JUST OUTRAGEOUS :

Voucher Nation? : Why school choice could demolish national unity. (Richard Just, 7.11.02, American Prospect)

Forget the Pledge of Allegiance ruling. The real legal blow of the last few weeks to American patriotism was delivered not by an eccentric panel of Circuit Court judges, but by the U.S. Supreme Court -- in its 5-to-4 decision declaring school vouchers constitutional. For years, libertarian conservatives and the religious right have, for different reasons, touted vouchers as the savior of American education. That they still do should come as no shock. But far more surprising is that no segment of the post-September 11 right has risen to question vouchers on the grounds where they are most vulnerable: that they undermine the foundations of American unity -- indeed, of American nationalism. You would expect members of an intellectually consistent right wing to be up in arms over any development that threatened our shared sense of national purpose. Unless, of course, mainstream conservatives are deeper in ideological debt to religious nuts and libertarian zealots than to their own principles of patriotism. [...]

In failing systems -- the kind that vouchers are supposed to help -- the primary alternatives to public schools are often religious ones. So the inane logic of vouchers would leave us with a stark choice: Either become a country that pays religious institutions to proselytize to children of other faiths, or become a country that educates children of different religions separately. One option undermines the spirit of the U.S. Constitution. The other undermines the spirit of American patriotism. Conservatives have long clung to the notion of an American melting pot. But what kind of melting pot will our society be if Protestants, Catholics, Jews and Muslims are educated separately in their own schools? If ever there was a sinister way to weaken American patriotism borne of pluralism, this is it.

If Americans are unified on any issue in public life it is that the removal of religion from our schools over the last forty years has been a mistake. Polls consistently show that Americans, by large majorities, wish to see religion reintroduced to the educational process, from prayer before the school day to teaching creationism along side evolution. But the Left's assault on religion has made it nearly impossible for America to achieve this unified vision and so today we see a growing movement asking the government to return our educational tax dollars to us, in the form of vouchers, so that we can send our kids to non-public schools which at least for now are beyond the reach of the Left's anti-religious hegemony.

If Mr. Just were serious about saving public schools and preserving national unity, all he'd have top do is look at these poll results to see what people want, Most Americans Support Prayer in Public Schools : Also express widespread support for religious extracurricular activities (Mark Gillespie, July 9, 1999, GALLUP NEWS SERVICE) :

(1) Making public school facilities available after school hours for use by student religious groups : Favor 78%
(2) Allowing public schools to display the Ten Commandments : Favor 74%
(3) Allowing students to say prayers at graduation ceremonies as part of the official program : Favor 83%
(4) Using the Bible in literature, history, and social studies classes : Favor 71%
(5) Allowing daily prayer to be spoken in the classroom : Favor 70%
(6) Teaching creationism ALONG WITH evolution in public schools : Favor 68%

Note that these numbers are several years old and reflect neither the emotions raised by the Pledge ruling nor the possible additional support that may be expected now that the Court has ruled that tax dollars may go to parochial schools without violating the Constitution. Nor do they reflect the rapproachment between Jews and conservative Christians and the heightened sense of the threat to Israel and to Judaism which may have affected Jewish feeling, historically hostile, on these issues.

There is no ambiguity in these numbers. They indicate a nation that is unified in its belief that religion belongs in our public schools. It now appears that they may be so desperate to achieve this goal that they are ready to contemplate dismantling the public education system and moving towards a privatized education system. This is their radical response to the wall of separation that Mr. Just and his ilk have erected. For him to blame conservatives for somehow disuniting America, when it is in fact he who opposes that which unites America, is an act of unmitigated gall.

Posted by Orrin Judd at July 12, 2002 4:30 PM