[699] in libertarians
school prayer debate is pointless
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (damartin@ampere.mit.edu)
Tue Feb 14 22:00:17 1995
Date: Tue, 14 Feb 1995 21:59:10 -0500
From: damartin@ampere.mit.edu
To: libertarians@MIT.EDU
>Also, the gov't doesn't subsidize good wholesome entertainment like the
>Cleavers.
Some of us do not find the Cleavers wholesome.
>>school prayer is the government endorsing religious values for everyone.
>>The government's role should not be to endorse anything. Period.
>Come on - this is the type of fuzzy reasoning the left is so fond of.
>Letting Bobby pray in school endorses religious values for Robert, who
>chooses to remain silent? Please. The First Amendment says that the
>Congress shall make no law respecting establishment of a religion -- or
>prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Just because these kids are in
>school doesn't mean they give up their First Amendment rights, no?
>The best solution (short of a total abolishment of school and state),
>mentioned briefly in the Boston Globe op-ed on Cato, would be a system of
>total school choice. Parents should be able to send their kids to send
>their kids to private public or pariochal schools, IMO, and then we could
>escape these silly devisive arguments.
This sort of discussion always pops up once and a while in
Libertarian groups. The correct, IMNSHO, answer is:
There shouldn't be state-funded, state-run schools in the first place,
so arguments about school prayer are meaningless. There isn't any good
answer. The only answer is that you should be able to choose whatever
school you want and can afford for your kids with whatever level of
school prayer you deem appropriate. The school prayer issue is a
perfect example of how having the state run things creates new
problems.
-David Martin
