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16 Tex. Tech L. Rev. 515 (1985)
Broad Tort Immunity Provided Texas Public Schools and Public School Personnnel: A Reappraisal

handle is hein.journals/text16 and id is 521 raw text is: COMMENTS BROAD TORT IMMUNITY PROVIDED TEXAS PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND PUBLIC SCHOOL PERSONNEL: A REAPPRAISAL I. INTRODUCTION: THE RISE AND FALL OF SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY Public schools and professional employees of public schools in the State of Texas enjoy immunity from tort liability so extensive that one commentator has likened it to the creation of a privileged class.' The purposes of this comment are to review that broad immunity as to both schools and school employees, compare the arguments for and against continuing the current policy, propose some possible changes, and assess the likelihood of legislative or judicial enactment of such changes. The original basis for the tort immunity afforded schools and school employees was the common-law doctrine of sovereign immu- nity.' Professor Prosser indicates that the doctrine possibly had its beginnings in Roman law,3 but its acceptance as part of the common law in this country has generally been traced to an eighteenth century English case4 which entered American jurisprudence when it was adopted by the Massachusetts Supreme Court in 1812.' The theory 1. Comment, Professional School Employees-The Privileged Class?, 19 S. TEX. L.J. 664 (1978). 2. See, Annot., 33 A.L.R.3d 703, 714 (1970). 3. W. PROSSER, HANDBOOK OF THE LAW OF TORTS § 131, at 970 (4th ed. 1971). 4. Russell v. Men of Devron, 2 T.R. 667, 100 Eng. Rep. 359 (1788). 5. The Supreme Court of Minnesota noted: All of the paths leading to the origin of governmental tort immunity converge on Russell v. The Men of Devron, 100 Eng. Rep. 359, 2 T.R. 667 (1788). This product of the English common law was left on our doorstep to become the putative ancestor of a long line of American cases beginning with Mower v. Leicester, 9 Mass. 247 (1812). Spanel v. Mounds View School Dist. No. 621, 264 Minn. 279, -,118 N.W.2d 795, 796 (1962).

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