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Alan Keyes is Making Sense
Alan KeyesFebruary 20, 2002
ALAN KEYES, HOST: Hi, I'm Alan Keyes. Welcome to MAKING SENSE.
How important do you think it is that parents should be able to choose where their children go to school? I think it's a critical issue, but, of course, if you have enough money, you're probably already making that choice. You can decide, leave your children in the government school, send them to private schools, religious schools. Money seems to be the key to that.
But, of course, there are those who can't afford that kind of choice. And as a result, we've seen springing up around the country efforts to institute school choice programs that would support the parental choice of those who are outside the economic mainstream and don't have the wherewithal to make those kinds of choices when they think that the government schools that are available in their area are failing.
Cleveland, Ohio, is one of those places. And today, before the Supreme Court of the United States, a case was argued, having its roots in Ohio. And as a result of those arguments, protesters gathered on the steps of the Supreme Court on one side and the other as to whether or not government funds should be used to help people have the kind of educational choice that will allow parents to decide where their children should go to school.
The nine justices heard arguments on a whole range of questions, involving the right of families to choose religious schools and pay for them with these voucherized tax dollars, and the right of others who are arguing that separation of church and state requires that the government not be allowed to fund these kinds of parental choices.
Before we get to our guests tonight, here is NBC News justice correspondent Pete Williams to tell us a little bit about this case and its background.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Come here. Let me check out everybody.
PETE WILLIAMS, NBC CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Roberta Kitchen (ph) believes Cleveland's public school system is a disaster, failing to inspire her children's natural curiosity.
ROBERTA KITCHEN (ph), PARENT: I began to see all of that excitement just — just wane away.
WILLIAMS: So her daughter, Toshika (ph), attends a private school paid for with public money, a voucher, about $2,200 a year. The state of Ohio offers vouchers as part of a program to give parents alternatives to Cleveland's struggling public schools. But like nearly all the 4,000 children who get vouchers, Toshika attends a religious school. So a group of teachers and parents sued claiming the voucher program violates the separation of church and state.
HOLLY HOLLMAN, BAPTIST JOINT COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC AFFAIRS: The question is whether the state can subsidize religious indoctrination in parochial schools. In our view, the Constitution forbids such funding.
WILLIAMS: And because nearly all the Cleveland private schools that accept vouchers are religious, opponents say, parents have no real choice. But defenders of the voucher plan say the state is not subsidizing religion because the parents make the key decisions.
JUDITH FRENCH, OHIO ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's not government money going directly to these schools. It's the government saying to parents, we will give you a certain amount of money, and you decide where it goes.
WILLIAMS: And, say supporters of Ohio's program, vouchers aren't the only option. Parents can also send their children to magnet or charter schools or get tutors. Lawyers for both sides today found a court that appeared sharply divided, but Justice O'Connor, who may be the decisive vote, seemed to find the program acceptable. The state couldn't be seen as favoring religious schools, she said, since it also offers Cleveland parents other schooling options.
Nationwide, vouchers are a hotly debated issue. Wisconsin and Florida have similar programs and President Bush campaigned for them, saying they give parents a choice.
(on camera): The court's decision won't settle the debate about whether vouchers are good for children, but a win here would encourage other states to try them.
Pete Williams, NBC News, at the Supreme Court.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KEYES: Tonight, we are going to be addressing some of the key questions that are involved in the issue of parental choice. Do school vouchers help students? Do they hurt the government's schools? Do they violate the separation of church and state? We're going to be looking at this issue, of course, with a panel of folks who are on one side and the other, have strong opinions.
But up front tonight, we're going to be talking to Jay Sekulow, the chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice, who filed an amicus brief at the Supreme Court today on behalf of pro-voucher advocates. Also with us, Mayor John Norquist, Democrat of Milwaukee, who wrote an op-ed in today's “Wall Street Journal” entitled “Vouchers Aren't Just For Religious Schools”. Milwaukee is one of three such vouchers programs in the country that, as the mayor put it, now hangs in the balance.
Gentlemen, welcome to MAKING SENSE and thank you for taking the time to be with us today.
Jay, first of all to you. We see this case coming before the Supreme Court. The issues that are involved in it seem to hearken back to a whole range of issues, starting with school prayer and other things, where people have come against policies based on this idea of the separation of church and state. Do you think that this question of parental choice is actually going to be undermined because of that argument?
JAY SEKULOW, AMERICAN CENTER FOR LAW & JUSTICE: No, I'll tell you something, Alan, I think we saw today the Supreme Court of the United States is going to affirm the fact that these voucher programs are constitutional. Clearly, the swing voter, the necessary vote for our position is Justice O'Connor. In fact, our brief at the American Center for Law and Justice targeted directly her previous opinions, and they support the voucher concept.
And I think the good news here, for those that are in favor of parental choices, this Supreme Court appears to be ready to say that when you've got a situation like this, where the benefits — the voucher could go to a variety of different schools, religious schools, non-religious schools, even other public schools, charter schools, community schools, this Supreme Court, I believe, is going to say it's constitutional and appropriate. It's going to be one of the most significant victories, I believe, in the church/state separation issue in church/state relations probably in the Supreme Court's history. It's going to be a big case.
KEYES: Now, when we look at the program at Cleveland, is one of the key factors involved in what may be its ability to stand scrutiny, the fact that there are such a wide range of choices available to parents, at least under the law?
SEKULOW: Clearly, that was important to Justice O'Connor, again, the necessary vote. And Justice Kennedy mentioned it as well, so I think the fact that the way the voucher program was set up, providing various alternatives, allowing both private schools, allowing sectarian schools, non-sectarian schools, community schools, I think that is going to go a long way in making it constitutional. And I think that needs to serve as the model basis, if you will, for these other cases. So at the end of the day, that is going to be a decisive and probably the decisive factor, certainly for Justice O'Connor, as this case is now pending before the Supreme Court. They'll actually vote on it Friday.
KEYES: Mayor Norquist, in your article, you were stressing the fact that vouchers aren't just for religious schools. Getting away a little bit though from the more abstract issue, separation and so forth and so on, do you think that this kind of parental choice approach has benefits for the children who are involved, for the families for whom this choice is available?
JOHN NORQUIST (D), MILWAUKEE MAYOR: Yes. I think it will benefit children and their parents and society as a whole just as much as school choice has in higher education, where you can go to a public, private, or religious university and use the Pell Grants or G.I. Bill or the many state tuition grant programs. There's really no issue of separation of church — of church and state here. The parent makes the decision, not the state.
KEYES: Given the fact that the parents make the decision, do you think that it also contributes to a greater involvement of parents in the aftermath of that decision? I mean, I think one of the problems sometimes is that if parents think that education is somebody else's business and they're not really involved, they can opt out of the process and leave it on the shoulders of so-called professional educators, yet their role is critical. Does school choice help to encourage that role?
NORQUIST: Well, school choice is particularly good and particularly relevant to cities where you have lots of people living close together. And you already have a school choice program in place in all the major metropolitan areas in the United States. And that's where with people that have money and kids leave town, and you never hear the opponents of school choice complaining about that, the NEA or the ACLU, none of them ever complain about the fact that we have this vicious segregation of poor in the cities and wealthy in the suburbs with school choice.
Do you know why? Because when they leave town, they go out there and they're still in a government-owned school out in the suburbs, so then it's OK. And that tells you what the opponents of school choice really care about. It's not the kids. It's the job security of the public employees.
KEYES: Jay Sekulow, that sense that the school choice idea is actually intended to broaden the participation in access to quality education, wouldn't an argument like that hearken back to Brown v. Board of Education? I mean, are we talking here about something that involves that kind of equity argument as well?
SEKULOW: Exactly correct. In fact, these arguments were reminiscent of that. Justice Scalia, we he was asking the question, said aren't we talking about basically breaking a monopoly here of an education system that in the inner cities is just not working and aren't we trying to give these inner city young people and their parents options and choice and help? And let's not penalize the religious schools because they're the ones that are staying in these cities to help. And that was part of the argument today as well, Alan.
KEYES: Mayor Norquist, did you have a...
NORQUIST: Yes, that's the argument. Yes, I want to — I hope we pick up Steven Breyer as well because...
SEKULOW: I think we will.
NORQUIST: ... he's somebody who looks at economic arguments. What you're really talking about here is allowing cities to work as an economy where you provide all these great things in other areas, like good university and college education in the big cities in America, good restaurants, good ranking, all these other things go on. And then you get to K through 12 education and the government says the only money that the government can be — can put in has to go through a government-owned institution. It's absurd. And I think Steven Breyer will see that.
