Loftis op-ed on vouchers, tuition tax credits doesn't mention cost

Curtis Loftis has been a pretty good treasurer so far, questioning the expense of giving so much of the state retirement system to strange investments by contract investors, pushing Governor Nikki Haley to honor her campaign commitments on transparency, and generally blocking Haley's attempts to steamroll her policy preferences through the Budget and Control Board.

Last year, I recall that Loftis visited some public schoolchildren to promote financial literacy; I don't recall hearing that Haley has been in a single public school since being elected to office. Haley did hold a secret meeting with Georgia Governor Nathan Deal last week in Augusta, though, far from the prying eyes of the public and the capitol press corps, apparently to resolve the black eye she's suffered over the Jasper port. Remember transparency?

But that's another story.

Not everyone can be right all the time, and Loftis has taken a couple of stumbles lately. He backed Mitt Romney in the recent presidential primary here, and that turned out poorly. Now, he's published an opinion-editorial in the Spartanburg Herald-Journal in support of vouchers and tuition tax credits, which the Board of Economic Advisors -- which is now run by Haley's own hand-picked chief economist, Frank Rainwater -- says will cost tens of millions of dollars to public education and other state institutions and obligations.

[Yes, quibblers, Rainwater was selected by Marcia Adams, who was hand-picked by Haley to serve as the Budget and Control Board's executive director. And as much as Haley loves micromanagement, it's not a stretch to add two plus two.]

It looks like Spartanburg is going to be Ground Zero for the fight over vouchers and tuition tax credits this year. A couple of weeks ago, the astroturf -- that means non-grassroots -- organization "FreedomWorks," funded by billionaire ideologues, rolled into Hub City to put targets on the six not-very-moderate Republicans for behaving rationally and voting against last year's costly voucher and tuition tax credit bill.

2012 is an election year, so the theory goes like this: If sufficient pressure is put on those six, they'll turn and vote for the same old, reheated hash in a new package, and we'll dismantle public schools for good. And if they don't, then FreedomWorks and its minions will recruit more far-right candidates from these Upstate districts to run against the incumbents, and we'll see this cycle played out again next year.

If that happens, watch the money roll in. Remember how Joey Millwood defeated former House Education Committee chairman Bob Walker of Landrum, using this same template. (And though Millwood served -- unremarkably -- only a single term and was turned out by Rep. Doug Brannan, he didn't suffer too much; Haley installed him on her new-and-unimproved SCETV Board of Directors last year, though he's not there anymore.)

Back to Treasurer Loftis, who may be eyeing his own long-term prospects. His Herald-Journal sales pitch for vouchers plainly rings a populist bell -- "vouchers will save taxpayer dollars" -- but it doesn't address the concerns raised by the Board of Economic Advisors.

More than 15,000 low-income students attend private schools in South Carolina.

Notice the immediate emphasis on low-income families. By casting the voucher and tuition tax credit plan as helpful to low-income families, voucher proponents hope to garner sympathy. But low-income families don't send their children to Heathwood Hall and similar private schools -- schools that wouldn't accept them if they applied -- because a voucher or tax credit doesn't cover the cost of tuition there. So the case opens with sleigh-of-hand. Tsk, tsk.

Their parents scrimp and save. They make sacrifices. They’ve put their children’s education at the top of the family’s financial priority list.

Those parents also pay taxes. More than $8.5 million this year in state income taxes alone.

This is true of all parents of schoolchildren in the state, not only of those who choose to enroll their children in private schools. What parent doesn't put their children's education at the top of the priority list?

Much larger than their contribution to the government coffers is the sum they save other taxpayers. If those 15,000 students enrolled in public schools and were funded at the rate of the existing public school students, it would cost state taxpayers more than $72 million.

Here, the smoke thickens. The children of South Carolina's poor working families are a drain to the system, the column reads. Thank goodness these poor working families send their children to private schools, or their children would be costing the rest of us, too. Shouldn't more working families send their children to private schools, and save the state a lot of money?

Taxpayers below the $35,000 income class would not pick up that slack; it would be borne by those with deeper pockets.

Oh, no. Look who has to foot the bill when South Carolina's poor working families send their children to public schools: Citizens with deeper pockets! Wealthy South Carolinians, who could afford to cough up an extra couple of dimes per year, but who would rather renovate the upstairs bathrooms in their second home in Mount Pleasant.

It's just not fair, says the voucher proponent. Should we force our wealthier citizens to continue looking at 15-year-old bathroom decor when they visit the beach, just so that poor people can send their children to public schools? No, we should let poor people send their children to private schools and take their kids off the public school rolls. A penny saved means better bathroom wallpaper.

But low-income parents don’t send their children to private schools in order to lower the tax bills of their wealthier neighbors.

Clearly, they don't. There are 700,000 children enrolled in South Carolina's public schools, and South Carolina appropriates a king's ransom of $1,880 per child to pay for their education. Cheap as it is, that comes to a lot of money that could be spent on bathroom renovations at beach houses.

They don’t do it to siphon resources away from public school districts, either.

God, no. School districts have precious few resources to siphon, thanks to the starvation diet that legislators afford to them.

They do it because they love their children and know that, for one reason or another, their children need something different than what is offered at the local public school.

Message: Poor people love their children, and we should love them just as much, by letting them try to get into private schools and out of those resource-starved, decrepit old public schools, where they have to sit next to all those other children of poor working families. Public schools stink.

See, I'm beginning to think that Treasurer Loftis didn't actually write this column, but allowed his name to be used on it so the Herald-Journal would publish it, probably as a favor to someone else. It doesn't sound like the state treasurer who had such a good time talking to fourth-graders at West End Elementary School in Easley last year.

While the average cost of private school tuition in South Carolina is less than $5,000, it’s an enormous sum in a household with less than $35,000 of taxable income.

Ho, ho. That's rich.

When parents say to themselves, "I'm sick of public schools; let's send little Bartholomew to a private school," they're not picturing Miss Linda's A-Plus Academy where we're proud to announce that now one hundred percent of our teachers have associate's degrees from an online "university" and a genuine "calling" to teach; they're picturing Heathwood Hall. For $5,000, Heathwood Hall lets a child attend a three-day-a-week nursery school, and that means half-days, not whole days.

Want to send your child to the five-day-a-week (remember: half days) nursery school? That's $7,515 per year. Half-day pre-school: $7,850 per year. Kindergarten: $12,565 per year. Grades one through four: $13,300 per year. Grades five through eight: $14,300 per year. Grades nine through twelve: $15,850 per year, and these prices don't include the $235 technology fee, and the maximum $879 lunch fee required of all full-day students.

I reckon Heathwood Hall doesn't serve the peanut butter and cheese sandwiches and Capri-Sun that Miss Linda serves at the her A-Plus Academy, where the tuition is "less than $5,000" for the year.

It is a true sacrifice. It flies in the face of the stereotype of wealthy suburban students enrolled in elite, expensive private academies.

Sure it does.

