| Lawmakers opposed to school choice in our state often suggest that while they personally might agree with school choice, sadly, you can’t put government money into private schools.
Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling shows this excuse to be bunkum.
During Covid, when large sums of federal money were provided to Mississippi, our state legislature, in turn, authorized a state agency to distribute some of those funds to private schools for infrastructure improvement.
This prompted an activist group, Parents for Public Schools, to challenge allocating public money to private schools as unconstitutional. Had Parents for Public Schools been successful, we might have found ourselves in a situation now where public dollars could not follow a student into the private sector.
Thursday’s ruling is in favor of educational freedom. It is a defeat not just for anti-school choice activists. It means that those in the legislature looking for a ready-made excuse not to support school choice can no longer hide behind the claim that school choice is unconstitutional.
As our legal division, the Mississippi Justice Institute argued when we filed a ‘friend of the court’ brief, alongside the Institute for Justice, the Mississippi Constitution does not prevent school choice.
You might have noticed that despite there being a supposedly conservative majority in our state legislature, not a great deal of conservative legislation was passed this session.
A bill to tackle DEI (Diversity, Equity & Inclusion) dogma in our public universities was killed in committee. Efforts to restore the Right of Initiative fizzled out, as did proposals to remove restrictive laws that intentionally limit the number of health care providers.
Our lawmakers weren’t even prepared to pass a law that might have allowed Mississippians to buy wine online. They only just managed to pass the SAFER Act to protect women’s rights at the eleventh hour.
The forces of do-nothing intransigence are powerful. But as the success of education funding reform shows, inertia can be overcome.
When Speaker White played hardball and Governor Reeves gave a clear lead, the intransigent folded. Maybe this is the way to achieve change? |