SEKULOW: The mayor is right. That is an issue, by the way, — the mayor is absolutely correct. And Justice Breyer, Mayor, exactly talked about that. Some of his questioning went to that very fact of the economic impact and what does this mean for the inner city and what does it mean to the community at large. And I think that showed the broad nature of the support here for these types of programs. This is the way of the future on these issues. And I think the Supreme Court is going to give it a green light today.
KEYES: I have to confess, I listened to the discussion here, I looked at all of us who are participating in it. One of the things that strikes me is that this is an issue where we're transcending all kinds of normal boundaries. Democrat, Republican, the partisan things go out the window. I think if one is just focusing on how we get the best education for our children, that's what happens, because as the mayor is saying, he's a Democrat, I'm a Republican, but these are not partisan questions.
NORQUIST: I've never voted for, in my life, Alan, I've never voted for (UNINTELLIGIBLE) even once.
SEKULOW: But it does across those lines. And I think that's the key thing here. This is not a political issue, and some have tried to make it a political issue. It's not. This is an education issue. This is the betterment of young people and giving them a chance. That's what these voucher programs do, and we need to be encouraging them, we don't need to be discouraging it.
KEYES: Thanks so much for joining me tonight. Really appreciate it, and the light that you have from both the legal and the practical point of view on this key and critical question that's now before the Supreme Court.
Next, of course, we'll be getting to the heart of the matter here on MAKING SENSE. And later, my outrage of the day, where the innocent remarks of the attorney general are being misconstrued by some in a way that suggests we ought to throw the Declaration of the Independence out the window.
Plus, our open phone line segment. Call me at 1-866-KEYES-USA with whatever is on your mind.
But first of all, does this make sense? There was a lady who got stopped because she had been involved in a serious accident. It turned out that her alcohol level was more than twice the level for legally establishment drunkenness, right? And so, after she is involved in this accident that injured her and hurt obviously the car, what does she go and do? Well, I'll tell you. She sues Volkswagen, saying that somehow or another the car was at fault. Does this make sense?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JULIE UNDERWOOD, NATL. SCHOOL BOARD ASSOCIATION: They want to make sure that there's a strong public school system for this generation and generations in the future. We need to look at those kind of issues and the issues of good education for all children, not for the advantaged and not just for the advantaged few that are available in a voucher program. The American public wants public schools.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEYES: That is a word of shall we call it wisdom from one of the anti-voucher protesters that was outside the Supreme Court today. I actually think the reasoning in that one could make a very good “does that make sense?”
But anyway, let's get to the heart of it today. We are today talking about parental choice and whether that is, in fact, one of the options that ought to be available to people in this country today, particularly to those who don't have the money right now perhaps to afford that kind of choice when they think that the available government schools are failing.
Later, I'll be going one-on-one with one of the strongest opponents in the Congress of the very idea of parental choice, Loretta Sanchez.
But right now, we are being joined by Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. Also with us, Annie Laurie Gaylor, the co-founder of the Freedom From Religion Foundation and professor Caroline Hoxby of Harvard University who conducted a study of the Milwaukee voucher system.
Welcome, everyone, to MAKING SENSE. Barry, I cannot resist the temptation tonight to start with you.
BARRY LYNN, AMERICANS UNITED FOR SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE: All right.
KEYES: I have to tell everyone, Barry and I are kind of old adversaries. We've been at it in one way or another over the course of many years. Obviously, things are coming to a head in terms of the Supreme Court's consideration of this Cleveland program, with implications for this idea all over the country. Why are you so strongly opposed to the idea that parents of all economic backgrounds ought to be helped with choice in terms of their children's education?
LYNN: Well, because I think two reasons. One, there is an opportunity for us to help all parents by making sure that we have a strong, quality-free public education program available for every child. Now we don't have that yet, in no small measure because we keep diverting funds, as we do in Cleveland, $11 million a year for these vouchers alone, away from the programs in the public schools into the private schools, and then we say, oh well, the public schools are obviously failing. I mean, this is like — this is truly blaming the victim. We cut the money and then we say, oh, by the way, the system is failing.
The second reason is I don't think any one of us would agree that the churches and synagogues, mosques, and temples in this country should be directly subsidized by the government. In the same way these very important ministries of those institutions, the religious schools, which I am perfectly happy to see promoting particular religious values, should not be bailed out with taxpayer dollars.
What we should use the taxpayer dollars for is a public school system, just like we have a public fire department, a public police force. If you want something in addition, you have to pay for it. I would be happy — and I don't think, Alan, you would be — to raise taxes if necessary or equalize funding between the suburbs and the cities in order to make public schools work. Then they're going to work for everybody. We don't have to go through this charade of — or scam, as I call it, of school choice and vouchers.
KEYES: Annie Laurie Gaylor, we have a program here that is actually giving parents the choice. It is not government deciding where these children will go to school. Being as how it's the parents who are making the decision, just as, for instance, G.I.'s made the decision about the colleges they went to under the G.I. Bill, how could this possibly be construed as involving some type of government favoring of religion? It's the parents who make a choice.
ANNIE LAURIE GAYLOR, FREEDOM FROM RELIGION FOUNDATION: It involves state funding of indoctrination, and let's look at who the big beneficiary is of the voucher programs in Milwaukee and Cleveland. It's the Roman Catholic Church. Two-thirds of these schools that are being used are Catholic. We're bailing out the failing Catholic churches with this, and it's something that could topple not only the wall of separation between church and state, but could destroy our public school system, which is supposed to be a great melting pot.
And there's no virtue in religiously segregated schools. People shouldn't pat themselves on the back for wanting to segregate children on the basis of religion. Church schools are not better schools, and I think, if the Supreme Court, if it approves this, could ruin our country. I think bin Laden would support the program — look where the terrorists came from. These are all religious schools, and they're divisive.
Look at the example of Ireland, what's happening to the Catholic school children last September, being assaulted on the way to school, because we have religiously segregated systems in that country where the Protestants and the Catholics never meet. I think that our public schools are the richness of our country, and we should be supporting them.
KEYES: What's interesting to me, Caroline Hoxby, is that arguments that are brought forward really seem to depend on some things — part of them would have to be verified factually, the effect that it has on students, on their performance, on their educational attainments, on the public schools as a result of the implementation of this kind of parental choice approach. Now you decided to take an empirical look at what has happened with one of these programs. Would you summarize for the audience the kinds of things you found in terms of the factual result of the program you were looking at?
CAROLINE HOXBY, Ph.D., HARVARD UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR: Sure. I think what people worry about the most is what's going to happen in the public schools that have to compete with the voucher schools. And the place to look if you want to get evidence on that question is the city of Milwaukee, because it has a plan that's really much larger than any other voucher plan in the United States. And it also has a plan that isn't capped.
And the voucher in Milwaukee is about $5,500, and the per pupil spending in the Milwaukee public schools is about $9,000, so it's a more reasonably sized voucher.
And what I did was I looked in Milwaukee before and after the voucher program was expanded, and that happened in the 1998-1999 school year. The cap was lifted from about 1 percent of Milwaukee public school students to about 15 percent of Milwaukee public school students, and in some elementary schools in Milwaukee up to 97 percent, 98 percent of the children were actually eligible for the vouchers. So these schools faced very substantial competition from the voucher program.
And if you compare those schools to the other schools in the state of Wisconsin that are urban and poor, or if you compare them to other schools in Milwaukee that didn't face very much competition from vouchers, it's amazing how much better the schools that faced competition did.
KEYES: Wait, wait, wait a minute here, because we just heard a couple of suggestions that this is going to destroy the schools, undermine them, destroy their quality. Did you just say that the public schools that were most subject to competition from private schools because of the vouchers actually improved in terms of student performance, is that what you said?
HOXBY: They improved on the Wisconsin state tests in every subject — math, science, history, reading and writing — and they really improved dramatically compared to any improvements they had made in the past. To a certain extent, we know what they did to improve. We know that teachers who were bad teachers were counseled out and we know that the school district gave these schools more autonomy, gave them more hiring and firing authority.
KEYES: So they actually in response to the competition changed their approach to education, in other words, did some things that were meant to adjust.
LYNN: No, doctor...
KEYES: Go ahead — Barry, hold on a second. Barry, go ahead.
LYNN: The issue here, though, is that with — there are reforms that are needed in some schools. You know, most parents, if you ask them, do you like your own child's public school, they will, in fact, say yes, and then you say, well, what about schools in general, and they say, well, we heard horror stories about somebody else's school. Most Americans like their public schools.
