Vouchers benefit families, not schools

When an Arizona appellate court scrapped the state’s school-voucher programs for disabled and foster children, it pulled Arizona from a path of settled case law, threatening both groups’ educational prospects.

In scrapping the voucher programs May 15, the court cited one of the Arizona constitution’s two Blaine Amendments — 19th Century laws which prohibit “appropriation of public money made in aid of any church, or private or sectarian school.” Though 37 states have Blaine Amendments prohibiting state funds from being used to “support” private schools, Arizona is one of only four with a second amendment prohibiting state “aid” to them.

The Arizona Supreme Court, where the voucher case is now headed, has clearly stated school choice programs such as the two in question do not “aid” private schools. They aid parents and children by enabling them to purchase an education.

The court has held that in deciding Blaine issues, judges must determine who the “true beneficiary” of a state program is, and in the case of school choice, the court said, the beneficiaries are families, not private schools.

The groups who sued to halt the voucher programs — the ACLU Foundation of Arizona, People for the American Way, and the Arizona Education Association — don’t want the public to know who the true beneficiaries are.

What these opponents have accomplished is to rob a small number of disabled students (117 were enrolled this year) and foster children (140 students) and their parents of their civil rights in order to make a political point, and push a false interpretation of the state’s constitution.

Nor have they been intellectually honest enough to acknowledge that the state of Arizona has for years run a school choice program for disabled children very much like the voucher program in question, under the federal Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act. The only difference is that the state assigns special-needs children to the IDEA programs that bureaucrats feel will best serve them. Under the voucher program, parents choose.

That suggests what lies at the heart of this issue: a struggle for power and control. Those who run the government school monopoly want to keep their power instead of sharing it with taxpayers and parents who might not choose their services. The idea of competition can be a scary thing, especially for groups that already enjoy captive audiences. Arizona, which operates four distinct school choice programs, has shown choice really works — and that’s why these groups are targeting it.

The decision is headed to the Arizona Supreme Court on appeal. Since the lower court contradicted itself regarding the state constitution’s Blaine Amendments — saying the programs “aid” religious schools but do not “support” them — it’s reasonable to expect the high court to abide by its own precedents and recognize this case for what it is: a grab for additional power by a fat and callous educational establishment.

Karla Dial (dial@heartland.org) is managing editor of School Reform News.