Then again, it turns out that sending your children to public school in South Carolina is a true sacrifice, too, when lawmakers continue to deprive them of sufficient funds to pay for high-quality public education. Parents have to take whole reams of copy paper to school as part of the supply list, because districts can't buy what they need anymore. It flies in the face of the old notion that children of poor families could get just as good an education in public schools as those wealthy suburban students enrolled in elite, expensive private academies.

Hm.

In other states, laws have been passed to support these low-income parents.

Yes; it's called adequate public school funding. It's South Carolina, not North Carolina or Georgia, that has an entire region labeled the "Corridor of Shame" because of school funding deprivation by the state. Did you see that movie?

Tax credits for those who can absorb them and tax credit-funded tuition scholarships for those who cannot.

Aha, now we see a subtle shift: The plan has suddenly expanded to include "tax credits for those who can absorb them," which means wealthy -- at least upper-middle-class -- families who itemize, plus "tax credit-funded tuition scholarships for those who cannot," which means vouchers for poor children to take to whatever private school will let them enroll.

Which is a bad, bad joke. Heathwood Hall isn't going to accept a little voucher for Jimmy if it knows Jimmy's mom and dad can't pay the difference between the voucher and the full price of tuition. Which means that while Bartholomew's parents, who already send Bartholomew to Heathwood Hall, get a nice new tax credit, Jimmy's mom and dad get to shop around for a private school within daily driving distance that will take the little state voucher and not ask for more than that. Hey, didn't we hear that Miss Linda was opening an A-Plus Academy in town? And all of her teachers now have associate's degrees from online universities and a real calling to teach?

Not to mention the peanut butter and cheese sandwiches, and the Capri-Sun for lunch! Hooray for vouchers and tuition tax credits! Now we don't have to go to those rundown, deprived old public schools and sit next to the children of the poor(er).

More than 35,000 low-income students in Florida are enrolled in the school of their parents’ choice through such a program this school year. State budget officials there calculate that the tax credits save $1.49 for each dollar in revenues lost.

Yes, I heard about Florida's voucher program, a widely successful model that allows high school students to graduate in eight days for only $399, and with a 3.41 grade point average.

This is absolutely true and has been covered widely by Florida's media: Thanks to Florida's voucher and tuition tax credit program, high school students can graduate, with a real high school diploma, within eight days of their transfer, for the low, low price of $399. No wonder it saves Florida a bunch of money. Read all about it here. Choice!

Test scores in both the public and private schools have shot up, chipping away at long-standing income gaps.

I bet so! If I can get a high school diploma with a 3.41 grade point average after eight days of school work for only $399 and I can pocket the rest of the voucher, I've raised my income and my test scores, AND the state has raised its high school graduation rate, all at the same time. It's a win-win for everyone!

When critics belittle support of school choice (i.e., the Herald-Journal’s Feb. 5 editorial, “State’s obligation is to improve public schools, not make alternatives affordable”), they reveal both an ignorance of how school choice actually works as well as a condescending indifference about those whom it would most benefit.

Now that's patently offensive, which further convinces me that Treasurer Loftis didn't write this column, because Loftis isn't an offensive person.

You take a $2,000 voucher to the admissions office at Heathwood Hall and ask them to enroll your child for the year, because the state says you can do it with this voucher, and because you want Jimmy to get just as good an education as your CEO's son, Bartholomew, and see who reacts with condescending indifference. I wonder if suddenly YOU might reveal an ignorance of how school choice actually works.

Tax credits for school choice save money because the size of the credit is radically smaller than the level of per-student spending in the public schools.

And the vouchers? That's not universally true of vouchers because many states appropriate much more funding to support its public schools than South Carolina, and that greater investment is reflected in the outcomes.

In South Carolina, it won't be difficult to offer a voucher that is greater than the state's base student cost; South Carolina lawmakers struggle mightily to keep it as low as possible, and it's now $1,880. Therefore, a voucher of $1,881 would be greater than South Carolina's per-pupil investment, and Heathwood Hall would chortle at the suggestion that it will cover your child's enrollment at that school for a year.

Of course, Miss Linda might take you at her A-Plus Academy, because $1,881 will buy a lot of peanut butter and cheese sandwiches and Capri-Sun, and she'll make a tidy profit after paying her teachers with associate's degrees from online universities, because they have a real calling to teach and will accept minimum wage. Yes, Miss Linda may make out like a bandit. Maybe she'll make enough profit this year to open another location next year, and another...

Critics gloss over the fact that most of local, state and federal spending on public schools is not tied to the specific student. Much of the public money continues to flow even when students transfer out.

It's not really "glossing over" facts to say that when one child leaves a school of 200 students, 199 children are left, and the light bill, water bill, heating and air bills must be paid out of funding for 199 students rather than 200. It's the same light bill, water bill and heating and air bill, whether there are 200 children in the school or 190, 150 or 100. The difference is that drops in student enrollment in public schools mean the district can't afford as many teachers, and the remaining children must be packed into larger classrooms. That's hardly helpful to the teaching and learning process.

But it sure helps to cut the school budget, which cuts into school quality, which undermines parents' confidence in the school, which leads to parents taking their children to Miss Linda's A-Plus Academy for the peanut butter and cheese sandwiches and Capri-Sun lunches. Which leaves fewer children in the public school, which leads to... And the cycle repeats until the public schools have been closed, and education is fully privatized.

And while Heathwood Hall's parents have benefited from tax credits for Bartholomew's tuition, which helped pay for renovating the beach house bathrooms -- yay! cool blue marble tile! -- Heathwood Hall itself hasn't had to take a single child with a state voucher.

In other words, district budgets are protected and class sizes are reduced.

Har, har. At the end of this process, there is no school district budget, except for the poorest students with no Miss Linda's A-Plus Academy nearby, and students with special needs whose educations are funded with federal dollars and regulated by federal law. Miss Linda's A-Plus Academy isn't equipped to serve students with special needs, and she's not interested in trying to comply with federal regulations in order to get those dollars.

These small credits don’t shift a static tax burden from one taxpayer to another; the credits incentivize a choice that reduces that total burden for all.

One, small credits add up to a large sum of credits, which takes its toll on the state's General Fund. And two, "incentivize a choice" means paying people to do what you want them to do. Teenagers don't want to do chores at home; parents pay them an allowance to "incentivize a choice."

So a voucher and tuition tax credit bill offers to pay parents to do what? To leave public schools.

Why? Because some out-of-state interest groups and their billionaire funders have an ideological opposition to public education.

Personally, I support school choice because it gives parents the means and motivation to get more involved in their children’s education.

Personally, I support the full funding of public schools because it honors an American commitment to its citizens, that all children should have access to quality public education, regardless of where they were born and regardless of who and how wealthy their parents may be.

I know that parental engagement is the only silver bullet in the field of education.

And I know that the only golden bullet is a capable, caring, qualified teacher in front of a manageable number of students, with sufficient classrooms resources and access to experiential learning opportunities.

