Jesse Jackson is always a good read, even if you aren’t always
satisfied with his conclusions.
Such is the case with his latest article (65 years after
Brown v. Board of Education, we risk going backward – May 14). It is a plea to our country to do better, but
I think he unnecessarily loses some necessary sympathy from his readers along
the way.
He insists, agreeing with a Supreme Court decision, that
segregated schools are inherently unequal and unconstitutional.
Are all-girl and all-boy schools unequal and
unconstitutional as well? It seems there’s
quite a demand for all-girl schools, but people do have a problem with all boy
schools. I was glad that I could attend
an all-boy high school when I was younger.
USNews ranks 80 historically black colleges and universities. I didn’t check each one, but I’m guessing they
are all black by choice rather than by government edict.
There’s a difference between a school being all black,
because they weren’t allowed to go to the school of their choice and being all
black because that is what they chose. Technically,
under Jackson’s definition, it’s still segregated, unequal, and unconstitutional.
Brown vs. Board of Education is not law. The Supreme Court cannot make laws. Only the legislature can do that. Art. 1, Sec. 1, right at the beginning of our
Constitution.
He is correct to note the disparity in school funding
between rich white towns and poor black towns.
The answer is not to bus the poor black children to rich white areas,
because, well, there are far more poor black children than there is room in rich
white schools. The answer is also not to
take the money that the rich paid for their schools and send it to poor black
areas. Why? Because they paid it for their schools. It’s definitely not American to try to improve
one person’s school by making another person’s school worse.
The problem is that in Illinois we rely too much on property
taxes to fund schools. And why is that? Because the politicians in Illinois for too
long have seen their positions in power as a golden opportunity to enrich
themselves at the public expense.
But the simple answer is to establish a basic level of
school funding to be paid for through the income tax. Then allow the school districts to raise more
money through property taxes or other means.
Jackson laments that schools are segregated, because our
neighborhoods are segregated. What he forgets
is that in a free country, people can move where they want. If a neighborhood is segregated, it’s not so much
because certain people can’t move in, it’s that certain other people move out
when certain other people move in. Is that
bad? Perhaps so, but that is a price of
freedom.
Improve the schools through better funding. I have fought for this for years, but nobody
is interested. Pay for a desired level
of school funding through the income tax.
Allow school districts raise more however they like. And cut property taxes by the amount raised
through income taxes.
