A letter to my students
It's common knowledge that the founders of the United States favored the separation of church and state because they didn't want government interfering with freedom of religion by telling people what to think.<p>At that time, there were no government-run schools in America. If someone had suggested that government should be involved in running schools, maintain massive "Education Departments", etc., I'm sure Jefferson, Franklin, and the rest would have had the same reaction that they had to the idea of government-run churches.<p>If it is dangerous to a free society for government to be involved in telling people what to think via religion (and it is), how much more dangerous is it for government to be involved in telling many of the youngest and most impressionable members of society what to think?<p>We should demand the separation of school and state and end government control over education in the United States. Schooling is not the only means to getting an education (Mark Twain famously said "Never let your schooling interfere with your education"), but if universal schooling is deemed desirable, you could simply take the amount of money spent by government to run schools and maintain bureaucracies, divide it by the number of students, and issue each student a voucher to spend at the non-government, voluntarily funded community school of their choice.<p>To support freeing children from the dangers of government indoctrination and control, visit and join the Alliance for the Separation of School and State -- <a href="http://www.schoolandstate.org/home.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.schoolandstate.org/home.htm</a>. As authoritarians are so fond of saying, "Do it for the children!"<p>-Starchild, candidate for School Board, San Francisco