Arthur Levine
President of Columbia University
Teachers College
"Throughout my career, I have been an opponent of school voucher programs. . .
. However, after much soul-searching, I have reluctantly concluded that a limited school
voucher program is now essential for the poorest Americans attending the worst public
schools. . . . Today, to force children into inadequate schools is to deny them any chance
of success. To do so simply on the basis of their parent’s income is a sin."
—Wall Street Journal, June 15, 1998
Steve Jobs
Co-founder
Apple Computer
"What’s wrong with education cannot be fixed with technology. No amount
of technology will make a dent. It’s a political problem. . . . I’m one of those
people who believe the best thing we could ever do is go to the full voucher system."
—Wired, February, 1996
Alveda King
Niece of Martin Luther King, Jr.
"I believe that if Martin Luther King and A.D. King were here they would say
‘Do what’s best for the children.’ It [the idea for school vouchers] may
sound radical, but so were they." And, "Is it moral to tax families, compel
their children’s attendance at schools, and then give no choice between teaching
methods, religious or secular education and other matters?"
—Wall Street Journal, September 11, 1997
Laurence H. Tribe
Harvard Law School
"Any objection that anyone would have to a voucher program would have to be
policy-based and could not rest on legal doctrine. One would have to be awfully clumsy to
write voucher legislation that could not pass constitutional scrutiny . . . aid to parents
. . . would be constitutional."
—New York Times, June 12, 1991
David Selden
Former President
American Federation of Teachers
"Kids like them, teachers like them, parents like them—even I’ve
come to like the vouchers."
—Nation’s Schools and Colleges, June, 1975
Rev. Floyd H. Flake
Former U.S. Representative
"This is not a question for me about Democrats or Republicans. It is really a
question about whether or not we are going to continue to let every child die, arguing
that, if we begin to do vouchers, if we do charter schools, what we in fact are doing is
taking away from the public system. We say, let them all stay there. Let them all die. It
is like saying there has been a plane crash. But because we cannot save every child, we
are not going to save any of our children; we let them all die."
—Congressional Record, October 31, 1997
Chicago Tribune
"The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled well and wisely Wednesday in holding that there
is no constitutional bar to the use of taxpayer-provided vouchers to pay for education at
church-sponsored private schools. Not only does the decision move the controversial issue
a giant step closer to ultimate resolution by the U.S. Supreme Court, but it also clearly
puts the legal momentum firmly behind voucher proponents. That should be heartening to
anyone who appreciates the practical and profitable role that religious institutions have
played and can play in addressing the social needs of America's urban poor."
—Editorial, June 12, 1998
Howard Fuller
Former School Superintendent
Milwaukee School District
"Interests of poor children are best served if they are truly given options,
public and private." And "Real reform will only come from pressure from outside
the system, generated by empowered parents with expanded school choice."
—USA Today, August 25, 1995
Brent Staples
Editorial Board of The New York Times
"Democrats who had made careers as champions of the poor opposed the [school
choice] plan, arguing that a solution that did not save every child was unacceptable. The
Democrats got the worst of the exchange. They seemed more interested in preserving the
public school monopoly than in saving at least some children’s lives [through
vouchers]."
—New York Times, January 4, 1998
Albert Shanker
Former President
American Federation of Teachers
"It’s time to admit that public education operates like a planned
economy, a bureaucratic system in which everybody’s role is spelled out in advance,
and there are few incentives for innovation and productivity. It’s no surprise that
our school system doesn’t improve: It more resembles the communist economy than our
own market economy."
—Wall Street Journal, October 2, 1989
Michael Ovitz
Former President of Disney
"I got a really terrific public education. I am a strong believer in public
education and I am also a strong believer in options.’’
—Quoted by Associated Press, June 10, 1998
Gerald E. Stroufe
Former Executive Director
Nat. Com. for Support of the Public Schools
"While the voucher plan has offered despairing parents hope, the educator
organizations have chosen to attack the source of hope rather than the causes of
despair."
—Education Admin. Quarterly, Winter, 1971
Rod Paige
Superintendent
Houston Indep. School District
"[A limited voucher program] doesn’t weaken public school systems, it
strengthens public school systems."
—Houston Chronicle, May 22, 1998
John Kerry
U.S. Senator
"Shame on us for not realizing that there are parents in this country who . .
. today support vouchers not because they are enamored with private schools but because
they want a choice for their children. They want alternatives, and seeing none in our
rigid system, they are willing and some even desperate to look elsewhere."
—Speech, Northeastern Univ., June 16, 1998
Virginia Walden
D.C. Parent
"I am a lifelong Democrat, and I am not sure when the Democrats decided that
siding with the poor and the needy is no longer part of their platform. School choice
empowers parents, and I don’t care who is behind it, Democrats or Republicans."
—Washington Post, May 24, 1998
Warren Burger
Former Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court
"[T]he court will come to a more enlightened and tolerant view of the First
Amendment’s guarantee of free exercise of religion, thus eliminating the denial of
equal protection to children in church-sponsored schools, and take a more realistic view
that carefully limited aid to children is not a step toward establishing a state
religion."
—Meek vs. Pittenger (1975)
Dale L. Zuchlewski
Member of the Buffalo Common Council
"Do vouchers take resources from public education? There is that possibility,
but that doesn’t mean we can’t structure a program that doesn’t hurt the
public schools."
—Buffalo News, February 20, 1997
William Raspberry
Columnist
"If I find myself slowly morphing into a supporter of charter schools and
vouchers, it isn’t because I harbor any illusions that there’s something magical
about these alternatives. It is because I am increasingly doubtful that the public schools
can do (or at any rate will do) what is necessary to educate poor minority children."
—Washington Post, June 26, 1998
Kurt Schmoke
Democratic Mayor of Baltimore
"If parents of students have the right to choose so many other basics in their
lives—such as where they live, where they go to church, where they work—then
they also ought have the right to choose where their children go to school."
—Quoted by Associated Press, March 8, 1996
Polly Williams
Wisconsin State Representative
"Choice is the best thing that has come around for my people since I’ve
been born. It allows poor people to have those choices that all those other people who are
fearing it already have."
—Washington Times, April 2, 1990
Roy Allen
Former Democratic Georgia State Senator
"We’ve trusted the bureaucracy to reform the schools, and they
haven’t done the job. It’s time we talked about trusting parents to make the
decision on what school is best for their children."
—Wall Street Journal, September 21, 1993