I'm all for changes in public education, but I want to do ones that work, and Dr. Hoxby really doesn't prove that vouchers work. She's making this assumption that...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Wait a minute, wait a minute. Barry, hold it. She doesn't have to prove that, because the argument you all have made isn't aboutwhether vouchers work or don't work. The argument...
LYNN: I...
KEYES: Wait a minute, let me finish, please. The argument you all have made and that was just repeated by Anne Laurie Gaylor is that somehow or another this is going to lead to terrible things happening in the public schools. Apparently, that argument does not hold water.
LYNN: Alan, let me just finish. The point is what — what is being suggested here is that there are easier ways to do this, in fact, cheaper ways to do it. And they're not — the method is not through a voucher program, but it is through taking the innovative education reform, some of which Dr. Hoxby just mentioned, and implementing them right now.
You know, I always find it absurd when people start talking about these charter schools. We want to get — free up schools from silly regulations. Well, I don't want to just free up schools from silly regulations for 5 or 6 percent of the schools. If they're stupid regulations, they should not affect any of the schools. So let's do the things that we know work. Dr. Hoxby knows that there are programs at Harvard and Johns Hopkins, the University of Pennsylvania that have been implemented that make at-risk children more likely to succeed. Let's do it tomorrow. Let's not waste our time with the voucher argument.
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: ... chance to respond. Go ahead.
HOXBY: I think the point is that the Milwaukee public schools did these things that they needed to do in response to competition, and they had not been doing these things before.
(CROSSTALK)
HOXBY: I think the reality is that most changes that public schools need to make are difficult changes. There are good people in public schools, but there are also people who resist good changes in public schools. And you need to have some pressure, some force from the outside so that the people who wanted to make the good changes are enabled to make them. And they can make the argument to the people who oppose them that, look, we're going to lose the students, we're going to lose the jobs, we're not going to be around to be educating these kids if we don't make the changes.
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Professor Hoxby, I have to tell you, that sounds remarkably like the speculative arguments — I will grant that they were — that folks like myself were making years ago as to what would, in fact, be the effect of introducing this kind of competition.
Introduced, by the way, not by forcing parents to do anything, but simply by allowing them the choice to do something, and allowing them to do that in a way, as I understood what you were saying, when you are voucherizing these young people to go to the non-government, non-public schools, the voucher is actually less than you would have had to pay to put them in the government schools, is that right?
HOXBY: Yes. The voucher is only about $5,500, and the Milwaukee spend about $9,000 per year on a per pupil basis.
KEYES: So in a sense they've saved money, though?
HOXBY: Yes. The Milwaukee public schools lose about...
KEYES: Anne Laurie Gaylor — wait a second. You're shaking your head. Why are you shaking it?
GAYLOR: I'm from Wisconsin, and my tax money goes to all of these Catholic and religious schools, and 50 percent of the money to support these religious schools in Milwaukee is coming out of Milwaukee public school system, which is beleaguered. The same thing is happening in Cleveland, $10 million or more a year. They don't even have all-day kindergarten in Cleveland, because they're supporting religious schools, which can offer all-day kindergarten...
KEYES: Annie, I have to beg to differ with you. Logic...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Wait a second, please. Wait a second. Logic always has a little bit of a place on my program, and what you just said simply doesn't make any sense. We just heard that by sending the children to these private schools, the system overall is freeing up some $4,000 that it does not have to spend on those kids that can then be used on others. In a sense, the child is getting educated for — for less money...
LYNN: That is literally nonsense. That's nonsense.
KEYES: Your major objection seems to be — hold on, Barry. Your major objection seems to be that this is somehow going to religious schools. I seem to miss...
GAYLOR: The money (UNINTELLIGIBLE) private schools.
KEYES: Let me finish, please. I misunderstand — I misunderstand the whole notion of what's allowed and not allowed under the so-called separation of church and state. I thought it mattered if government was sponsoring it, if government was choosing. These are parents who are making this choice, not government.
GAYLOR: And taxpayers. We taxpayers are the ones who are footing the bill. We are paying for Bibles and...
KEYES: So you think the G.I.s under the G.I. Bill should not have been allowed to choose religious schools?
GAYLOR: It's very different, because we have compulsory education, kindergarten through 12th grade. Mandatory education.
KEYES: I don't understand what that has to do with anything. The .I.'s were making the choice...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Hold it. The G.I.'s were making the choice. They took the money to religious schools. You are saying they should not have been allowed to do so, right?
GAYLOR: I'm saying that's a totally different situation.
KEYES: You just don't want to answer that question. Go ahead, Barry.
LYNN: Well, first of all, remember the G.I. Bill is delayed compensation for service to your country. In other words, it's money they don't pay you while you're in Vietnam, they pay it to you when you come back. It's entirely different.
But I want to get back to this earlier point, I do think logic matters. It is not true that the Milwaukee plan, the comparison that Dr. Hoxby gave is accurate, because all she's talking about are the direct cost of the vouchers versus the direct and indirect costs to the public schools. If you compare the two, apples to apples, the program expenditures are virtually the same, so I don't even — I would have to seriously wonder how much of the rest of her analysis makes any sense.
HOXBY: I don't understand what the difficulty is. I mean, I think that everyone in Wisconsin who is involved in government knows what the numbers are. The way it works in Wisconsin...
LYNN: No, they don't.
HOXBY: The way it works in Wisconsin is that some of the money comes from the state to pay for the voucher, and some of the money comes from the Milwaukee public school system. And when Milwaukee has a child who goes on a voucher, Milwaukee loses about 28 percent, 29 percent of the money that it was getting in per pupil spending for that child. So on average, Milwaukee's per pupil spending actually goes up every time.
(CROSSTALK)
LYNN: That's economic nonsense.
KEYES: Professor Hoxby, we have come to the end of our time for this segment, but I listened to this back and forth, and as I think we'll see in the next segment when I debate Congressman Loretta Sanchez, for years the folks against vouchers have been impervious to logic. Now they are impervious to facts. But we shall see where that leaves the rest of us, next, as we reach the bottom line with Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez.
I want to thanks Barry Lynn, Annie Laurie Gaylor and professor Caroline Hoxby for being with me today. Really appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts with us.
Plus, later, my outrage of the day, over the reaction to some comments made by our U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, in which he actually had the gall to refer to the creator.
And later, we'll get to what's on your mind.
But first of all, does this make sense: is President Bush backing down from his axis of evil rhetoric? Yesterday he had this to say when he visited the famed DMZ between North and South Korea.
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GEORGE W. BUSH, U.S. PRESIDENT: We're peaceful people. We have no intention of invading North Korea. South Korea has no intention of attacking North Korea. Nor does America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEYES: Now here is what the president said last month during his state of the union address.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: I will not wait on events while dangers gather. I will not stand by as peril draws closer and closer. The United States of America will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons.
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KEYES: I don't know if the president is confused, but I certainly am. Do you think that makes sense?
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KEYES (voice-over): These pictures just in, showing President Bush as he arrives for his visit to China, which will have him there during the observance of the historic Nixon trip that opened our relationship with China in the midst of the Cold War.
(on camera): We are talking this evening about school vouchers, and whether or not giving parents the choice to send their children to non government schools with government funding is, in fact, something that's going to help kids, is it going to hurt the public schools, is it a violation of separation?
These are issues that have been controversial for many years, coming to a head because the Supreme Court today began to take a look at a case that involved such a program in Cleveland, Ohio.
Well, joining me this evening, to get to the bottom line, Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, Democrat of California, and a member of the House Education Committee. Also well-known for her strong opposition to the idea of vouchers.
Congresswoman, welcome to MAKING SENSE and thank you for making time to be with us this evening.
Against the backdrop of the Supreme Court's decision, the question that just keeps occurring to me, as I look at what's being considered and consider the opposition that has been there over the years on separation grounds and so forth, is why is it so threatening that we should actually allow parents who are lower income, may not be in a position to do so, to have the same kind of choice that wealthier people have in terms of sending their children to schools that they think will best serve their educational needs? Why is this a problem?
REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ (D), CALIFORNIA: Well, first of all, Alan, congratulations on the show, and I'm happy to be here.
And I really believe that this issue that's before the Supreme Court will probably be decided on the issue of separation of church and state.
Having said that, I think that's very different than the whole issue of choice for parents. And I think many of us have done quite a bit for choice for parents.
I know that kids that get to go in my school district, my public school district get to — the parents get to send them to a fundamental school or a magnet school. They get to be taught in English or Spanish. There are charter schools in my area. And so I think parents are getting a lot of choices.
