Golden State opportunity - California's school choice Proposition 174 may change future of education if it passes on November 2, 1993 - Editorial

National Review, Nov 1, 1993 by William J. Bennett

California's Proposition 174 has the opportunity to do for education in the 1990s what Proposition 13 did for tax cuts in the 1970s. If it passes on November 2, it will fundamentally change American education - and transform the future of American politics.

Proposition 174 would allow parents to choose the best school for their children by providing them with vouchers redeemable at a private or religious school for about $2,600, or at a public school, where they would be worth the full $5,200. By allowing parents to choose the public, private, or religious school their children attend, this plan would introduce much-needed competition and accountability into the system, break up an inefficient and unresponsive monopoly, and return decision-making authority, and responsibility, to parents.

Also, Proposition 174 would very likely save taxpayers money, which is why three Nobel Laureates (including Milton Friedman), more than 140 leading economists, and every major anti-tax group in the state have endorsed it. And because parents would be able to choose environments that affirm their own values rather than undermine them (as is now too often the case), a wide array of pro-family and religious groups support Proposition 174.

In short, school choice is the sine qua non of real education reform. But it is worth considering some of its wider political implications.

1. It is overwhelmingly popular among certain traditionally non-conservative groups-lower-income and minority citizens whose children suffer most from the poor performance of public schools. Here is an opportunity to join with new allies in pursuit of a common political purpose. Take the case of Marvin Jackson, a South-Central Los Angeles father of five, who comes from a traditionally liberal family. Here is Mr. Jackson's eloquent case for school choice (told to the Los Angeles Times): "The thing about the voucher is it could be used to get local control of our community schools. You take that voucher and you talk to the principal and you say, |Let's get some real education going here. Let's get back to some reading, writing, and 'rithmetic. Levs get rid of condom distribution. If you want to experiment, get yourself some volunteers. Don't use my children."'

On school choice - and probably much else once we know one another better - conservatives should stand alongside men like Marvin Jackson.

2. Proposition 174 is a dagger pointed at the heart of the liberal teachers' unions - the most powerful political force in the modern Democratic Party. The teachers' lobby represented 40 per cent of the delegates needed for nomination at the 1992 Democratic convention. Coincidentally, 40 per cent of all urban public-school teachers send their children to private schools, according to Keith Geiger, president of the NEA. But his organization continues to do all it can to discourage others from exercising that same option.

If Proposition 174 passes, it will strike a crippling blow to the education establishment. Their fear is not that school choice will be tried and fail. It is that school choice will be tried and succeed.

3. Even if Proposition 174 loses, the school-choice movement will continue to grow. For one thing, the education establishment is intellectually bankrupt. So its spokesmen have become merchants of fear. In the increasingly shrill world of the National Education Association and the California Teachers Association, the suggestion that parents should be allowed to pick the schools their children attend raises the specter of "David Koresh High School," science courses in which kids learn how to make Molotov cocktails, witches' covens, etc., etc. Resorting to these tactics is a sign of desperation, from people unable to make intellectually compelling arguments.

Over the last 25 years, the education establishment has opposed every meaningful education reform that has been proposed. It is largely responsible for engineering the worst decline in the history of American education. And it is now in the (unenviable) position of defending one of the worst-performing education systems in the industrialized world. With such a record, popular insurgencies were sure to come. And come they have - in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Yansas, and Connecticut; in Milwaukee, Indianapolis, San Antonio, and Jersey City. More will follow.

But for now, the eyes of the nation are on California. It is as good a place as any to start a revolution in American education.