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Daniel
Herbster reporting
As
AdvanceUSA
blog reported, the Arizona Supreme Court recently overturned that state’s school
voucher program, ruling the program, which had benefited low-income and
disabled children, unconstitutional. The
Institute for Justice is a libertarian legal
organization which defended the Arizona voucher program in court. Tim Keller, the executive director of the
Institute for Justice Arizona Chapter, has been kind enough to share with us
about the Arizona case and his work for IJ.
DH: Tim, how was the Arizona school voucher
program set up, and what kinds of results was it achieving before the court
made its ruling?
TK: Enacted and implemented in 2006, Arizona’s two
innovative voucher programs, for children with disabilities and children in
foster care, offered a genuine lifeline to many families trapped in schools
that failed to meet their children’s unique educational needs. Teachers’
unions immediately challenged both programs in court. The Institute for
Justice filed intervention papers on behalf of parents and children relying on
the programs to defend against the lawsuits. During the more than two
years of litigation, the programs grew numerically and the children receiving
the vouchers grew both socially and academically. To say that parental
satisfaction soared is an understatement. During the litigation, we
actually filed a number of testimonials
with the Arizona Supreme Court typical of the truly life-changing impact the
programs have had on families.
DH: On what grounds did the Arizona Supreme Court
overturn the voucher program? Why do you
feel they wrongly decided this case?
TK: The Arizona Supreme Court declared that the
voucher programs violate a provision of the Arizona Constitution that prohibits
state funds being appropriated “in aid of” private and religious schools. The Court wrongly decided the case because
the programs were not passed “in aid of” schools. The programs were passed “in aid of”
individuals. Just like food stamps do
not aid grocery stores, school vouchers do not aid schools. For decades, the legal test applied by the
Arizona Supreme Court to similar programs challenged under the so-called “aid
clause” has been the “true beneficiary” test.
In this case, as in prior Arizona school choice cases, parents and
children are the true beneficiaries, not private schools.
Moreover, the decision threatens numerous other educational
aid programs that allow students to use public funds to attend private
schools. For example, at the
post-secondary level, Arizona has no less than three separate programs that
award state-funded vouchers or scholarships to students who can choose to use
those public funds at private, even religious, colleges and universities. The decision also jeopardizes a program that
allows public school districts to place children with disabilities in private
schools and use state funds to pay the tuition to those schools.
DH: Your
press release mentioned a young girl named Lexie. How had she benefited from the voucher
program and what will she have to do once it is discontinued?
TK: Lexie has cerebral palsy, autism, and mild
mental retardation. She spent two years
in the public school system and made no academic or social progress. She was not speaking, she was not
communicating through sign language, and she was not interacting with her
mother or siblings. Lexie experienced a
dramatic change after just a few months at the private Chrysalis Academy. Now, two years later, she is on the brink of
speaking for the first time, she plays and reads with her sisters, and she uses
sign language to communicate with her mother.
She is a different little girl.
Now, without the voucher program, Lexie is facing the possibility of
returning to the public schools. Lexie’s
mom, Andrea, is most concerned that Lexie will regress and that all of the
great strides she has made could be lost.
Considering the fact that over half of the students at Chrysalis have
been placed at the private school by public school districts that use state
funds to pay the private school’s tuition, the result in this case is
manifestly unjust.
DH: What kinds of school choice measures
(vouchers, tax credits, charter schools, etc.) do you support or think the most
effective?
TK: The Institute for Justice supports all manner
of school choice programs.
DH: What could our readers do to encourage more
school choice in their communities, states, and country?
TK: First, they can take the time to learn the
facts about the benefits of school choice so that they can learn to disregard
the many myths propagated by school choice opponents. School choice
improves parental satisfaction, it helps some of our most vulnerable students
obtain the best available education, and competition spurs public schools
toward innovation. School choice also saves taxpayers money. The
Institute has gathered a lot of the leading research on school choice in
one place on our website. Second, they can get involved with
organizations like the Alliance for School Choice
and the Friedman
Foundation for Educational Choice so that they can get involved at
the grassroots level to advocate for expanded school choice opportunities in
the court of public opinion and at the legislature.
