The underfunding of Kansas public schools has been a long-running problem made worse by both parties in budget pinches over the years. But the schools’ fiscal agony took a precipitous turn last year when statehouse Republicans decided that an encouraging postrecession increase in revenues was the perfect moment for a huge tax cut, rather than for the overdue restoration of school aid to levels mandated under the State Constitution.

In signing a five-year, $3.7 billion tax cut, Gov. Sam Brownback took the position that cutting taxes did more to create jobs than meeting per-student aid formulas. That dodgy rationale was argued in the State Supreme Court last week when a group of school districts and parents sued for their fair share of aid under the State Constitution’s “suitable provision” mandate. State spending on education has fallen an estimated 16.5 percent since 2008, including $500 million in cuts under the Brownback administration, resulting in teacher layoffs and larger class sizes.

In response, lawyers for the state insisted that the Legislature, not the courts, was the best judge of what should be spent on the schools, and conservative lawmakers vowed to defy any court order to the contrary.

The court should quickly put priorities in order by affirming a lower-court ruling last January that found the state “completely illogical” in using the new revenues to provide tax cuts while arguing it had inadequate resources for educating schoolchildren. The lower court unanimously ordered the state to increase annual education funding by at least $440 million.