It's just that as a lawmaker at the federal level, I am looking at the fact that over 93 percent of the kids in the United States go to public schools. So my concentration is going to be on how do we make public schools better.
KEYES: Well, how do you respond, though, because one of the arguments that's been made over the years is that if we go down the road of parental choice, it's going to have this devastating effect on the government schools.
Now some of us suggested a long time ago, me among them, that this was not so. That in point of fact, if you had greater competition, you would see an improvement in the performance of the public schools in response to that competition. We heard from Professor Carolyn Hoxby just now that that in fact looks to be what happened in Milwaukee. An empirical verification of this logic.
Why would one not be willing to look at an alternative that actually seems to improve schools all around? It performs the performance of the kids who go to the non government schools and the reaction, the competitive reaction, improves the environment for the kids in the government schools. Isn't that a win-win situation?
SANCHEZ: Well, I believe your previous people who were speaking, one of the problems that they had is that, in particular in the Milwaukee situation, only 21 percent of the kids who were actually in public schools are using these vouchers.
Of the kids who go to these private schools with vouchers, only 21 percent of those kids are coming out of the public school system. The rest of them were already going to the private school system.
So that's why they feel that it's siphoning monies out of the public school system.
KEYES: I don't quite understand. What's actually happened then is that some parents who are were paying twice, paying their taxes and also sending their children to other schools, are now given some relief from that double taxation. Other parents who felt like they didn't have that choice have been given that choice, and as a result they have sparked improvements in the schools.
I say, again, it looks like everybody benefits here.
SANCHEZ: Well, Alan, I don't believe that that is double taxation. I'll tell you why.
I, for example, my husband and I, pay taxes. We don't have children. So if you were going to take the logic that you just used, then I should not be paying any taxes towards educating kids.
But the reality is that I'm paying taxes towards educating children because I understand that that is a mutual benefit to our society as a whole.
That's why we've made compulsory education. That's why we require kids to go to school at least through the 12th grade. And so your logic wouldn't make sense.
It's not a double taxation. It's the fact we're all putting in money so that the overall average of the American people is high.
KEYES: Oh, so it's not double taxation, even though some folks are paying the taxes and their children are going to the government schools and other folks are paying the taxes and paying again to send their children to non government schools so they'll get decent education, and yet they're not paying twice? I see the — the logic of that is perfectly clear to me...
SANCHEZ: Alan...
KEYES: But the great problem I have as well — answer this question, because a lot of people talk about separation. You say the issue will be decided on the basis of separation. If parents, like GI's under the GI Bill are making the choice, not government, how can we say that this involves any kind of government sponsorship of religion? These are private citizens making their choices. Not the government making a choice.
SANCHEZ: Well, Alan, I'm not going to be making that decision. The persons who will be making that decision are the Supreme Court justices.
I think we can take a look at some of the previous decisions they've made, and in particular I'm going to be very interested in seeing what Sandra Day O'Connor does, because she, in fact, wrote at one point, while she upheld some monies going for some faith-based situations, she said that public money should not be used for religious indoctrination of people.
And if that's how she feels about monies being diverted from the public schools and put into, for example, a Catholic school education, then we may look to her as being that fifth judge that disallows a voucher program like that one in Milwaukee.
KEYES: So you are open to the possibility then that the court will decide to allow this program, and at that point I presume your opposition will disappear, you'll be perfectly happy to let it go forward then?
SANCHEZ: Well, I think there's always going to be the controversy of what's going on, but, of course, as a legislator and as someone who obeys the law, I may fight to change that law, but it doesn't mean that I'm going to go against whatever law sits in place at this particular time.
So it's really going to be dependent on what those judges do in this decision.
KEYES: You give me some hope then, Representative Sanchez, because for many years we have been going back and forth here and it seemed as if, as the logic and the facts moved in the direction of supporting school choice, a lot of folks continued their resistance.
But if the court accepts the logic that is now being strongly argued in favor of this program, then, as I understand what you're saying, you will then accept that result, and I that I will be a great step forward for all of us.
Really appreciate your joining me tonight and taking the time to share your thoughts on this issue with me and my audience.
Later, I will get to my outrage of the day. Burt first, I want to hear what's on your mind.
You're watching MSNBC, the best news on cable.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEYES: Welcome back to MAKING SENSE.
Now I get to hear what's on your mind. I got to tell you, this is the part of the program that can be the most fun for me.
So I'm glad y'all are calling and participating as you're doing in the chat room at CHAT.MSNBC.COM
Let's go first to Michelle in Pennsylvania.
Welcome to MAKING SENSE.
MICHELLE: Hi, Alan.
KEYES: Hi.
MICHELLE: I am very much in favor of the school voucher. I'm in Pennsylvania, and my son attended a fine public school here. My husband and I graduated from that school, and my daughter as well was in that school.
And when she reached her freshman year, just was floundering, just drowning in that environment with that many students. She was in honors programs, high honor roll, coming home every day just discouraged, not wanting to go back, slipping into depression, not wanting to be there.
We had to make a choice for our child. We put her in a Christian school, not because we wanted them to be a religious teacher. That's our job. We're her parents.
She is flourishing in this school. She loves it.
We met with the school psychiatrist at the public school trying to make this decision, because she was an honor roll student. He said, mom, and dad, she is a great kid and she's communicating with you. She's being open.
KEYES: And you, of course, had to think about what was best for your child.
MICHELLE: Right. Exactly.
KEYES: And I have to say, my wife and I were in a similar position with our eldest son, in some ways and when we decided to pull him out of the government school system, it was, I think, the best decision that we made for him.
Let's go to Elaine in California.
Elaine, welcome to MAKING SENSE.
ELAINE: Hello, Mr. Keyes.
Although I don't agree with a lot of things you say, I have to respect you are well read, OK?
But I'm here in California, and there's a voucher proposition on the ballot like a year and a half ago, and the black community, especially, you know, the clergy, went and they were totally against the voucher system, but I think it's something — statistics show that the California public school system has failed black children.
If you are look at the penitentiaries and the input into the college system, it has totally failed us. And I think the voucher system, although people may be against it, I think it's an option. It gives you an option to take care of your child.
KEYES: Elaine, that is exactly what I have argued over many years, and I have never understood the opposition that comes from some of the leadership in the black community when this would empower people, black parents, to make choices that are not now within their reach, and would greatly improve prospects for their children.
Let's go to Thomas in Virginia. Very quickly, Thomas, what's on your mind?
THOMAS: Good evening, Dr. Keyes, thank you for taking my call.
KEYES: Sure.
THOMAS: I just hopefully was going to stop you short of something — you had mentioned something about the president and the comments about him not going to attack North Korea and then referring back to his state of the union address.
I'd just would like to remind you that his direct manner actually said nothing about war. It just said that this...
KEYES: Thomas, Thomas, I need to be very quick here.
The implication was that we weren't going to wait for them to hit us before we hit them.
THOMAS: No, that wasn't the implication at all.
KEYES: Yes it was, sorry.
THOMAS: That wasn't the implication at all.
KEYES: And if it wasn't the implication, then the speech didn't make any sense because — let me finish, sir.
THOMAS: The speech made very good sense.
KEYES: We don't have much time. The speech was intended to establish deterrents, and you can only deter if people understand that you are going to strike back at them if you are struck by these terrorists with weapons of mass destruction.
That was the implication that made it effective, and he seems to be taking it back.
Thanks for your calls. Really appreciate it.
We're going to get into the China question and other questions about the axis of evil tomorrow, so you'll want to tune in.
Thanks for your feedback.
Next, my outrage of the day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEYES: Speaking of separation of church and state, here is my outrage of the day.
This is what Attorney General John Ashcroft said to the national religious broadcasters association the other day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN ASHCROFT, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Civilized individuals, Christians, Jews, and Muslims, all understand that the source of freedom and human dignity is the creator.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
And here is how Robert Boston of Americans United for Separation of Church and State responded:
“One of the things that he (Ashcroft) never understood is that true pluralism in our society includes those who would choose not to believe, and there are millions of Americans who fall under that umbrella.”
Well, one of the things I think Mr. Boston ought to understand is that the founders of this country put in the declaration of independence these clear words: “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.”
When a public official refers to the creator in that sense, he is not borrowing from some religion. He's actually standing on the strong common ground of the American creed. Does Mr. Boston think we ought to throw the declaration out the window in order to appease the feelings of a few folks who feel uncomfortable every time they hear even the slightest hint of God mentioned anywhere in America?
I think not, because our freedoms would go out the window with those principles.