And the only platinum bullet is a combination of literacy resources in the home, plus a nurturing family structure, and good nutrition, and adequate rest, and stimulating interaction with other children and attentive adults.

And the only diamond bullet is a culture that supports the concept that when we educate one another's children evenly and fairly, we strengthen our community, our state and our nation.

I know engagement is not something that can be appropriated in a state budget bill or regulated into existence by a bureaucrat in Washington.

I know that good parenting skills can't be legislated by a government entity, but that the root problems that impede a family's ability to support their child's education -- unemployment, poverty, crime, poor nutrition, lack of literacy resources in the home, etc. -- can be addressed through federal and state aid problems, and through appropriations for student services through public schools.

It's amazing what can be accomplished for children when lawmakers choose to support it.

The fact that school choice is proven to save money — and has never been tied to a reduction in public school funding levels — is just a nice side benefit of doing the right thing for students.

Oh, Treasurer Loftis.

As you know, the Board of Economic Advisors, in a pair of fiscal impact statements, have said precisely the opposite: That the two voucher and tuition tax credit bills now sitting in the House, don't save any money -- they cost money. The cost of one version will be $30.2 million in the first year alone; the cost of the other version will be $68.8 million in year one, $83.8 million in year two, and $98.8 million in year three.

Convincing -- no, paying -- parents to take their children out of economical public schools and enroll them in private schools is expensive to South Carolina, and ultimately to those students who will, inevitably, be left behind in ever-smaller, ever-more deprived public schools.

Florence 1 opposes privatization, vouchers, 1989 funding

The Florence District 1 Board of Trustees voted unanimously last night to oppose three proposed bills that, if adopted by the legislature, would devastate the small district and those like it.

The bills in question happen to be ones favored by Governor Nikki Haley, Superintendent Mick Zais, and the Florence legislative delegation. One privatizes the state's school bus transportation function, passing responsibility to local school districts to maintain or to privatize. The other two are competing voucher and tuition tax credit bills, taking public dollars away from public schools to pay for private education.

The school bus bill raised the board's collective temperature.

A major stipulation of the bill would require the district to replace buses older than 15 years. Rabon said if the bill were to pass it initially would cost the district $10 million to replace all buses, a number chairman Porter Stewart calls outrageous.

“We worked hard at this table to be financially responsible,” Stewart said, audibly agitated in comparison to his normal calm demeanor. “We’ve done what we’re supposed to do and now we’re getting our pockets picked — yeah, I’m upset.”

The bill has support from area legislators Rep. Chris Crawford and Rep. Phillip Lowe, State Superintendent of Education Mick Zais and Gov. Nikki Haley, who mentioned it in her State of the State address in January.

“We’re not interested in mandating bus choices down on our locals — what we are interested in is giving them options and getting the State of South Carolina out of the school bus maintenance business,” she said.

FSD1 superintendent Dr. Allie E. Brooks Jr. says the bill would be devastating not only to his fiscally sound district, but those smaller ones that are squeaking by.

“The bill that’s introduced to shift bus operations from state to school districts is going to adversely impact the school districts,” Brooks said. “Depending on the financial status of the district, it can run anywhere from severe to devastating.”

After discussion, Stewart passed a resolution, with full board support, to oppose the bill. Board member Willard Dorriety Jr., a stated proponent of privatization in general, said the bill doesn’t make sense.

“Privatization works if it does two things: improves services and cut costs,” Dorriety said. “But this means we’ve got to pick up the costs, in a way, to save their (the state’s) budget.”

The money, Stewart said, would have to come from the district’s building fund.

See, that's the trouble with supporting right-wing notions like privatization; it comes around to bite you in the end.

So long as it's something else's ox that's getting gored, well, life's unfair. But when it's your own ox getting the worst end of the deal, something must be done to avenge the injustice.

And the other two bills that Florence trustees opposed?

Other bills on which the board passed a resolution of opposition were House bills 4547, regarding tuition tax deductions, and bill 4576, regarding a tuition tax credit.

And why do Florence trustees oppose them?

Both bills would severely cut general fund revenues.

Again, it comes back to the man in the middle. Families in Florence expect their government to provide services to them, and the government in Columbia is so far away. So it's the Florence board of trustees -- the man in the middle -- who bears the brunt of local anxiety when services get cut. And right now, thanks to the Haley-Zais cabal leading the government, the trustees are getting bled dry of options and resources.

Passing a tuition tax credit bill, as the Florence trustees aptly observed, will drain dollars from the general fund that would otherwise go to public education. It's a lawyer's trick to get around the Constitutional prohibition against supporting private schools with public money, but the effect is exactly the same: Public schools get less money.

In terms of the 2012-13 budget year, Rabon says the state economic outlook is stable.

“The last three years have been awful. We’ve lost about $10 million in revenue,” Rabon said. “I think 2012-2013 will be stable, we didn’t receive an official budget cut this year or last year.”

Although, one major area concern for Rabon and other district officials is the base student cost (BSC) staying at the same rate as last year, or possibly lower, according to Haley’s executive budget.

The BSC for the current year is $1,880 — which is what it was in 1989. The current BSC should be at $2,790, a number that Rabon and others know is not attainable, especially since Zais asked for the same BSC in the 2012-13 budget, a move he defended on Wednesday.

“We asked for the same budget as last year, as a minimum,” Zais said to the state board. “And we had that in bold and underlined.”

Maintaining that level will cost an additional $15 million, Zais said, because of student population increases.

“We’re presently around the 1989 level and our expenditures are at the 2012 level. We need to get the BSC around $2,100 to get it at a level it should be,” Rabon said.

Brooks echoes Rabon’s feelings on the BSC, saying it’s hard to be progressive with such outdated funding.

“The sad thing about it is the state is responsible for educating its citizenry,” Brooks said. “Those of us in public education are not getting encouraging signs for advancing the opportunities for our students in the 21st century.”

Did you catch that?

Zais asked the legislature this year to fund a base student cost equal to the base student cost of 1989.

Remember 1989? It was the year George Herbert Walker Bush and Dan Quayle took office. The Exxon Valdez ran aground and dumped oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound. Rain Man won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Protestors rose up in Tiananmen Square until the Chinese government massacred them.

It was the year Seinfeld and the first full-length episode of The Simpsons premiered on television. Nintendo released its Game Boy. Lyle and Erik Menendez killed their parents in Los Angeles. Pete Rose was banned from baseball. Hurricane Hugo attacked Charleston and cut a swath of devastation across South Carolina. Germans tore down the Berlin Wall.

Daniel Radcliffe and Taylor Swift were born that year. Lucille Ball, Bette Davis and Sir Laurence Olivier died that year, and serial killer Ted Bundy was executed. The Dalai Lama won the Nobel Peace Prize.

And that year, the base student cost in South Carolina was $1,880 -- the same base student cost that our current superintendent of education says will be sufficient this year.

Not only did Zais say that to lawmakers, he bolded and underlined it in his budget request.

The Florence trustees' anger is understandable. They want the best for Florence's public schoolchildren, and their state superintendent of education doesn't.

