Editor, Times-Union: Evident in the successful push for charter school vouchers and in the platform that David Koch actually ran on for public office on you do get a sense that the ultra conservatives have some problem with public education, insomuch as that they have a problem with publicly provided anything.
It almost seems a yearning for anarchy. Stumbling across the witless postings in a Yahoo news article I found a reference to the 28 Principles of Liberty. There is some interesting discussion over the relevance of these principles in the shaping of the constitution and how they can be construed, however I like #23 ...
Principle 23 - A free society cannot survive as a republic without a broad program of general education.
“They made an early provision by law that every town consisting of so many families should be always furnished with a grammar school. They made it a crime for such a town to be destitute of a grammar schoolmaster for a few months, and subjected it to a heavy penalty. So that the education of all ranks of people was made the care and expense of the public, in a manner that I believe has been unknown to any other people, ancient or modern. The consequences of these establishments we see and feel every day [written in 1765]. A native of America who cannot read and write is as rare ... as a comet or an earthquake.” John Adams.