That's my sense of it this evening.
Tomorrow night on MAKING SENSE, an in-depth look at the Andrea Yates case.
How important do you think it is that parents should be able to choose where their children go to school? I think it's a critical issue, but, of course, if you have enough money, you're probably already making that choice. You can decide, leave your children in the government school, send them to private schools, religious schools. Money seems to be the key to that.
But, of course, there are those who can't afford that kind of choice. And as a result, we've seen springing up around the country efforts to institute school choice programs that would support the parental choice of those who are outside the economic mainstream and don't have the wherewithal to make those kinds of choices when they think that the government schools that are available in their area are failing.
Cleveland, Ohio, is one of those places. And today, before the Supreme Court of the United States, a case was argued, having its roots in Ohio. And as a result of those arguments, protesters gathered on the steps of the Supreme Court on one side and the other as to whether or not government funds should be used to help people have the kind of educational choice that will allow parents to decide where their children should go to school.
The nine justices heard arguments on a whole range of questions, involving the right of families to choose religious schools and pay for them with these voucherized tax dollars, and the right of others who are arguing that separation of church and state requires that the government not be allowed to fund these kinds of parental choices.
Before we get to our guests tonight, here is NBC News justice correspondent Pete Williams to tell us a little bit about this case and its background.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Come here. Let me check out everybody.
PETE WILLIAMS, NBC CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Roberta Kitchen (ph) believes Cleveland's public school system is a disaster, failing to inspire her children's natural curiosity.
ROBERTA KITCHEN (ph), PARENT: I began to see all of that excitement just — just wane away.
WILLIAMS: So her daughter, Toshika (ph), attends a private school paid for with public money, a voucher, about $2,200 a year. The state of Ohio offers vouchers as part of a program to give parents alternatives to Cleveland's struggling public schools. But like nearly all the 4,000 children who get vouchers, Toshika attends a religious school. So a group of teachers and parents sued claiming the voucher program violates the separation of church and state.
HOLLY HOLLMAN, BAPTIST JOINT COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC AFFAIRS: The question is whether the state can subsidize religious indoctrination in parochial schools. In our view, the Constitution forbids such funding.
WILLIAMS: And because nearly all the Cleveland private schools that accept vouchers are religious, opponents say, parents have no real choice. But defenders of the voucher plan say the state is not subsidizing religion because the parents make the key decisions.
JUDITH FRENCH, OHIO ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's not government money going directly to these schools. It's the government saying to parents, we will give you a certain amount of money, and you decide where it goes.
WILLIAMS: And, say supporters of Ohio's program, vouchers aren't the only option. Parents can also send their children to magnet or charter schools or get tutors. Lawyers for both sides today found a court that appeared sharply divided, but Justice O'Connor, who may be the decisive vote, seemed to find the program acceptable. The state couldn't be seen as favoring religious schools, she said, since it also offers Cleveland parents other schooling options.
Nationwide, vouchers are a hotly debated issue. Wisconsin and Florida have similar programs and President Bush campaigned for them, saying they give parents a choice.
(on camera): The court's decision won't settle the debate about whether vouchers are good for children, but a win here would encourage other states to try them.
Pete Williams, NBC News, at the Supreme Court.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KEYES: Tonight, we are going to be addressing some of the key questions that are involved in the issue of parental choice. Do school vouchers help students? Do they hurt the government's schools? Do they violate the separation of church and state? We're going to be looking at this issue, of course, with a panel of folks who are on one side and the other, have strong opinions.
But up front tonight, we're going to be talking to Jay Sekulow, the chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice, who filed an amicus brief at the Supreme Court today on behalf of pro-voucher advocates. Also with us, Mayor John Norquist, Democrat of Milwaukee, who wrote an op-ed in today's “Wall Street Journal” entitled “Vouchers Aren't Just For Religious Schools”. Milwaukee is one of three such vouchers programs in the country that, as the mayor put it, now hangs in the balance.
Gentlemen, welcome to MAKING SENSE and thank you for taking the time to be with us today.
Jay, first of all to you. We see this case coming before the Supreme Court. The issues that are involved in it seem to hearken back to a whole range of issues, starting with school prayer and other things, where people have come against policies based on this idea of the separation of church and state. Do you think that this question of parental choice is actually going to be undermined because of that argument?
JAY SEKULOW, AMERICAN CENTER FOR LAW & JUSTICE: No, I'll tell you something, Alan, I think we saw today the Supreme Court of the United States is going to affirm the fact that these voucher programs are constitutional. Clearly, the swing voter, the necessary vote for our position is Justice O'Connor. In fact, our brief at the American Center for Law and Justice targeted directly her previous opinions, and they support the voucher concept.
And I think the good news here, for those that are in favor of parental choices, this Supreme Court appears to be ready to say that when you've got a situation like this, where the benefits — the voucher could go to a variety of different schools, religious schools, non-religious schools, even other public schools, charter schools, community schools, this Supreme Court, I believe, is going to say it's constitutional and appropriate. It's going to be one of the most significant victories, I believe, in the church/state separation issue in church/state relations probably in the Supreme Court's history. It's going to be a big case.
KEYES: Now, when we look at the program at Cleveland, is one of the key factors involved in what may be its ability to stand scrutiny, the fact that there are such a wide range of choices available to parents, at least under the law?
SEKULOW: Clearly, that was important to Justice O'Connor, again, the necessary vote. And Justice Kennedy mentioned it as well, so I think the fact that the way the voucher program was set up, providing various alternatives, allowing both private schools, allowing sectarian schools, non-sectarian schools, community schools, I think that is going to go a long way in making it constitutional. And I think that needs to serve as the model basis, if you will, for these other cases. So at the end of the day, that is going to be a decisive and probably the decisive factor, certainly for Justice O'Connor, as this case is now pending before the Supreme Court. They'll actually vote on it Friday.
KEYES: Mayor Norquist, in your article, you were stressing the fact that vouchers aren't just for religious schools. Getting away a little bit though from the more abstract issue, separation and so forth and so on, do you think that this kind of parental choice approach has benefits for the children who are involved, for the families for whom this choice is available?
JOHN NORQUIST (D), MILWAUKEE MAYOR: Yes. I think it will benefit children and their parents and society as a whole just as much as school choice has in higher education, where you can go to a public, private, or religious university and use the Pell Grants or G.I. Bill or the many state tuition grant programs. There's really no issue of separation of church — of church and state here. The parent makes the decision, not the state.
KEYES: Given the fact that the parents make the decision, do you think that it also contributes to a greater involvement of parents in the aftermath of that decision? I mean, I think one of the problems sometimes is that if parents think that education is somebody else's business and they're not really involved, they can opt out of the process and leave it on the shoulders of so-called professional educators, yet their role is critical. Does school choice help to encourage that role?
NORQUIST: Well, school choice is particularly good and particularly relevant to cities where you have lots of people living close together. And you already have a school choice program in place in all the major metropolitan areas in the United States. And that's where with people that have money and kids leave town, and you never hear the opponents of school choice complaining about that, the NEA or the ACLU, none of them ever complain about the fact that we have this vicious segregation of poor in the cities and wealthy in the suburbs with school choice.
Do you know why? Because when they leave town, they go out there and they're still in a government-owned school out in the suburbs, so then it's OK. And that tells you what the opponents of school choice really care about. It's not the kids. It's the job security of the public employees.
KEYES: Jay Sekulow, that sense that the school choice idea is actually intended to broaden the participation in access to quality education, wouldn't an argument like that hearken back to Brown v. Board of Education? I mean, are we talking here about something that involves that kind of equity argument as well?
SEKULOW: Exactly correct. In fact, these arguments were reminiscent of that. Justice Scalia, we he was asking the question, said aren't we talking about basically breaking a monopoly here of an education system that in the inner cities is just not working and aren't we trying to give these inner city young people and their parents options and choice and help? And let's not penalize the religious schools because they're the ones that are staying in these cities to help. And that was part of the argument today as well, Alan.
KEYES: Mayor Norquist, did you have a...
NORQUIST: Yes, that's the argument. Yes, I want to — I hope we pick up Steven Breyer as well because...
SEKULOW: I think we will.
NORQUIST: ... he's somebody who looks at economic arguments. What you're really talking about here is allowing cities to work as an economy where you provide all these great things in other areas, like good university and college education in the big cities in America, good restaurants, good ranking, all these other things go on. And then you get to K through 12 education and the government says the only money that the government can be — can put in has to go through a government-owned institution. It's absurd. And I think Steven Breyer will see that.