Lawmakers avoid charges of heroism, advance private-school subsidies

In most state legislatures, a subcommittee is the first place a bill must weather -- and survive -- scrutiny from conscientious lawmakers. Of course, such a system depends entirely on the active engagement of conscientious lawmakers. In the exceptional republic of South Carolina, we have the lawmakers we have, conscientious or not, and they suffer no obligation to scrutinize anything before forwarding a suspect piece of legislation to the full committee for review.

This was the story of Wednesday's House and Senate hearings on the Sanford-Haley-Zais plan to divert public dollars from public schools and invest them in private and religious schools. The only scrutiny applied by subcommittee members, it appears, was to those individuals inveighing against the unaffordable, unaccountable and unnecessary proposal. Even the longtime legislative liaison from the state School Boards Association was attacked by legislators in the process.

At the end of the Senate subcommittee's "hearing," the group voted not to approve or disapprove the bill, but rather to "move the debate" to the full Senate Education Committee. By a vote of five to one, they represented beautifully the principle that elections have consequences.

The kicker?

Budget advisers estimate the latest version would save the state $2 million in the first year, but cost $6 million in the second year. The state's net loss would increase yearly to $133 million in 13 years.

These are the same state economists whose projections guide lawmakers in their choices to appropriate and cut state funding for various priorities. But in THIS case -- in THIS case -- the experts' numbers ran into a wall:

Advocates of the measure question the state economists' figures.

Because in the exceptional republic of South Carolina, fantasies trump facts.

Budget advisers say private school choice would eventually cost the state $133 million, not save money as advocates predict, but the new information didn't stop legislators Wednesday from advancing the measure to use tax credits to help parents send their children to private schools.

Here's another difference between subcommittees in other state legislatures and subcommittees in South Carolina: Elsewhere, the subcommittee level is where experts are summoned to answer questions ad nauseum about statistics, dollars, revenue projections and policy priorities before the subcommittee takes its position. In fact, some subcommittees meet again and again on a single topic, to allow multiple experts to bring data reflecting multiple points of view.

But in South Carolina, the subcommittee addressing public subsidies for private school tuition summoned its experts, who brought an "inch-thick report," then gave him -- the state's chief economist, no less -- time for only "cursory remarks" before getting to its business.

Phil Leventis, a Sumter Democrat and opponent, argued the latest version needed further study in subcommittee, particularly after the state's chief economist had time for only cursory remarks on an inch-thick report.

But Sen. Wes Hayes, the panel's chairman, said senators know where they stand on an issue that keeps resurfacing in the Legislature.

This is informative and should be dissected.

Hayes's first power as subcommittee chairman is to schedule the hearing in the first place. Subcommittee chairs who oppose a piece of legislation often exercise this power in the negative: They never schedule a hearing. But Hayes did. Does this mean he supports the plan to drain public dollars from public schools, and send them to private schools?

The subcommittee chairman's second power is to allot time, even to schedule additional hearings, so that all pertinent data is given full airing. But Hayes didn't do this; he allowed only time for "cursory remarks" from the state's chief economist, and he called for a vote at this hearing to "move debate" to the full committee. Does this mean he has little regard for the chief economist's expertise and projections, and little interest in hearing opposing viewpoints?

The subcommittee chairman's ultimate power is to recognize members' motions. Many's the time I've seen a subcommittee chairman ignore a motion loudly stated by a member, either to allow for more discussion or to subvert the member's clear intent. But in this case, Hayes entertained a motion -- NOT a motion to vote up or down the bill, which would clearly identify members' position on the bill -- but a motion to "move debate" to the full Senate Education Committee.

Not to succumb to too much hyperbole here, but I'm reminded of Matthew 27:24: "When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person: see ye to it."

Is it possible that Hayes, acting on instructions from some higher power, scheduled the hearing, limited the input from the state's chief economist and entertained the motion to move debate just to get the bill out of his hands and off his shoulders? Or is it simply that Hayes supports the measure and chose to grease the wheels to move it as quickly as possible? Who can say for sure?

The basics of the latest proposal are the same: Parents who can afford to foot the tuition upfront could claim a credit on their state income taxes, while poor parents could apply for a scholarship for their child. The people and businesses that donate toward those scholarships take the tax credit. Homeschoolers could also take a $1,000 credit toward the cost of instructional supplies.
...

Budget advisers estimate the measure would save the state $2.1 million in the first year, but cost $6 million in the second, as revenue lost due to tax credits exceeds how much the state would save with fewer students to pay for in public schools. The state's net loss would increase yearly to $133.4 million in 13 years, when all students would be eligible.

Districts would receive an estimated $66 million less from the state initially, and $115 million by 2023-24, the report said.

How will this impact your school district? Even the imported anti-public-schools expert from the Cato Institute admitted it would impact children in public schools negatively:

"Districts do reduce spending when enrollment goes down," said Coulson, with the group that advocates for limited government and free markets, which could work up a separate report on the bill's impact.

Reduced spending means fewer classroom resources, larger class sizes, fewer extra-curricular activities.

At least one Senator saw irony in the Cato Institute's intervention in South Carolina's policies:

Leventis said he found it ironic that a group that advocates for free markets is pushing for government subsidies of private education.

Spearman: Out-of-state interests governing our government

Molly Spearman, executive director of the South Carolina Association of School Administrators, was featured this week in the Orangeburg Times and Democrat, advising South Carolinians of the insidious influence of out-of-state ideologues governing us by proxy.

Public school supporters in communities across South Carolina need to know that the free-flowing funds from out-of-state interests are filtering through the State House and influencing the agenda on K-12 education. House and Senate members are being pressured by millionaires and in some cases, billionaires from across the country to put in place a program to give tax incentives for students to leave SC public schools. They say that the new program would save the state money and improve public education.

Should parents have the right to send their children to private schools with strong religious foundations? Yes. Should private groups and church organizers have the right to set their own school policies, admission requirements and classes for Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or any other religious training? Yes. Should they be able to hire uncertified teachers, give their choice of tests, diplomas, and select students based on whatever criteria they choose? Yes. The urgent question - Should public tax dollars and incentives support and subsidize these schools? No.

Proponents of the tax credit bill say, "Yes, parents have a right to choose and they should be helped with a tax incentive, especially those who can't afford the private school choice." When asked if the accepting private schools should be accredited and be required to adhere to same standards or oversight, the supports answer, "No, there should be no government intrusion, or additional requirements." That is why public tax dollars and incentives should not be given and why this legislation is a bad idea.

Many families want their children to be involved with religious training during the school day and that is fine. However, tax incentives should not support these religious programs. These same schools often evaluate the personal testimony and faith of potential students. That is fine; but, tax incentives and subsidies should not support these K-12 programs!