DH: Tell us a little about the Institute for
Justice. What’s your mission, and how do
you go about achieving it?
TK: Founded in 1991, the Institute for Justice is
our nation's only libertarian public interest law firm. We engage in cutting-edge litigation and
advocacy both in the courts of law and in the court of public opinion on behalf
of individuals whose most basic rights are denied by the government. Simply put, we challenge the government when
it stands in the way of people trying to earn an honest living, when it
unconstitutionally takes away individuals’ property, when bureaucrats instead
of parents dictate the education of children, and when government stifles
speech. We seek a rule of law under which individuals can control their
destinies as free and responsible members of society. We have accomplished a great deal since our
founding in 1991. You may have seen our clients, cases and attorneys featured
frequently in the national media, such as ABC News 20/20 or the CBS News
program 60 Minutes. As Investor's Business Daily observed, “The Institute for
Justice's influence is being felt across the nation.”
We go about achieving our mission through a unique
combination of litigation, legal counsel, training, research, communications
and outreach. We file strategic legal
cases, we provide legal counsel to inner-city entrepreneurs, and we train law
students, lawyers, policy activists and grassroots organizers in the tactics of
public interest litigation and advocacy for liberty. Through these activities,
IJ challenges the ideology of the welfare state and illustrates and extends the
benefits of freedom to those whose full enjoyment of liberty is denied by
government.
DH: I understand that you are more of a
“libertarian” organization. Do you feel
libertarians have more in common with “conservatives” or
“liberal/progressives?” Or does it
depend on the particular issue?
TK: IJ is unabashedly libertarian. My experience is that libertarians have
something in common with conservatives, liberals and progressives: a love for freedom. Because freedom undergirds each of our core
litigation areas, our work appeals to individuals across the ideological
spectrum regardless of the specific issue.
The result is that in each of our cases we routinely and successfully
reach out to nontraditional allies and by doing so demonstrate the tangible and
unifying benefits of liberty.
DH: Do you think libertarians and conservatives
can work effectively together on issues like school choice, the courts, and
bringing our government back to a more constitutionalist philosophy?
TK: I have no doubts that libertarians can work
effectively with conservatives to restore the many constitutional protections
that we have lost at the hands of judges and lawyers who have abdicated their
duty to keep the government to its constitutionally limited powers and to
protect individual rights from overreaching governmental action.
DH: I’ve heard that there can be a range of
belief among libertarians on pro-life issues.
Some libertarians consider the “right to abortion” as an important
individual right while others (with whom I would agree) see the “right to
life” as the most important, certainly
the most fundamental, individual right.
Does IJ take a position on abortion and what are your thoughts on
pro-life issues?
TK: IJ limits its focus to four specific areas, or
pillars as generally refer to them:
private property rights, economic liberty, First Amendment rights, and
defending school choice.
DH: What do you think are some of the biggest
challenges facing our nation, especially now that we have a new president?
TK: One of the biggest challenges our nation faces
today is temptation to give into discouragement as the government relentlessly
attacks our free market system. Every
day it seems there is more bad news regarding the economy and with that news
come word of some new government scheme to intervene in and interfere with our
economy. What our nation needs right now
is hope. The Institute for Justice is an
organization dedicated to taking on genuine David v. Goliath battles and to
winning cases even in the face of seemingly-impossible odds. We are not discouraged. We are not cynical. Instead, we believe that our message of
individual and economic freedom coupled with our hard work in the courts of law
places us in a unique position to offer genuine hope that our Constitutional rights
can and will be vindicated.
DH: Tim, thanks so much for your time and thanks
for taking a stand for school choice!
Note:
The views of any interviewee do not necessarily reflect the views of
AdvanceUSA.
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