SEKULOW: The mayor is right. That is an issue, by the way, — the mayor is absolutely correct. And Justice Breyer, Mayor, exactly talked about that. Some of his questioning went to that very fact of the economic impact and what does this mean for the inner city and what does it mean to the community at large. And I think that showed the broad nature of the support here for these types of programs. This is the way of the future on these issues. And I think the Supreme Court is going to give it a green light today.
KEYES: I have to confess, I listened to the discussion here, I looked at all of us who are participating in it. One of the things that strikes me is that this is an issue where we're transcending all kinds of normal boundaries. Democrat, Republican, the partisan things go out the window. I think if one is just focusing on how we get the best education for our children, that's what happens, because as the mayor is saying, he's a Democrat, I'm a Republican, but these are not partisan questions.
NORQUIST: I've never voted for, in my life, Alan, I've never voted for (UNINTELLIGIBLE) even once.
SEKULOW: But it does across those lines. And I think that's the key thing here. This is not a political issue, and some have tried to make it a political issue. It's not. This is an education issue. This is the betterment of young people and giving them a chance. That's what these voucher programs do, and we need to be encouraging them, we don't need to be discouraging it.
KEYES: Thanks so much for joining me tonight. Really appreciate it, and the light that you have from both the legal and the practical point of view on this key and critical question that's now before the Supreme Court.
Next, of course, we'll be getting to the heart of the matter here on MAKING SENSE. And later, my outrage of the day, where the innocent remarks of the attorney general are being misconstrued by some in a way that suggests we ought to throw the Declaration of the Independence out the window.
Plus, our open phone line segment. Call me at 1-866-KEYES-USA with whatever is on your mind.
But first of all, does this make sense? There was a lady who got stopped because she had been involved in a serious accident. It turned out that her alcohol level was more than twice the level for legally establishment drunkenness, right? And so, after she is involved in this accident that injured her and hurt obviously the car, what does she go and do? Well, I'll tell you. She sues Volkswagen, saying that somehow or another the car was at fault. Does this make sense?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JULIE UNDERWOOD, NATL. SCHOOL BOARD ASSOCIATION: They want to make sure that there's a strong public school system for this generation and generations in the future. We need to look at those kind of issues and the issues of good education for all children, not for the advantaged and not just for the advantaged few that are available in a voucher program. The American public wants public schools.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEYES: That is a word of shall we call it wisdom from one of the anti-voucher protesters that was outside the Supreme Court today. I actually think the reasoning in that one could make a very good “does that make sense?”
But anyway, let's get to the heart of it today. We are today talking about parental choice and whether that is, in fact, one of the options that ought to be available to people in this country today, particularly to those who don't have the money right now perhaps to afford that kind of choice when they think that the available government schools are failing.
Later, I'll be going one-on-one with one of the strongest opponents in the Congress of the very idea of parental choice, Loretta Sanchez.
But right now, we are being joined by Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. Also with us, Annie Laurie Gaylor, the co-founder of the Freedom From Religion Foundation and professor Caroline Hoxby of Harvard University who conducted a study of the Milwaukee voucher system.
Welcome, everyone, to MAKING SENSE. Barry, I cannot resist the temptation tonight to start with you.
BARRY LYNN, AMERICANS UNITED FOR SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE: All right.
KEYES: I have to tell everyone, Barry and I are kind of old adversaries. We've been at it in one way or another over the course of many years. Obviously, things are coming to a head in terms of the Supreme Court's consideration of this Cleveland program, with implications for this idea all over the country. Why are you so strongly opposed to the idea that parents of all economic backgrounds ought to be helped with choice in terms of their children's education?
LYNN: Well, because I think two reasons. One, there is an opportunity for us to help all parents by making sure that we have a strong, quality-free public education program available for every child. Now we don't have that yet, in no small measure because we keep diverting funds, as we do in Cleveland, $11 million a year for these vouchers alone, away from the programs in the public schools into the private schools, and then we say, oh well, the public schools are obviously failing. I mean, this is like — this is truly blaming the victim. We cut the money and then we say, oh, by the way, the system is failing.
The second reason is I don't think any one of us would agree that the churches and synagogues, mosques, and temples in this country should be directly subsidized by the government. In the same way these very important ministries of those institutions, the religious schools, which I am perfectly happy to see promoting particular religious values, should not be bailed out with taxpayer dollars.
What we should use the taxpayer dollars for is a public school system, just like we have a public fire department, a public police force. If you want something in addition, you have to pay for it. I would be happy — and I don't think, Alan, you would be — to raise taxes if necessary or equalize funding between the suburbs and the cities in order to make public schools work. Then they're going to work for everybody. We don't have to go through this charade of — or scam, as I call it, of school choice and vouchers.
KEYES: Annie Laurie Gaylor, we have a program here that is actually giving parents the choice. It is not government deciding where these children will go to school. Being as how it's the parents who are making the decision, just as, for instance, G.I.'s made the decision about the colleges they went to under the G.I. Bill, how could this possibly be construed as involving some type of government favoring of religion? It's the parents who make a choice.
ANNIE LAURIE GAYLOR, FREEDOM FROM RELIGION FOUNDATION: It involves state funding of indoctrination, and let's look at who the big beneficiary is of the voucher programs in Milwaukee and Cleveland. It's the Roman Catholic Church. Two-thirds of these schools that are being used are Catholic. We're bailing out the failing Catholic churches with this, and it's something that could topple not only the wall of separation between church and state, but could destroy our public school system, which is supposed to be a great melting pot.
And there's no virtue in religiously segregated schools. People shouldn't pat themselves on the back for wanting to segregate children on the basis of religion. Church schools are not better schools, and I think, if the Supreme Court, if it approves this, could ruin our country. I think bin Laden would support the program — look where the terrorists came from. These are all religious schools, and they're divisive.
Look at the example of Ireland, what's happening to the Catholic school children last September, being assaulted on the way to school, because we have religiously segregated systems in that country where the Protestants and the Catholics never meet. I think that our public schools are the richness of our country, and we should be supporting them.
KEYES: What's interesting to me, Caroline Hoxby, is that arguments that are brought forward really seem to depend on some things — part of them would have to be verified factually, the effect that it has on students, on their performance, on their educational attainments, on the public schools as a result of the implementation of this kind of parental choice approach. Now you decided to take an empirical look at what has happened with one of these programs. Would you summarize for the audience the kinds of things you found in terms of the factual result of the program you were looking at?
CAROLINE HOXBY, Ph.D., HARVARD UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR: Sure. I think what people worry about the most is what's going to happen in the public schools that have to compete with the voucher schools. And the place to look if you want to get evidence on that question is the city of Milwaukee, because it has a plan that's really much larger than any other voucher plan in the United States. And it also has a plan that isn't capped.
And the voucher in Milwaukee is about $5,500, and the per pupil spending in the Milwaukee public schools is about $9,000, so it's a more reasonably sized voucher.
And what I did was I looked in Milwaukee before and after the voucher program was expanded, and that happened in the 1998-1999 school year. The cap was lifted from about 1 percent of Milwaukee public school students to about 15 percent of Milwaukee public school students, and in some elementary schools in Milwaukee up to 97 percent, 98 percent of the children were actually eligible for the vouchers. So these schools faced very substantial competition from the voucher program.
And if you compare those schools to the other schools in the state of Wisconsin that are urban and poor, or if you compare them to other schools in Milwaukee that didn't face very much competition from vouchers, it's amazing how much better the schools that faced competition did.
KEYES: Wait, wait, wait a minute here, because we just heard a couple of suggestions that this is going to destroy the schools, undermine them, destroy their quality. Did you just say that the public schools that were most subject to competition from private schools because of the vouchers actually improved in terms of student performance, is that what you said?
HOXBY: They improved on the Wisconsin state tests in every subject — math, science, history, reading and writing — and they really improved dramatically compared to any improvements they had made in the past. To a certain extent, we know what they did to improve. We know that teachers who were bad teachers were counseled out and we know that the school district gave these schools more autonomy, gave them more hiring and firing authority.
KEYES: So they actually in response to the competition changed their approach to education, in other words, did some things that were meant to adjust.
LYNN: No, doctor...
KEYES: Go ahead — Barry, hold on a second. Barry, go ahead.
LYNN: The issue here, though, is that with — there are reforms that are needed in some schools. You know, most parents, if you ask them, do you like your own child's public school, they will, in fact, say yes, and then you say, well, what about schools in general, and they say, well, we heard horror stories about somebody else's school. Most Americans like their public schools.
