A North Carolina lawsuit that attempts to block a law permitting four Charlotte-area municipalities to operate their own charter schools can’t go forward, the state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.

Two years ago, the North Carolina and Charlotte-Mecklenburg NAACP chapters and two parents challenged the law approved by the General Assembly in 2018, saying it violated the state constitution in part by encouraging racial segregation and financial inequity in public schools.

Republican lawmakers and town leaders who pushed the measure said it had nothing to do with race, but rather addressed overcrowded public schools in their area that the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system failed to address adequately.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Vince Rozier refused last year to dismiss the lawsuit — as Republican legislative leaders who were sued had sought — and referred it to a panel of trial judges, which handle claims of unconstitutionality.

But the GOP lawmakers appealed to the Court of Appeals, where a separate panel of appeals judges vacated Rozier’s ruling Tuesday.

The plaintiffs “have not alleged in their complaint they sustained a direct injury, or that they are in immediate danger of sustaining a direct injury, resulting from the (law’s) enactment,” Court of Appeals Judge Jeffery Carpenter wrote in the unanimous opinion.

The plaintiffs argued the new option for Matthews, Mint Hill, Huntersville and Cornelius would create essentially new town school districts that siphon money from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools.