78-10-A7
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School Busing
TranscriptThe other day when I picked up my local Los Angeles newspaper, I saw a headline referring to the court ordered school busing program scheduled to begin in September. I thought my eyes were playing tricks. The busing scheme, it seems, will involve bus rides of up to 90 minutes each way every day for some of the youngsters. That's three hours a day on a bus for a child, just to satisfy some federal judge's notion of how to achieve equal education. It sounds more like the Mad Hatter's Tea Party. Federal judges still seem to be stuck on the notion that rigid forced busing schemes which disrupt family and neighborhood life (not to mention wasting thousands of gallons of gasoline and large numbers of tax dollars) are somehow the way to solve the problem. Yet, in case after case, such schemes have proved impractical, counterproductive and divisive. Meanwhile, there have been a variety of innovations designed to improve and equalize educational opportunities-- such things as "magnet" schools, academic parks, open enrollment and the flexible voucher system. Increasingly in recent years, public opinion has been running strongly against compulsory busing. Judges, however, are insulated against public opinion. When they legislate, as they are doing in implementing and overseeing forced busing schemes, they can upend people's daily lives without answering to anyone. There is a remedy that is coming closer to fulfillment. Back in 1975 a freshman Congressman, Representative Ron Mottl, Democrat of Ohio, introduced a Constitutional amendment to abolish forced school busing as a means of achieving racial integration. Representative Don Edwards of California, also a Democrat and chairman of the House Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights, refused to hold hearings on the bill. Mottl then tried to get a discharge petition, the only other way he could get his bill to the floor. He needed a majority of signatures--218; he got only 17. Early last year, Congressman Mottl tried again. His bill has two key provisions: One says "No student shall be compelled to attend public school other than the one nearest his residence". The other says, "The Congress shall have the power to enforce by appropriate legislation the provisions of this article; and to insure equal educational opportunities for all students wherever located". Edwards again refused to hold hearings and, along with Congressman Peter Rodino, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, he persuaded 10 members to take their names off the Mottl petition. Still, by this summer, a net total of 201 members of the House have signed it, just 17 short of the needed number. The signers are about evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, though individual names are not made public while a petition is being circulated. Congressman Mottl believes that if he can get his petition to the floor of the house it will pass and also has a good chance in the Senate. He says, "There is growing sentiment in Congress that compulsory busing just hasn't worked; that it is a case of many minuses and no plusses." This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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