I'm all for changes in public education, but I want to do ones that work, and Dr. Hoxby really doesn't prove that vouchers work. She's making this assumption that...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Wait a minute, wait a minute. Barry, hold it. She doesn't have to prove that, because the argument you all have made isn't aboutwhether vouchers work or don't work. The argument...
LYNN: I...
KEYES: Wait a minute, let me finish, please. The argument you all have made and that was just repeated by Anne Laurie Gaylor is that somehow or another this is going to lead to terrible things happening in the public schools. Apparently, that argument does not hold water.
LYNN: Alan, let me just finish. The point is what — what is being suggested here is that there are easier ways to do this, in fact, cheaper ways to do it. And they're not — the method is not through a voucher program, but it is through taking the innovative education reform, some of which Dr. Hoxby just mentioned, and implementing them right now.
You know, I always find it absurd when people start talking about these charter schools. We want to get — free up schools from silly regulations. Well, I don't want to just free up schools from silly regulations for 5 or 6 percent of the schools. If they're stupid regulations, they should not affect any of the schools. So let's do the things that we know work. Dr. Hoxby knows that there are programs at Harvard and Johns Hopkins, the University of Pennsylvania that have been implemented that make at-risk children more likely to succeed. Let's do it tomorrow. Let's not waste our time with the voucher argument.
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: ... chance to respond. Go ahead.
HOXBY: I think the point is that the Milwaukee public schools did these things that they needed to do in response to competition, and they had not been doing these things before.
(CROSSTALK)
HOXBY: I think the reality is that most changes that public schools need to make are difficult changes. There are good people in public schools, but there are also people who resist good changes in public schools. And you need to have some pressure, some force from the outside so that the people who wanted to make the good changes are enabled to make them. And they can make the argument to the people who oppose them that, look, we're going to lose the students, we're going to lose the jobs, we're not going to be around to be educating these kids if we don't make the changes.
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Professor Hoxby, I have to tell you, that sounds remarkably like the speculative arguments — I will grant that they were — that folks like myself were making years ago as to what would, in fact, be the effect of introducing this kind of competition.
Introduced, by the way, not by forcing parents to do anything, but simply by allowing them the choice to do something, and allowing them to do that in a way, as I understood what you were saying, when you are voucherizing these young people to go to the non-government, non-public schools, the voucher is actually less than you would have had to pay to put them in the government schools, is that right?
HOXBY: Yes. The voucher is only about $5,500, and the Milwaukee spend about $9,000 per year on a per pupil basis.
KEYES: So in a sense they've saved money, though?
HOXBY: Yes. The Milwaukee public schools lose about...
KEYES: Anne Laurie Gaylor — wait a second. You're shaking your head. Why are you shaking it?
GAYLOR: I'm from Wisconsin, and my tax money goes to all of these Catholic and religious schools, and 50 percent of the money to support these religious schools in Milwaukee is coming out of Milwaukee public school system, which is beleaguered. The same thing is happening in Cleveland, $10 million or more a year. They don't even have all-day kindergarten in Cleveland, because they're supporting religious schools, which can offer all-day kindergarten...
KEYES: Annie, I have to beg to differ with you. Logic...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Wait a second, please. Wait a second. Logic always has a little bit of a place on my program, and what you just said simply doesn't make any sense. We just heard that by sending the children to these private schools, the system overall is freeing up some $4,000 that it does not have to spend on those kids that can then be used on others. In a sense, the child is getting educated for — for less money...
LYNN: That is literally nonsense. That's nonsense.
KEYES: Your major objection seems to be — hold on, Barry. Your major objection seems to be that this is somehow going to religious schools. I seem to miss...
GAYLOR: The money (UNINTELLIGIBLE) private schools.
KEYES: Let me finish, please. I misunderstand — I misunderstand the whole notion of what's allowed and not allowed under the so-called separation of church and state. I thought it mattered if government was sponsoring it, if government was choosing. These are parents who are making this choice, not government.
GAYLOR: And taxpayers. We taxpayers are the ones who are footing the bill. We are paying for Bibles and...
KEYES: So you think the G.I.s under the G.I. Bill should not have been allowed to choose religious schools?
GAYLOR: It's very different, because we have compulsory education, kindergarten through 12th grade. Mandatory education.
KEYES: I don't understand what that has to do with anything. The .I.'s were making the choice...
(CROSSTALK)
KEYES: Hold it. The G.I.'s were making the choice. They took the money to religious schools. You are saying they should not have been allowed to do so, right?
GAYLOR: I'm saying that's a totally different situation.
KEYES: You just don't want to answer that question. Go ahead, Barry.
LYNN: Well, first of all, remember the G.I. Bill is delayed compensation for service to your country. In other words, it's money they don't pay you while you're in Vietnam, they pay it to you when you come back. It's entirely different.
But I want to get back to this earlier point, I do think logic matters. It is not true that the Milwaukee plan, the comparison that Dr. Hoxby gave is accurate, because all she's talking about are the direct cost of the vouchers versus the direct and indirect costs to the public schools. If you compare the two, apples to apples, the program expenditures are virtually the same, so I don't even — I would have to seriously wonder how much of the rest of her analysis makes any sense.
HOXBY: I don't understand what the difficulty is. I mean, I think that everyone in Wisconsin who is involved in government knows what the numbers are. The way it works in Wisconsin...
LYNN: No, they don't.
HOXBY: The way it works in Wisconsin is that some of the money comes from the state to pay for the voucher, and some of the money comes from the Milwaukee public school system. And when Milwaukee has a child who goes on a voucher, Milwaukee loses about 28 percent, 29 percent of the money that it was getting in per pupil spending for that child. So on average, Milwaukee's per pupil spending actually goes up every time.
(CROSSTALK)
LYNN: That's economic nonsense.
KEYES: Professor Hoxby, we have come to the end of our time for this segment, but I listened to this back and forth, and as I think we'll see in the next segment when I debate Congressman Loretta Sanchez, for years the folks against vouchers have been impervious to logic. Now they are impervious to facts. But we shall see where that leaves the rest of us, next, as we reach the bottom line with Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez.
I want to thanks Barry Lynn, Annie Laurie Gaylor and professor Caroline Hoxby for being with me today. Really appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts with us.
Plus, later, my outrage of the day, over the reaction to some comments made by our U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, in which he actually had the gall to refer to the creator.
And later, we'll get to what's on your mind.
But first of all, does this make sense: is President Bush backing down from his axis of evil rhetoric? Yesterday he had this to say when he visited the famed DMZ between North and South Korea.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, U.S. PRESIDENT: We're peaceful people. We have no intention of invading North Korea. South Korea has no intention of attacking North Korea. Nor does America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEYES: Now here is what the president said last month during his state of the union address.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: I will not wait on events while dangers gather. I will not stand by as peril draws closer and closer. The United States of America will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEYES: I don't know if the president is confused, but I certainly am. Do you think that makes sense?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEYES (voice-over): These pictures just in, showing President Bush as he arrives for his visit to China, which will have him there during the observance of the historic Nixon trip that opened our relationship with China in the midst of the Cold War.
(on camera): We are talking this evening about school vouchers, and whether or not giving parents the choice to send their children to non government schools with government funding is, in fact, something that's going to help kids, is it going to hurt the public schools, is it a violation of separation?
These are issues that have been controversial for many years, coming to a head because the Supreme Court today began to take a look at a case that involved such a program in Cleveland, Ohio.
Well, joining me this evening, to get to the bottom line, Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, Democrat of California, and a member of the House Education Committee. Also well-known for her strong opposition to the idea of vouchers.
Congresswoman, welcome to MAKING SENSE and thank you for making time to be with us this evening.
Against the backdrop of the Supreme Court's decision, the question that just keeps occurring to me, as I look at what's being considered and consider the opposition that has been there over the years on separation grounds and so forth, is why is it so threatening that we should actually allow parents who are lower income, may not be in a position to do so, to have the same kind of choice that wealthier people have in terms of sending their children to schools that they think will best serve their educational needs? Why is this a problem?
REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ (D), CALIFORNIA: Well, first of all, Alan, congratulations on the show, and I'm happy to be here.
And I really believe that this issue that's before the Supreme Court will probably be decided on the issue of separation of church and state.
Having said that, I think that's very different than the whole issue of choice for parents. And I think many of us have done quite a bit for choice for parents.
I know that kids that get to go in my school district, my public school district get to — the parents get to send them to a fundamental school or a magnet school. They get to be taught in English or Spanish. There are charter schools in my area. And so I think parents are getting a lot of choices.
It's just that as a lawmaker at the federal level, I am looking at the fact that over 93 percent of the kids in the United States go to public schools. So my concentration is going to be on how do we make public schools better.
