Posted on 01/05/2006 8:32:55 AM PST by SoFloFreeper
TALLLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) -- The Florida Supreme Court has struck down the state's school voucher system that paid for some students to attend private schools.
That was my thought as well.
In 1999 when the law allowing the vouchers was passed, they should have anticipated the Constitutional argument and amended the Constitution at the same time.
He joined the Navy just before his 17th birthday (he lied about his age) and became a hospital corpsman. He was in the Navy for 20 years, eventually getting his GED and attending William and Mary. At some point, he completed his AA. He then became a lab tech with the USDA.
He was always embarrassed that he didn't have a high school diploma, but I'm proud of his accomplishments and his contributions.
Thanks for posting the link. The decision is bogus and the dissent shreds it thouroughly. The people, as usual, have no effective recourse. Oh well, just another case of judicial tyranny.
great link. thanks.
The teachers' union must be delighted.
If "vouchers" were instead issued as tax credits, in other words, The People keeping their money instead of The People sending their money to the State only to have the State return it back to them in the form of vouchers, then the State is not funding private schools since it would have always been The People's money in the first place.
What this argument boils down to is who owns the benefits of your labor? Does all money belong to the State, and they let The People keep only as much as the State allows, or do The People own their money to do with as they please, and only send to The State what The State needs operate?
-PJ
If they don't read it, or if they don't know about a particular race, then WHY ARE THEY VOTING ON IT? Don't they know their ballot is still good if they LEAVE THOSE ONES BLANK????? Sheeeesh!!!
"1) get an amount equal to what you paid on your property tax every year?"
You should.
"2) Or would they take the entires State collection and divide it between parents?"
You obviously do not have any idea what a tax credit is. The credit would be pro-rated based on the amount of taxes paid. So, say, someone with a tax liability of $20,000 would get $5,000 and someone with a tax liabilty of $10,000 gets $2,500 and if a taxpayer's tax liability is zero, he gets zero. A tax credit is a retun of a taxpayer's tax to be used toward the education of one's children. I'm making numbers up here, obviously, but the credit could be more or less depending on the number of school age children.
A voucher, otoh, merely uses a taxpayer's funds to pay for someone else's children education. A tax credit returns the taxes to the rightful owner of those funds. Simple and fair.
I don't think conservatives care anything for whether a public school closes or stays open. There are conservatives that support their public schools greatly and there are conservatives that would give anything to get their kids out of public schools.
What happens when there is a choice in education is that some public schools will fold because they are so mismanaged.
One anecdote I share is from when I lived in the Los Angeles area in the 1980s.
The LA Unified School District (LAUSD) Superintendent made a higher salary than the President of the USA and had a chauffered limo take him where he wanted.
There were eight more levels of management (bureaucracy) in California public schools than in a comparable network of private schools. The public school budget was higher on a per student basis than private education.
Then there was the school construction budget that was fraught year after year with cost overruns, cronyism and no accountable auditing process.
Half of California's total budget was consumed by education and there was no, zip, nada accountability. Government officials privately referred to the education budget as a blackhole that sucked in huge masses of $$$ that were never to be seen again.
And I understand not much has changed.
Anyone that tries to be wise with dollar expenditures faces a lashing from local media that they are anti-children and anti-education.
Yes, vouchers will go a long way in breaking the back of that racket.
I live in the DC suburbs, and having seen enough news articles about the mismanagement about DC public schools, I can certainly see your point.
However, I think #288 is closer to the mark, with tax credits, rather than vouchers, and for the same reasons 288 gives.
I've heard that argument before, and it sounds entirely reasonable, but the track record of federal Pell grants being used for private colleges shows that it's not necessarily true.
Right. There is no Latin or Greek in English. There is no such thing as literature.
more disruption for the schoolkids. Florida Supremes rival the Ninth of Appeals in San Francisco for their arrogance. Jeb's appointee Cantero is not of much use in there either.
Yeah I know. I hate that I pay school taxes when I home schooled and my grandkids go to private school.
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Cindy - I don't know about Florida, but in Calif the homeschooled are still a part of the local school district, which provides some sort of oversight from a distance. The taxes would cover those expenditures I guess.
http://www.local6.com/news/5844950/detail.html
The Florida supremes were correct that public and private are competing interests; however 'equal' is an educational goal not a financial reality to impose. The very fact that the OST kicks in only when there is an unequal case e.g. a failing public school shows that the Florida supremes are imposing thier version of equal (funding) versus the legislatures version of equal (educational results).
Something about it being a threat to the teacher's unions and the government monopoly.
Don't keep us in suspense, what are your reasons.
Simple solution. Pull an Andrew Jackson and simply ignore it. Who is going to enforce it? The legislature that passed the voucher program in the first place? The governor who supported it? Congress? Hah hah. Maybe Dubya will intervene lol. One branch is not more powerful then the other, even the Judicial branch.
gotta keep those kids in the indoctrination system...
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