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The leaders of South Carolina’s “Republican” supermajorities have decided not to challenge a controversial supreme court ruling that struck down a fledgling school choice program earlier this month on specious grounds.
“After careful consideration, we have decided not to request a rehearing from the supreme court,” S.C. Senate president Thomas Alexander and S.C. House speaker Murrell Smith said in a joint statement released on Wednesday afternoon (September 25, 2024).
As I reported at the time, the high court – or at least an iteration of it which included an acting justice and a now-former chief justice – struck down broad sections of the Education Scholarship Trust Fund (ESTF) – a program created last year by lawmakers and administered by the S.C. Department of Education (SCDE) which provided roughly 5,000 academic scholarships totaling $6,000 apiece for eligible K-12 students.
That was a mere $30 million worth of school choice… out of a total state education budget of nearly $14 billion.
Adding insult to injury, the court ruled the program unconstitutional just days into the 2024-2025 school year – disrupting the plans of thousands of South Carolina families and forcing many of them to re-enroll their children in failing government-run schools.
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Justice Garrison Hill and a narrow majority of the court concluded that tuition payments from the ESTF constituted a “direct benefit” to private education institutions – a view roundly rebuked by new chief justice John Kittredge and John Few, who affirmed the legislature’s right to establish a choice program in which parents make that decision.
“Our constitution allows the legislature — and only the legislature — to make this policy decision,” Kittredge wrote in a dissent joined by Few.
Unfortunately, legislative leaders are disinclined to stand up for their right to do so.
“While we strongly disagree with the majority’s decision, believing it to have misinterpreted both the intent of the framers of our state constitution and previous Supreme Court rulings, we do not believe that seeking a rehearing would alter the outcome,” Alexander and Smith wrote. “More importantly, it would not provide immediate relief to the thousands of children who now face being removed from their current schools because of the Court’s decision. Further delays caused by continuing this litigation will not help the students for whom the legislature intended to provide hope and opportunity.”
According to the legislative leaders, they intend to “address the consequences of the court’s opinion and correct the course.”
“To accomplish that goal, both the House of Representatives and the Senate will each begin working to find a way to restore the opportunities these students deserve and unfortunately lost,” they noted. “Our highest priority when the General Assembly reconvenes in January is to ensure that families have educational choice and that funding for other educational programs that have been relied upon by so many South Carolinians for decades are secured for the future.”
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RELATED | SUPREMES SLAM BRAKES ON CHOICE
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Highest priority, eh?
You better believe our media outlet is going to hold them to that…
Which version of school choice are they going to prioritize, though? Last year, several alternatives to the ESTF program were introduced – but none of them gained traction.
One bill – H. 4645 – would cut the state out as a middleman and simply give the money directly to parents in the form of a refundable tax credit. Such an approach would avoid constitutional entanglements by keeping the cash out of the government coffers in the first place. The tax credit proposal – submitted by state representative Jordan Pace – would provide more money than the scholarship, $7,000 per child, with unlimited eligibility.
Pace confirmed to this media outlet his plans to reintroduce his bill during the 2025-2026 legislative session, which begins in January.
Another bill – S. 285 – would provide “an income tax credit for contributions to a scholarship-funding organization that provides grants for students to attend certain independent and home schools.” Introduced by senator Tom Davis, the legislation is backed by many school choice advocates because it is privately administered.
Davis has also confirmed to this media outlet his plans to reintroduce his bill during the upcoming session.
My media outlet has consistently advocated on behalf of expanded school choice – for more than a decade, in fact. As I have often noted, choice is the “silver bullet” in education – the key to “unlocking academic achievement, stimulating innovation and creating the only accountability that’s worth a damn, the accountability of the marketplace.”
Let’s hope GOP leaders who have promised to make it their “highest priority” in the coming legislative year are true to their word…
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the owner and founding editor of FITSNews. Prior to founding his own news outlet, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina, bass guitarist in an alternative rock band and bouncer at a Columbia, S.C. dive bar. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.
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6 comments
I’ve said before that I’m not opposed to school choice, but the avenue to what they’re trying to achieve is through an amendment to the state constitution. If the “framers” of the state constitution were not opposing this sort of plan when they drafted Section 4, they sure hid it well with some deceptively simple language.
“SECTION 4. Direct aid to religious or other private educational institutions prohibited.
No money shall be paid from public funds nor shall the credit of the State or any of its political subdivisions be used for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution.”
To say that the sticking point here was that the “framers” would only accept public dollars going to private and religious institutions if it first passed through a series of middlemen is retarded. Supporters of the voucher plan are seeing only what they want to see. It just isn’t there. The intent of Section 4 was clearly to prevent taxpayer subsidization of private or religious education. If South Carolinians’ attitudes surrounding education and state government allocating public dollars to private schools have changed, then they need to put forth a constitutional amendment. I doubt they’re going to do that because my gut tells me that the average South Carolinian doesn’t want that to happen.
Under your assertion, the Life Scholarship is unconstitutional. Your assertion of “direct aid” is flawed.
The Life Scholarship is just that, a scholarship given for academic achievement. It requires certain levels of academic achievement to be initially received and to be continued by the student. Vouchers have no such academic requirement.
I could be wrong, but I believe that Article XI of the SC Constitution applies only to the “system of free public schools open to all children in the State”, which would be K-12. It establishes the State Board of Education and the Superintendent of Education, neither of which has anything to do with institutions of higher education.
I’d like to see the Legislature address the issue of tax dollars being wasted on superfluous school districts and their overhead costs. Why can the single Greenville County School District serve 99 schools while in neighboring Spartanburg County there are seven school districts serving a total of 72 schools. Why does a poor school district like Greenwood 50 (Ware Shoals) have the associated administrative staff and overhead costs and only serve three schools? It is past time to mandate one school district per county reducing over 70 school districts to 46. We have an experiment going regarding public Charter Schools that now number over 100 and are exempted from many laws and regulations related to other public schools giving them the freedom to use the teaching methods of non-public schools. The Charter School laws may not be perfect, but fine tune them and give them a chance before dumping tax dollars into private schools.
Chief Justice Kittredge needs to schedule a reconsideration hearing with the current justices and get that idiot former chief justice off the panel.