KEYES: Well, how do you respond, though, because one of the arguments that's been made over the years is that if we go down the road of parental choice, it's going to have this devastating effect on the government schools.
Now some of us suggested a long time ago, me among them, that this was not so. That in point of fact, if you had greater competition, you would see an improvement in the performance of the public schools in response to that competition. We heard from Professor Carolyn Hoxby just now that that in fact looks to be what happened in Milwaukee. An empirical verification of this logic.
Why would one not be willing to look at an alternative that actually seems to improve schools all around? It performs the performance of the kids who go to the non government schools and the reaction, the competitive reaction, improves the environment for the kids in the government schools. Isn't that a win-win situation?
SANCHEZ: Well, I believe your previous people who were speaking, one of the problems that they had is that, in particular in the Milwaukee situation, only 21 percent of the kids who were actually in public schools are using these vouchers.
Of the kids who go to these private schools with vouchers, only 21 percent of those kids are coming out of the public school system. The rest of them were already going to the private school system.
So that's why they feel that it's siphoning monies out of the public school system.
KEYES: I don't quite understand. What's actually happened then is that some parents who are were paying twice, paying their taxes and also sending their children to other schools, are now given some relief from that double taxation. Other parents who felt like they didn't have that choice have been given that choice, and as a result they have sparked improvements in the schools.
I say, again, it looks like everybody benefits here.
SANCHEZ: Well, Alan, I don't believe that that is double taxation. I'll tell you why.
I, for example, my husband and I, pay taxes. We don't have children. So if you were going to take the logic that you just used, then I should not be paying any taxes towards educating kids.
But the reality is that I'm paying taxes towards educating children because I understand that that is a mutual benefit to our society as a whole.
That's why we've made compulsory education. That's why we require kids to go to school at least through the 12th grade. And so your logic wouldn't make sense.
It's not a double taxation. It's the fact we're all putting in money so that the overall average of the American people is high.
KEYES: Oh, so it's not double taxation, even though some folks are paying the taxes and their children are going to the government schools and other folks are paying the taxes and paying again to send their children to non government schools so they'll get decent education, and yet they're not paying twice? I see the — the logic of that is perfectly clear to me...
SANCHEZ: Alan...
KEYES: But the great problem I have as well — answer this question, because a lot of people talk about separation. You say the issue will be decided on the basis of separation. If parents, like GI's under the GI Bill are making the choice, not government, how can we say that this involves any kind of government sponsorship of religion? These are private citizens making their choices. Not the government making a choice.
SANCHEZ: Well, Alan, I'm not going to be making that decision. The persons who will be making that decision are the Supreme Court justices.
I think we can take a look at some of the previous decisions they've made, and in particular I'm going to be very interested in seeing what Sandra Day O'Connor does, because she, in fact, wrote at one point, while she upheld some monies going for some faith-based situations, she said that public money should not be used for religious indoctrination of people.
And if that's how she feels about monies being diverted from the public schools and put into, for example, a Catholic school education, then we may look to her as being that fifth judge that disallows a voucher program like that one in Milwaukee.
KEYES: So you are open to the possibility then that the court will decide to allow this program, and at that point I presume your opposition will disappear, you'll be perfectly happy to let it go forward then?
SANCHEZ: Well, I think there's always going to be the controversy of what's going on, but, of course, as a legislator and as someone who obeys the law, I may fight to change that law, but it doesn't mean that I'm going to go against whatever law sits in place at this particular time.
So it's really going to be dependent on what those judges do in this decision.
KEYES: You give me some hope then, Representative Sanchez, because for many years we have been going back and forth here and it seemed as if, as the logic and the facts moved in the direction of supporting school choice, a lot of folks continued their resistance.
But if the court accepts the logic that is now being strongly argued in favor of this program, then, as I understand what you're saying, you will then accept that result, and I that I will be a great step forward for all of us.
Really appreciate your joining me tonight and taking the time to share your thoughts on this issue with me and my audience.
Later, I will get to my outrage of the day. Burt first, I want to hear what's on your mind.
You're watching MSNBC, the best news on cable.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEYES: Welcome back to MAKING SENSE.
Now I get to hear what's on your mind. I got to tell you, this is the part of the program that can be the most fun for me.
So I'm glad y'all are calling and participating as you're doing in the chat room at CHAT.MSNBC.COM
Let's go first to Michelle in Pennsylvania.
Welcome to MAKING SENSE.
MICHELLE: Hi, Alan.
KEYES: Hi.
MICHELLE: I am very much in favor of the school voucher. I'm in Pennsylvania, and my son attended a fine public school here. My husband and I graduated from that school, and my daughter as well was in that school.
And when she reached her freshman year, just was floundering, just drowning in that environment with that many students. She was in honors programs, high honor roll, coming home every day just discouraged, not wanting to go back, slipping into depression, not wanting to be there.
We had to make a choice for our child. We put her in a Christian school, not because we wanted them to be a religious teacher. That's our job. We're her parents.
She is flourishing in this school. She loves it.
We met with the school psychiatrist at the public school trying to make this decision, because she was an honor roll student. He said, mom, and dad, she is a great kid and she's communicating with you. She's being open.
KEYES: And you, of course, had to think about what was best for your child.
MICHELLE: Right. Exactly.
KEYES: And I have to say, my wife and I were in a similar position with our eldest son, in some ways and when we decided to pull him out of the government school system, it was, I think, the best decision that we made for him.
Let's go to Elaine in California.
Elaine, welcome to MAKING SENSE.
ELAINE: Hello, Mr. Keyes.
Although I don't agree with a lot of things you say, I have to respect you are well read, OK?
But I'm here in California, and there's a voucher proposition on the ballot like a year and a half ago, and the black community, especially, you know, the clergy, went and they were totally against the voucher system, but I think it's something — statistics show that the California public school system has failed black children.
If you are look at the penitentiaries and the input into the college system, it has totally failed us. And I think the voucher system, although people may be against it, I think it's an option. It gives you an option to take care of your child.
KEYES: Elaine, that is exactly what I have argued over many years, and I have never understood the opposition that comes from some of the leadership in the black community when this would empower people, black parents, to make choices that are not now within their reach, and would greatly improve prospects for their children.
Let's go to Thomas in Virginia. Very quickly, Thomas, what's on your mind?
THOMAS: Good evening, Dr. Keyes, thank you for taking my call.
KEYES: Sure.
THOMAS: I just hopefully was going to stop you short of something — you had mentioned something about the president and the comments about him not going to attack North Korea and then referring back to his state of the union address.
I'd just would like to remind you that his direct manner actually said nothing about war. It just said that this...
KEYES: Thomas, Thomas, I need to be very quick here.
The implication was that we weren't going to wait for them to hit us before we hit them.
THOMAS: No, that wasn't the implication at all.
KEYES: Yes it was, sorry.
THOMAS: That wasn't the implication at all.
KEYES: And if it wasn't the implication, then the speech didn't make any sense because — let me finish, sir.
THOMAS: The speech made very good sense.
KEYES: We don't have much time. The speech was intended to establish deterrents, and you can only deter if people understand that you are going to strike back at them if you are struck by these terrorists with weapons of mass destruction.
That was the implication that made it effective, and he seems to be taking it back.
Thanks for your calls. Really appreciate it.
We're going to get into the China question and other questions about the axis of evil tomorrow, so you'll want to tune in.
Thanks for your feedback.
Next, my outrage of the day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEYES: Speaking of separation of church and state, here is my outrage of the day.
This is what Attorney General John Ashcroft said to the national religious broadcasters association the other day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN ASHCROFT, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Civilized individuals, Christians, Jews, and Muslims, all understand that the source of freedom and human dignity is the creator.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
And here is how Robert Boston of Americans United for Separation of Church and State responded:
“One of the things that he (Ashcroft) never understood is that true pluralism in our society includes those who would choose not to believe, and there are millions of Americans who fall under that umbrella.”
Well, one of the things I think Mr. Boston ought to understand is that the founders of this country put in the declaration of independence these clear words: “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.”
When a public official refers to the creator in that sense, he is not borrowing from some religion. He's actually standing on the strong common ground of the American creed. Does Mr. Boston think we ought to throw the declaration out the window in order to appease the feelings of a few folks who feel uncomfortable every time they hear even the slightest hint of God mentioned anywhere in America?
I think not, because our freedoms would go out the window with those principles.
That's my sense of it this evening.
Tomorrow night on MAKING SENSE, an in-depth look at the Andrea Yates case.