Perspective: Nixon pulls a Lucy on education

Poor Charlie Brown. He wanted to be a place-kicker. He just needed someone to hold the football up for him. Along came Lucy. She teed the ball up for him and told him it was time to kick. Then, just as Charlie was about to kick the ball, Lucy would swipe it away.

On Friday, Gov. Nixon vetoed House Bill 42, an education reform bill sponsored by Rep. David Wood, R-Versailles. In the process, he pulled a Lucy.

This was not the first education transfer bill to cross Gov. Nixon's desk. Last year the bill was Senate Bill 493. I was involved in its formation and passage. We held dozens of meetings with legislators of both parties and across the ideological spectrum. In the end, we passed a bi-partisan, cross-regional bill. Gov. Nixon vetoed it.

In his veto message from last year, Gov. Nixon said he had four major problems with the bill.

First, it included a "private option" that would allow children in failing schools within failing school districts to transfer to private schools if those private schools agreed to accept a lower tuition rate than the traditional public schools to which those same children would be eligible to transfer under current Missouri law.

This provision would have saved "sending" districts money, alleviated pressure on "receiving" districts, and given children and their parents in poor neighborhoods similar opportunities that children of middle class and wealthy families enjoy. Nevertheless, equality in educational choice was too much for Gov. Nixon. It's too dangerous for Gov. Nixon and the defenders of the status quo to allow poor families, no matter how desperate, the freedom to make their own choices. (It's also relevant to mention that these eligible private schools would have had to abide by the same regulations as public schools, could not have been controlled by any religion, and could not have required students to take any religion classes.

The Legislature listened to Gov. Nixon and took this extremely limited private option out of the bill.

Second, Nixon said he could not sign the bill because it did not provide any transportation funding for transfer students. I agreed with Nixon on this point, and the Legislature fixed that flaw.

Third, Nixon said he disliked a provision in the bill encouraging receiving districts to accept a lower tuition by not counting the transfer student scores in statewide assessments for five years. Again, I agreed with Nixon on this. And again, the Legislature fixed the problem in this year's bill.

Fourth, Nixon complained that a "hardship transfer" provision in the bill was unrelated to the bill's real impetus. That was certainly true. So the Legislature removed it from this year's bill.

In January, I attended a meeting with two members of Gov. Nixon's staff and eight other key House members on education. Gov. Nixon's staff laid out his requirements for a bill. There was great hope that we could reach an agreement. Although I wasn't integrally involved in the bill process this year, I heard from several people that the governor's office actually engaged on the bill.

Like Charlie Brown, the Legislature tried. We trusted Gov. Nixon was holding the ball in good faith. On Friday, Gov. Nixon yanked the football away. We will not fall for his trick again. Student transfer legislation is finished during the Nixon Administration. It will take a leader who can be trusted in the governor's office before the Legislature is willing to make another run at it.

Crazy Abortion Lawsuit

This is not just a bad joke. This week in federal court a group of devil worshippers sued to overturn our state's restrictions on abortion as a violation of their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion and the Establishment Clause. (I'm not just calling them devil worshippers. The suit is literally brought on behalf of "The Satanic Temple.")

While absurd, this lawsuit strikes at the heart of a key point in the abortion argument and governing philosophy in general. Abortion defenders often claim, "Well, you can't legislate morality." Not true.

We "legislate morality" all the time. In fact, most laws involve some moral judgment. Prohibitions on murder, rape, theft, assault, slavery, you name it, all involve moral judgments. Even civil laws with no criminal consequence involve morality. Take, for example, the Senior Savings Protection Act - which I handled and Gov. Nixon just signed - it's underlying premise is that it's morally wrong for a swindler to steal from vulnerable Missourians, so the law makes it easier to stop that fraud. That's legislating morality.

Do these laws violate the Establishment Clause because they're based on morality that's entirely consistent and derived from religious values that are shared by nearly all religions? Of course not. Neither do our restrictions on abortion, an event that ends a life. In the case of the 72 hour waiting period, it's not too much to ask three days wait before taking an entire lifetime away from a child.

Usually when someone argues, "We can't legislate morality," what they really mean is just, "We shouldn't legislate morality" in this situation. In some senses, the statement that "we can't legislate morality" is also true. No law will ever eliminate fraud or crime or any of the other things we prohibit or limit. Human beings will make bad choices regardless of what government tries to do. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try.

State Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City, represents Missouri's 60th District.