School Vouchers: Transubstantiate Your Cash For Fun and Profit
When is a tax dollar not a tax dollar?
When it’s used to pay for a school voucher.
That’s the slight of hand behind much of our education policy today.
Lawmakers want to give away a huge bundle of your cash to religious schools, but they can’t because of that pesky old First Amendment.
The establishment clause sets up a distinct separation between church and state. It explicitly forbids public money being spent on any specific religion.
So these lawmakers do a bit of magic. They take that money, wave their hands over it, mumble a few secret words and Voilà ! It’s no longer public; it’s private. And private money can be spent any way you want – even on religion.
Here’s how they do it.
You simply take public tax dollars and turn them into credits that can be used to pay for alternatives to public schools. Call it a “school voucher.”
But wait a minute. Isn’t that like a check? If Peter writes Paul a check, that money is no longer Peter’s. Now it’s Paul’s. Right?
Yes. But that’s not what’s happening here.
A school voucher isn’t a check. A check is an order to your bank to transfer funds to another account or to be exchanged for cash or goods or services. School vouchers do not come from your account. And they cannot be transferred into just any account or spent in any way.
They’re more like food stamps. It’s not money that can be used in any way you see fit. It’s money that can only be used to pay for a child’s education. And you can only use School Vouchers: Transubstantiate Your Cash For Fun and Profit | gadflyonthewallblog:
