The Washington State Supreme Court turned down an appeal from its September ruling that charter schools are not public schools and cannot receive public funding. The vote was 5-4.

Only one charter existed before August 2015, when another 8 opened. Advocates for charters said these new schools were already getting “tremendous results,” even though they opened only three months ago.

As is now customary, charters bussed their students to the state Capitol, in hopes of swaying the decision, but they produced only hundreds of students, not the thousands that appear to pressure legislators where charters are well established. No one asked about the legality or propriety of closing the school for a political rally, a practice that public schools are it permitted to do.

Some background: Washington State has conducted four referenda on whether to permit charters. The first three failed. In 2012, Bill Gates and a handful of other…