In a video message posted to his Twitter account, former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore says it is time to end the federal government’s involvement in education and allow parents to take the lead in how best to educate their children.
“Education has always been in the purview of the parent,” explains Moore, who is running against establishment GOP candidate Luther Strange in Alabama’s U.S. Senate primary runoff for the seat vacated by now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
“They know best how to educate their children,” he continues. “The states have various forms of education, but the federal government has no involvement in education under the Constitution.”
https://twitter.com/MooreSenate/status/904512225972506626
Moore adds:
The federal government should have no involvement in education. Common Core is an example of an attempt to indoctrinate our children with ideas that most people – at least in Alabama – don’t agree with. And yet it’s pushed on us by using our own tax money to buy our children over. And I think that’s very wrong. I oppose Common Core. … It’s a very bad thing … and I think it should be stopped in Alabama.
Moore continues in his video message that he recalls President Ronald Reagan talked about abolishing the federal education department.
He asserts:
I would have no problem with it being turned back to the states. I think the competition between the states is good, and I think they will improve their educational systems. And I think it they can use their own money for their educational system, they can give tax credits, they can give charter schools, they can give Christian organizations at schools. There’s many different forms of education, and I think we got to instill in the students the willingness and the “want to,” if you will, to become educated.
Moore says his father taught him “that’s the one thing no one can take from you, is your education.”
“If you become educated, they may criticize your techniques, your motives, or whatever, but they can’t say that you’re not thoughtful enough to think about them,” he says, adding that though education is very valuable, “I don’t think we’re doing it right in our country.”
Two members of Congress have introduced legislation to end the U.S. Education Department.
In February, Kentucky Republican Rep. Thomas Massie introduced H.R. 899, a measure that contains only one sentence: “The Department of Education Shall Terminate on December 31, 2018.”
Neither Congress nor the Pres, thru his appointees, has the const. auth. to dictate how/what our children must learn https://t.co/T87DXtY0Xd
— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) February 7, 2017
North Carolina Rep. David Rouzer (R) introduced another measure in March, H.R. 1510, that “proposes a responsible dismantle of the Department of Education by reallocating its billions in funding to be proportionally distributed to the respective states to be used for any education purpose as they see fit.”
In April, the Utah state legislature passed a joint resolution calling for a return to federalism in general, and, in particular, the end of the federal education department.
Utah state Rep. Ken Ivory sponsored HJR 017, titled “Joint Resolution to Restore the Division of Governmental Responsibilities Between the National Government and the States.”
The resolution “urges the President of the United States and Congress to recognize state authority and take action to restore power to the states.”
The measure specifically urges that Congress end the federal Education Department and block grant funds for education to the states.
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