NY Times Dismisses Constitution

In a hollow editorial today, the New York Times dismissed the US Constitution.

The United States has historically viewed public education as a local issue, so the federal government has looked the other way when the states have damaged the national interest by failing to educate large swaths of the population.

The federal government did not look the other way, folks. It is illegal for the federal government to be involved at all.

Here’s a quick history lesson for the editors of the Gray Lady and anyone else who is interested. The Constitution was written long ago. There was a lot politicking that went on to ratify it. Some really smart folks created a set of amendments to the Constitution. Those first 10 amendments are pretty damn important. So important, that we call them the Bill of Rights. Perhaps you have heard of it.

The Bill of Rights guarantees all sorts of protections for the citizens from the government. The Tenth Amendment protects us from the federal government imposing any laws on issues which are in the domain of the states. Which issues are those? Any not specifically mentioned in the Constitution.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

Search the Constitution. Go ahead. Nowhere will you find education mentioned.

It’s not like this is the first time someone has ever mentioned this. As a matter of fact, the US Supreme Court has weighed in on this issue in the past. In the school funding case of San Antonio v. Rodriguez more than 30 years ago, the Court held that education is not a fundamental right.

It is this question - whether education is a fundamental right, in the sense that it is among the rights and liberties protected by the Constitution - which has so consumed the attention of courts and commentators in recent years .

the key to discovering whether education is “fundamental” is not to be found in comparisons of the relative societal significance of education as opposed to subsistence or housing. Nor is it to be found by weighing whether education is as important as the right to travel. Rather, the answer lies in assessing whether there is a right to education explicitly or implicitly guaranteed by the Constitution.

We have carefully considered each of the arguments supportive of the District Court’s finding that education is a fundamental right or liberty and have found those arguments unpersuasive.

If education isn’t protected by the federal government, then it is either a right belonging to the state or the people themselves. Why? Because the Tenth Amendment said so. Back to today’s NY Times editorial . . .

But the core part of the law [No Child Left Behind], which requires the states to close the achievement gap between white and minority students, must remain sacrosanct

Huh? The Gray Lady knows this is illegal yet it continues to dismiss your rights. Yes, your rights, dear reader.

Local school systems have plenty of good reasons for impatience with No Child Left Behind - particularly on the critical issue of money.

This is where the Times has it correct. It is about the money. It is always about the money. In this case, the federal government is the problem. Where does government get its revenue? From our pockets. So, our federal taxes are being used to fund NCLB (whether or not it is funded at the levels the Times thinks it should). The feds released a report recently telling us that it more than $2.3 billion will be spent by the feds this year on education in New Jersey.

We are all intelligent folks, I assume. The people who collected the taxes from us make a salary and earn benfits. So do the folks who administer the money once it is collected. And those who write the laws. And the ones who enforce them. There are administrators, clerks, janitors, oversight committees, advertising, supplies, etc. that all go towards ensuring NJ receives that $2.3 billion. That is all happening in our nation’s capital. That is where the decisions about what to teach to whom are being made. Barbara Boxer is in on those decisions. Tom DeLay is in on those decisions.

The National Education Association is in on those decisions. Given the record of our senators actually representating us have in returning our federal taxes to the Garden State, I do not trust the feds to make these decisions. For each dollar NJ pays in federal taxes, we receive 62¢ in return. The missing 38¢ is slippage. Slippage is the amount that remains in DC or is spent elsewhere. It is a measure of the inefficiency of the system.

So, the federal government’s role in education should be non-existent since that is what the really smart people who founded this country wanted. The federal government disregards the law and has inserted itself into public education. By doing so, it keeps the citizens of NJ from being able to purchase education with a full wallet. And the NY Times thinks this is just ducky.

And just think . . . had we all those dollars that the feds have kept, would we have had to go into debt to build schools in New Jersey? Shouldn’t we determine how to educate our own children? If not, then why do we have protections in our state constitution for education?

Education is a state issue. Every time some politician wants to come off as doing something good, he tosses around a few dollars for education. It’s an easy sell. No one is against education. But not understanding that those in Washington have no role for what happens in the classroom has created a system frought with inefficiency, abuse, and a lost of purchasing power. That is why the US Education Department should be abolished and why the NY Times has it wrong.

Also blogged on this date . . .

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