Arne Duncan can’t name the provision in the constitution which allows the federal government to get involved in education

   Arne Duncan–Education Secretary–was asked, and could not answer, a simple question; Where does the constitution give the federal government the authority to involve itself in the education of our children? Here is the question which was asked of Arne Duncan:

The Bill of Rights says that powers not delegated to the federal government by the Constitution are reserved to the states and the people. With that in mind, Mr. Secretary, where specifically does the Constitution authorize the federal government to be involved in primary and secondary education

  Here is Duncan’s response to that question:

“We are obviously a small percent of overall funding–you know about 10 percent,” he said. “The vast majority of funding comes at the local level–state and local level. But we have a responsibility to support children who have historically not had those kinds of opportunities–disadvantaged children, poor children, homeless students, children who are English language learners and, more recently, we’ve seen a tremendous amount of reform from the department.”We have to dramatically improve the quality of education we are providing this country and we can help to continue to reward excellence and encourage at the local level,

  A typical Washington politician’s dodge to a question. He did not state where the authority lies, what he did was to explain why he felt the federal government SHOULD be involved in the education of our children. His answer to the question was no answer at all–it was a deflection.

  To be fair, this is a question that Arne Duncan–or anyone else for that matter–could not possibly have an answer for because the fact is that there is nothing in the constitution that gives the federal government the authority to interfere in the education system. Article 1, Section 8 of the constitution lays out the 17 SPECIFIC powers which the Congress was granted, they are:

To borrow money on the credit of the United States;

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;

To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;

To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;

To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;

To establish Post Offices and Post Roads;

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;

To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offenses against the Law of Nations;

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;

To provide and maintain a Navy;

To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings; And

To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

  As you can see, nowhere in that list is the issue of education, this means that according to the 10th amendment of the constitution the power lies solely within the states and the people. Just before this list is the “general welfare” clause, and some would argue that the government is interfering in education for the “general welfare” of the United States, but if you look at the words of James Madison (and those of you who believe that the term “separation of church and state” appears in the constitution based on words Thomas Jefferson penned in a private correspondence will surely grant me the license for the excursion I am about to make outside the constitution to make my point) you will see that the “general welfare” clause in the constitution has been used in a manner in which the writers of the constitution never meant. Writing in Federalist 41 James Madison said the following:

It has been urged and echoed, that the power “to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,” amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare…But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?…For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity

  In other words the “general welfare” clause is tied directly to the 17 specific issues which follow. One simply cannot separate the “general welfare” clause from the enumerated powers of the Congress, they go hand in hand. So the “general welfare” clause is still limited to the precise enumerated powers outlined in the constitution.

  Still not satisfied? Here are some more thoughts from the main author of the constitution:

With respect to the two words ‘general welfare,’ I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators

  And yet that is exactly what has happened here–and in many other instances–the constitution has seen a metamorphosis in regards to the “general welfare” clause which is in direct odds with–and not contemplated by–the authors of the constitution.

   So the constitution does not give the government the right to interfere in the education of our children, that much is clear, so let us look at the reason Arne Duncan gave as to why the government is right in doing so in spite of what the constitution tells us. Arne Duncan claimed that the reason the federal government should get involved in education was to make sure that disadvantaged and poor children had the same opportunities as other, more well off children did.

  Why then did Barack Obama effectively kill the Washington DC school vouchers program which did just that? I guess the unions were more important than the children.