result, the County Commissioners established seven single-member special election districts in the county outside the limits of Memphis, for the purpose of electing school board members to the Shelby County School Board.