The legislation being debated in the House Ways and Means and Senate Education Committees this week also sets up scholarship programs that will be funded by businesses or citizens who direct their income and business tax dollars from the state general fund to send needy students to private schools. It is always a nice idea to help needy students; but, there are two major problems with the set-up. First, most needy at-risk students will not be able to meet the admission requirements of these private schools even if there were one located within walking or driving distance (transportation is not included). Secondly, this "scholarship gift" program will allow businesses or citizens to keep their taxes from going into the S.C. General Fund. That means millions of dollars subtracted from the pie to pay for health care, roads, highway patrolmen, and other safety needs. This is at a time that South Carolina is $700 million short in our state budget and cutting jobs, health care, and critical programs.

Similar voucher and tax credits have been in place for a while in Washington, DC, and Florida. Wisconsin just released a report on comparing student achievement after both private and public schools administered the same test. The students receiving the tax credit trailed the regular public school students.

Florida has had a wide-based program for several years and students there are scoring better on standardized tests. Proponents claim that the tax credit program is the reason. It may have had some affect as research has showed that the threat of vouchers and accountability cause school folks to work harder. However, Florida educators in the trenches say that the improvement is based on hard work, more time on task for at-risk students, strong reading intervention programs, after-school sessions, and tremendous professional development training for teachers and school leaders. Those are the "silver bullets" that really make a difference in student achievement.

A strong public education system is important to the future of our county, state, and nation. Everyone has a duty to support public education, whether you have a child in school or not. Shifting tax incentives to encourage students to leave the public system and allowing supporters to transfer their needed tax dollars to private school scholarships is a terrible idea - especially when our charter and regular public schools are struggling financially to exist. If you agree that this pending legislation is a bad idea, please contact your legislators now.

Lawmakers ponder tax credits, economic resegregation

Here it comes.

On Monday, the right wing of the U.S. Supreme Court issued a majority ruling upholding Arizona's scheme to grant dollar-for-dollar tax credits for private or religious school tuition. The ruling means two things: Ideologues who oppose public education in legislatures across the nation are now free to adopt similar measures even if they contradict state constitutions, and parents who choose to send children to private or religious schools will have their choices subsidized by public funds.

Sure, the chattering class will say that my characterization is false, that a tax credit is not the same as a cash voucher. But Justice Elena Kagan put the lie to that dodge in her blistering minority dissent: There's no difference between a cash payment from the general treasury and a tax credit that diverts legitimate potential revenue from that treasury.

The ink isn't yet dry on the ruling, and voucher advocates in South Carolina are already on the case, as predicted.

After a two-year hiatus, proponents of private school choice are back before the S.C. General Assembly, pushing the fourth version of legislation that would use tax credits to help parents offset the cost of private tuition.

After enduring repeated defeats in the GOP-controlled legislature, advocates of the idea are touting a redesign in the amount of the scholarship or credit and in who's eligible. They hope the efforts will pick up support for an issue that has divided the GOP - and pumped money into mudslinging primary races - since former Gov. Mark Sanford rolled out the first plan in February 2004.

South Carolinians for Responsible Government, created in 2003 following Sanford's first inaugural, says it took a different tactic in drafting the latest proposal and reached out to public education groups such as the Education Oversight Committee.

"We said we needed to totally rethink this," said Neil Mellen, spokesman for the group backed by New York real estate investor Howard Rich, who vowed in 2008 to continue the push after Sanford's departure. "It resulted in a shift in what we wanted to pursue and how."

Not everyone is fooled by the wolf in Grandma's gown. Rep. Joe Neal, who spoke last month at State House rally in support of a moral budget, see through the new veil. "It's the same old retread. It simply has white walls this time," Neal told the Associated Press.

The basics of the latest proposal are the same as previous ones: Parents who can afford to foot the tuition upfront could claim a credit on their state income taxes, while poor parents could apply for a scholarship for their child. The people and businesses that donate toward those scholarships take the tax credit. Homeschoolers could also take a $1,000 credit per child toward the cost of instructional supplies.

Even parents who homeschool get in on the deal. That's one illustration of how far we've come from the first iteration of former Governor Mark Sanford's voucher plan from 2003, when he claimed the goal was to give children "trapped" in underperforming schools an escape route. Today, no one even pretends at that old canard: The present plan is a naked shift of funding from the public treasury to private and religious schools.

Another significant change is that the amount of the tax credit or scholarship would vary by district.
...
Tuition at the state's elite private schools can top $18,000 per student. Opponents have said the proposal is geared to well-off parents, since tuition would remain out of reach for poor students, even with a scholarship. But Mellen said the average cost of tuition across more than 300 private schools statewide is $4,400.

The plan also reveals that the principle of accountability -- the catchword of the past decade, used by the far right as a weapon against public schools and their defenders -- has been little more than a gimmick. With voucher opponents demanding the same accountability of private and religious schools benefiting from public dollars, voucher advocates say it's unnecessary.

Opponents also say private schools should have to be accredited to participate, and not just be a member of a reputable association, noting the state Association of Christian Schools doesn't require its members to be accredited.

Advocates of the bill say parents can decide what's best for their children.

"Accreditation sounds good, but it's not an end-all, be-all and doesn't necessarily mean a certain level of quality or accountability," Mellen said.

Whichever way the blade will fall, it's going to fall soon. Lawmakers have stacked up multiple hearings today on the matter.

South Carolina legislators are considering bills that would use tax credits to help parents send their children to private school.

House and Senate subcommittees will debate identical legislation Wednesday.

Republican Sen. Wes Hayes of Rock Hill says he expects senators to take a vote at his panel's third meeting on the issue.

The hearings were announced -- in the supremest of ironies -- on the same day that Governor Nikki Haley announced the availability of her brand-new "waste and fraud tipline."

A new hotline for state workers to report waste, fraud and abuse is up and running, Gov. Nikki Haley said Tuesday.

Calls to the hotline will be referred to George Schroeder, who Haley recently named to the newly-created post of state inspector general.

Schroeder has been charged with rooting out waste among the cabinet agencies that report directly to the governor.

"We have constituents who see waste, and they want to tell someone about it," said Gov. Haley. "We have state employees who see fraud and abuse, and they want to tell someone about it."

State employees can call 1-855-SC-FRAUD to anonymously leave a tip.

Psst. General Schroeder, I have a tip to share: I'm not naming names, but some high-level officials in state government are quietly implementing a plan to divert potentially millions -- ultimately hundreds of millions -- of dollars from the general treasury to benefit certain private-sector entities, without any oversight, regulation or accountability. There's reason to believe there's a quid pro quo element here, because certain high-level officials have collected a nice piece of change from contributors who may or may not stand to gain materially from the scheme. At a moment when South Carolina is suffering from poor-mouth already, we can hardly stomach such skimming as this. You may want to look into it.

If anyone questions your questions, just tell 'em you're educating South Carolina.

Katy, bar the door: Court offers 'roadmap' for private school vouchers

One more illustration that elections have consequences.

Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court issued the infamous Citizens United decision which overturned century-old precedent and now allows corporations to spend unlimited sums in their support for, or opposition of, candidates for public office. To the corporate elite for whom a million dollars here or there represent mere rounding errors, Congressional seats come cheap. My hundred dollars -- or OUR few thousand dollars, collected over a period of time -- cannot compete with a single transfer of ten or twenty millions of dollars into a single race.

But the ruling issued by the Roberts Court today is just as deadly to state treasuries and to public education as we know it. I'm confident that the far right's instruments in Columbia have spent today as spiders weaving, getting at their knitting with furious abandon, and tonight are toasting behind the oak doors. They know what the rest of us don't understand yet: A massive piece of change is about to come to South Carolina.

Here's NPR's Nina Totenberg's summary:

A deeply divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday that taxpayers have no legal right to challenge a tax break worth millions to donors supporting private religious schools. The 5-4 decision left intact an Arizona tax subsidy that was enacted because the state constitution forbids direct aid to religious schools.

Arizona is one of many states that has a state constitution barring direct aid to religious schools, including vouchers. These provisions date back more than a century.

South Carolina's Constitution includes the same prohibition in Article XI:

SECTION 4. Direct aid to religious or other private educational institutions prohibited.

No money shall be paid from public funds nor shall the credit of the State or any of its political subdivisions be used for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution. (1972 (57) 3193; 1973 (58) 44.)

This simple statement has been a staple of the opposition to voucher and tuition-tax-credit proposals from former Governor Mark Sanford and his successor. But while South Carolina has not adopted any law in open defiance of this principle, Arizona did, and taxpayers in that state sued. Their case is the case on which the Court ruled today.

To get around the ban on vouchers, Arizona enacted a law that allows residents to take a tax credit for money given to a private school scholarship funds known as a "school tuition organizations."

A tax credit is different from a tax deduction. The credit comes directly off the tax bill on a dollar-for-dollar basis, so a $500 donation to a school tuition organization allows the donor to take $500 off his owed taxes. In contrast, a charitable donation of $500 to a private school would be worth no more than one-third of that amount in tax deductions.

This means every $500 that is given to a "tuition organization" is $500 directly diverted from the state's treasury, dollar for dollar. How great an impact could this become?

Consider that any corporate interest can open a nonprofit "tuition organization" -- Sanford named them "scholarship granting organizations," or SGOs -- and that corporate interest might (if it pays corporate income taxes to South Carolina at all) owe the state $10 million in corporate taxes this year. If it chooses to do so, it can contribute $10 million to its own "tuition organization" and parcel those funds out as vouchers to private or religious schools instead, and take the entire amount off their tax bill as a "credit."

The loss of that $10 million to the state treasury means either that our wise lawmakers will cut $10 million from public services -- including, surprise! public schools -- or you and I will have to make up the $10 million through additional taxes or fees. The winners in this formula are, as usual, the ideological corporate elite, and their pet private or religious schools.

Do you imagine that it won't happen in South Carolina? It already did in Arizona.

Under the Arizona law, more than $50 million was donated annually to student tuition organizations, which, in turn, directed the money to private schools, at least two-third of them religious schools.

A group of taxpayers challenged the tax credit in court, contending that it amounted to an unconstitutional state subsidy for religious schools.

But on Monday, the Supreme Court ruled that the taxpayers have no legal right to bring such a challenge.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the five-justice majority, said that taxpayers may challenge a direct legislative appropriation for religious schools, but not a tax credit. He conceded that a tax credit and a direct government expenditure "may have similar economic consequences," but he said a tax credit is different because any injury to the disagreeing taxpayer is "speculative," and the money is directed by private individuals, not the state.

Not one but two new principles have come from this ruling: (1) that a state like South Carolina is now free to allow corporations and wealthy individuals to divert funds before those funds arrive in the treasury to private schools through vouchers, and (2) ordinary taxpayers have no legal standing to challenge such legislation in court. We're barred from the discussion, you and I, and no key will let us back in the door.

Civil libertarians reacted to the decision with dismay. Arizona State University law professor Paul Bender, who represented the Arizona taxpayers, says the court's opinion defies reality.

"The state has a budget deficit of a billion dollars, so when $100 million doesn't come into the Treasury, the rest of the state's taxpayers have to make up for that," he says. "The idea that [the tax credit] doesn't affect the rest of the state's taxpayers is just fantasy."

Again, elections have consequences.

Justice Elena Kagan, in a blistering dissent — her first dissent since joining the court — said Monday's decision "devastates" the ability of taxpayers to challenge government actions that favor religion.

In reality, she said, there is no difference between a tax credit and a direct appropriation. "What is a cash grant today can be a tax break tomorrow," and the court's decision, she charged, "offers a road map — more truly, just a one-step instruction — to any government that wishes to insulate its financing of religious activity from legal challenge."

The Court's ruling, NPR reports, "follows a 2007 decision that barred challenges to President George W. Bush's faith-based initiative because it used discretionary funds in the executive branch." Again, taxpayers are barred by the court from challenging the decisions of its elected government in court.

Civil libertarians suggested on Monday that the ruling in that case, combined with the Arizona ruling, has the effect of eroding the constitutional separation of church and state.

But Stanford University law professor Michael McConnell says these decisions "probably [do] not change the ultimate outcome of any cases," given the current Supreme Court's more accommodating view of church and state.

Dismissing the challenges on the basis of legal standing, rather than on the merits, he says, "just means [the cases] are going to be resolved at a slightly earlier stage in the litigation."

University of Michigan law professor Douglas Laycock isn't so sure. He argues that the ruling opens another — and more politically appealing — avenue for legislators to support religious schools.

Although the Supreme Court upheld school voucher programs nearly a decade ago, he notes most states have not adopted voucher programs because they cost the state money.

"It is mostly Republicans who support these aid-to-religion programs, and Republicans don't want to raise taxes to pay for vouchers," Laycock says. "But if they can do it through a tax credit, they can support religious schools and claim it's a tax cut all at the same time."

The New York Times added a bit more detail, but not much.

“Awarding some citizens a tax credit allows other citizens to retain control over their own funds in accordance with their own consciences,” Justice Kennedy wrote for himself, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

That may be well for the Court, but the ruling also -- wittingly or otherwise -- establishes in law that we now have, dare I say it, two Americas: one for the wealthy corporate elite whose ideology leads them to promote the dismantling of public services and public schools, and one for the rest of us whose combined wealth cannot buy equal justice, and who rely upon public services and public schools to give a foundation to our democracy.

The plaintiffs’ position, Justice Kennedy wrote, “assumes that income should be treated as if it were government property even if it has not come into the tax collector’s hands.”

I've heard it said often that to avoid paying taxes is no crime, but to evade paying taxes is. What the Court has declared today is that for those wealthy enough, tax evasion is legal, too.

Don't believe that elections have consequences? Read more of Kagan's dissent and imagine what might have happened it she'd been elevated to chief Justice rather than Roberts.

In her dissent in the case, Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn, No. 09-987, Justice Kagan said the majority’s position was an elevation of form over substance. “Taxpayers experience the same injury for standing purposes,” she wrote, “whether government subsidization of religion takes the form of a cash grant or a tax measure.”

She offered examples. “Suppose a state desires to reward Jews — by, say, $500 per year — for their religious devotion,” she wrote. Would it matter to taxpayers offended by the practice whether the reward came in the form of a government stipend or a tax credit?

“Or assume,” she wrote, “a state wishes to subsidize the ownership of crucifixes” in one of three ways. It could purchase them in bulk and distribute them; it could reimburse buyers with a check; or it could pay with a tax credit.

“Now, really — do taxpayers have less reason to complain if the state selects the last of these three options?” Justice Kagan asked.

Justice Kagan said the majority’s opinion was particularly surprising because the court had never thought the point even worth arguing over. “To the contrary: We have faced the identical situation five times — including in a prior incarnation of this very case! — and we have five times resolved the suit without questioning the plaintiffs’ standing,” she wrote.

Justice Kagan acknowledged that people would sometimes continue to have standing of the more traditional sort to challenge government spending on religion. In other cases, though, she wrote, Monday’s decision “will prevent federal courts from determining whether some subsidies to sectarian organizations comport with our Constitution’s guarantee of religious neutrality.”

School board opposes tuition tax credits; Thomas 'open-minded'

Greenville, despite its location in the most conservative part of the state, sometimes surprises people with a progressive declaration here and there. It did so again last week, as its school board made clear its opposition to the tuition tax credit plan that Governor Mark Sanford cooked up and Governor Nikki Haley has reheated.

Reporter Ron Barnett explains in the Greenville News:

The Greenville County School Board fired off a letter to local legislators Tuesday urging them to oppose a bill that would provide tax credits to parents who send their children to private schools.

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The letter the board wrote to the county's legislative delegation calls Senate bill 414 “another tax break championed by a well-funded, out-of-state special interest group.”

“In fact, if passed, this legislation may well decrease opportunities for our students as funding is diverted from the state's General Fund into the pockets of a few.”

The bill, which has been referred to the Senate Education Committee, would draw money from the general fund rather than from education funds, but school board members said it would have the effect of taking money from schools, which already have suffered more than $750 million in cuts in state funds over the past three years.

“As school districts across the state lay off teachers, reduce class offerings, discontinue innovative programs and rely on parents to provide basic supplies, it is simply irresponsible to consider legislation which further erodes resources for our public school students and threatens the other core services of our state,” the letter says.

That just about sums it up, doesn't it?

The plan benefits only a few, particularly those who don't need the benefit. It harms the vast majority, who can ill afford the harm. It's couched as a tax break, at a time when South Carolina has already cut its public service budgets to the bone. And it's being pushed by ideologues from outside our border.

Logic like that can't go ignored, right?

Not so fast. We're in South Carolina. Logic is not feared in these parts. Just ask Sen. David Thomas, who co-sponsored the bill.

State Sen. David Thomas, one of the sponsors of the bill, said the bill isn't likely to pass as written because of the budget situation.

He favors a scaled-down version that would target impoverished school districts in a pilot program.

“I'm open-minded and have been,” the Fountain Inn Republican said. “There seems to be a lack of open-mindedness on all sides on this.”

I think that the operative definition of open-mindedness, in this instance, seems to be that when a majority of citizens oppose an idea, for various reasons, that's no reason to believe that the majority of citizens oppose the idea. It could still be adopted, if a majority of lawmakers ignore the stated will of voters and pass it anyway.

I'm open-minded, too: I see that elections have consequences, and this is one.

On this date: Gov. James F. Byrnes speaks to The SCEA, 1951

There was a time in South Carolina when public education was such a priority to statesmen, and educators were such a potent and valued human resource, that governors came to address teachers at their annual gatherings. But there was a time, too, when South Carolina's leaders were statesmen.

Such was the case sixty years ago today when one of South Carolina's true statesmen, Governor James F. Byrnes, addressed the representative assembly of The South Carolina Education Association. It was the first of two such addresses to this body, this one in the first year of his term -- less than two months after his inauguration, in fact -- and the second coming in the last year of his term.

For those unfamiliar with Byrnes, it is no exaggeration to call him one of the greatest of South Carolina's products in the twentieth century and, indeed, he played an active role in shaping that century. His election to the governor's office was merely the cherry atop a long and storied life in public service.

As a young Congressman, Byrnes became a close and trusted ally to President Woodrow Wilson. Though Byrnes was associated with Sen. "Pitchfork" Ben Tillman, it was Byrnes who often influenced the older Tillman -- and for the better -- rather than the other way round. As a U.S. Senator, he supported Franklin Roosevelt's bid for the presidency and Roosevelt rewarded him with a seat on the United State Supreme Court -- making him only the third South Carolinian to serve on that body, and the only South Carolinian on the Supreme Court in the twentieth century.

But life on the court was too restrictive, and he resigned the seat before his second anniversary in it, first leading Roosevelt's Economic Stabilization Office, then the Office of War Mobilization. His influence was so great -- and his relationship with Roosevelt so close -- that he was nicknamed "Assistant President." Byrnes was believed to be Roosevelt's choice for vice president on the 1944 ticket, until Roosevelt chose Sen. Harry Truman of Missouri instead. Still, it was Byrnes who came with Roosevelt to the "Big Three" Conference at Yalta in 1945, and Byrnes served as Truman's Secretary of State until 1947.

To place Byrnes in more particular context, consider this: Upon his resignation as Secretary of State, he was succeeded by George Marshall, author of the "Marshall Plan" that rebuilt postwar Europe. Byrnes's seat on the U.S. Supreme Court is now held by Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

So it was this statesman and confidante to three presidents who held South Carolina's chief executive office in 1951 -- taking over from former Governor Strom Thurmond, no less -- and who spoke to South Carolina's educators in Columbia sixty years ago today. As governor, the quality and easy access of the state's public schools to its children were paramount concern. As a former associate justice of the Supreme Court, he understood the gathering storm around public education as a civil right. As a native South Carolinian and politician, he understood the volatility of integration as a political issue, and he positioned himself as one earnestly seeking to equalize the quality of schools for black and white children, under a segregated system.

"It has been three-fourths of century since South Carolina faced a problem more serious than the one we face today," he began. "After the War for Southern Independence, reconstruction was a tremendous task. Second only to that is the task now confronting us to provide adequate educational facilities for the children of our State."

For those children we must provide new school buildings, more teachers, and better transportation. And we must try to preserve the Public School System. Every child in the State, white or colored, should have the opportunity for a full public school education. It must be our goal to see that each of them accepts that opportunity.

South Carolina must go forward. It cannot go forward without a new educational program. You cannot lift the State economically without raising the educational level of the people. Statistics will show that in the states where there is the greatest illiteracy there is the smallest per capita income.

I am sure you and all other South Carolinians were humiliated recently to read that during a three-months period last fall the rejection rate of draftees for military service, due to mental causes, was higher in South Carolina than in any other State in the Union. More than 60 percent of the men in this State were rejected. The rejection rate was 35 percent for the rest of the South.

I am convinced this humiliating rejection rate was due not so much to lack of intelligence as to lack of education.

Byrnes cited a litany of numbers: children going without education, never enrolling in schools; lamenting the poor shape of existing schools, and the "shifts" required of its instructors to serve all of their pupils; the fact that South Carolina was home to more school-age children than any other Southern state; and the fact that some classrooms were packed with 40 children.

So Byrnes described his proposed campaign for school construction and other educational improvements. He concluded that greater tax revenues were necessary to fund this program, so he advocated for the issuance of $75 million in bonds, and the implementation of a new sales tax, to finance it -- regardless of the political fallout.

But he recognized there were be vehement opposition to raising tax revenues to do what was inherently right, and he addressed it:

Naturally there is opposition to the Sales Tax. There is opposition to every tax, but I have failed to find any man who is really in favor of improving our educational facilities who will suggest a substitute tax plan.

I can understand the position of the man who thinks it is a waste of money to educate the children of people he calls "common people." He is willing that we should continue to have more illiteracy than any state in the Union. I disagree with him but I understand him.

I cannot understand the position of the man who says he is in favor of increasing teachers' salaries, improving the transportation system, constructing new school buildings, and yet opposes the sales tax and offers no substitute. He wants to help the children -- provided it does not cost him anything.

That cannot be done. It will cost money. But the education of our children is the primary duty of our State just as National Defense is the primary duty of the Federal Government.

When we properly discharge our duty, we make more difficult the task of those who would have the Federal Government control our schools.

Other Southern states have had to meet this problem. Practically every state in the South now has a sales tax. It is argued by some that it will be a greater burden to the poor. The benefits will be greater to the poor. It is among them that we find large families and their children cannot be sent to private schools.

Schools in our cities, as a rule, are well equipped. The schools in our small towns and rural areas are not. The one teacher schools in rural areas, having not more than 15 or 20 pupils cannot secure good teachers. Our people must realize that these schools should be consolidated. I want the boys and girls of small towns and rural areas to have opportunities in life equal to the boys and girls of cities.

Men and women who receive little or no education participate in the election of those who govern this State. Government will only be as intelligent as the electorate. Moreover, the cities of South Carolina cannot prosper economically unless the peoples of the rural areas are educated and can increase their incomes. The improvement of conditions in rural sections is of vital concern to every city.

Just as pressing was the issue of equal schools for children of both races, and Byrnes -- who might have voted on these matters himself if he'd remained on the Court -- spelled out his expectations:

Last spring there were pending in the United States Supreme Court two cases brought by Negroes, one against the University of Texas and one against the University of Oklahoma. These cases were based on the charge that facilities furnished Negroes of the Negro colleges of the two states were not equal to the facilities furnished in colleges for whites. The United States Government was not involved in the suit. However, the attorney general filed an argument. He did not ask for equal facilities. On behalf of the United States Government he asked that the Court abolish segregation in State supported colleges. The Court did not decide this issue. It held it was no necessary to the disposition of the cases in which the petitioners asked only for equal facilities.

Last fall, after the election of this Legislature, some Negroes who had brought a suit against Clarendon County, asking for equal facilities, abandoned that suit. But they instituted a new suit, asking that the provisions of our constitution and statutes requiring separate schools for the races, be held unconstitutional.

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That case will be tried before a three-Judge Court in Charleston the last week of May. I do not see how a Judge of the Circuit Court of Appeals and two District Judges can reverse a decision of the Supreme Court which has been the law of the land for more than a half century. They may express their desire to do so but only the Supreme Court can reverse a decision of the Supreme Court.

No matter what may be the decision of the Court in Charleston, the case will go to the Supreme Court of the United States. My hope is that the record to be considered by that Court will show that regardless of how we may have failed in the past to provide substantially equal facilities, that a courageous and forward looking Legislature has enacted a law providing an educational program that will improve facilities for Negro children as well as for white children. I hope, too, it can show that the Governor of this State has said he will use what influence he has to accomplish that end.

Then, adopting the same strident tone that Sen. Thurmond would adopt in his failed bid for the presidency in 1948, Byrnes declared that South Carolina "will not now nor for some years to come, mix white and colored children in our schools. In the Reconstruction Days, a carpetbag government tried to do it and failed. A Democratic administration cannot now do what a Republican administration could not then do."

His next words were a strange admonition of things to come, far and long beyond the fight for civil rights and even into the century he wouldn't live to see: "If the Court changes what is now the law of the land, we will, if it is possible, live within the law, preserve the public school system, and at the same time maintain segregation. If that is not possible, reluctantly we will abandon the public school system."

He predicted that under such circumstances, school buildings "could be sold or leased" by the state, perhaps to parochial school interests. He imagined that the state might return the amount of tax revenues then being spent on public schools to parents, and "permit them to pay for the education of their children."

He acknowledged, "The difficulty, of course, is that many of those who most need education would not be sent to school. Now we find it difficult to get many children to attend free schools."

He told educators that he did not want these speculations to come to fruition, but he understood South Carolina's people and their predilections. In his conclusion, he turned to the state's educators for aid, and delivered sentiments that sound absolutely foreign to modern educators' ears:

No matter how serious may be the problems ahead of us, I know that the State can rely upon the loyal and intelligent assistance of the teachers of our schools.

I have an exalted idea of the importance of your profession. I resent the charge that this Association has no purpose other than to make efforts to increase your salaries. You fashion the thinking of the children of our State. You influence their lives. I believe you have at heart the future of your pupils, as well as your own future. I believe from your group meetings here you have benefitted and will be better able to help your schools.

The life of a teacher must be a life of sacrifice. To teach you must spend four years at college, and, in addition, you must continue to study as long as you teach. The college graduate who enters your profession cannot hope to receive the compensation of the doctor, the lawyer, the bricklayer, and the plumber. You may receive compensation equal to that of a preacher. You are entitled to compensation that will enable you to maintain a standard of living demanded by your profession. But, you do have a compensation greater than your financial reward. You see your pupils go out into the world. When one makes good in life, it must bring to you a satisfaction second only to the satisfaction of the parents of that pupil.

I ask God to bless you. I ask it with earnestness because upon you depends in great measure the character of the men and women who will guide this State in the days ahead of us.

Among Jimmy Byrnes's great gifts was prescience, as his predictions largely came to pass: The Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education changed the expectations of South Carolina's system of public education, to the anger and resentment of many citizens. The several years it took to integrate the schools gave segregationists time to establish "segregation academies," many of which still exist. Byrnes's premonition that the state would abandon its public school system is still playing out today, despite a few progressive spasms -- Governor Richard Riley's statesmanly efforts spring to mind -- in the intervening years. And his speculation that lawmakers would attempt to divert public funds to private schools has come to life in the form of vouchers, "opportunity scholarships" and "tuition tax credits."

It was a powerful presentation, delivered by a gifted and skillful state leader, to those he considered to stand among the state's most important citizens -- for their impact on the state's most precious element, its children.

That, it seems, is history.