COURTING JUSTICE

U.S. Supreme Court Set To Rule On Vouchers, Public Drug Searches

Besides the kids' vacation from school and annual family pilgrimages to
visit Grandma and Grandpa on the other side of the country, June is usually
the month the U.S. Supreme Court winds up its session. Still before the
court are pending decisions on a couple of important cases regarding school
choice and individual liberty.

Folks on both sides of the school-voucher debate are awaiting the court's
ruling on Cleveland's voucher plan, which allows low-income parents to opt
out of the public school system and pay for private school tuition with
vouchers they receive from the state.

Voucher supporters say they should be able to use some of their education
tax dollars to school their children, regardless of what kind of school
they wish to attend. It could be private, even parochial.

Opponents counter that giving tax money to religious schools in particular
violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

As we've long noted on this issue, that argument seems like something of a
stretch. The federal government has for decades been providing grants and
guaranteeing loans to students to attend whatever college they choose, many
of which are church-sponsored. Are we to believe the First Amendment
applies in one instance and not the other? Unlike, other, murkier
church-and-state debates, such as the school-prayer issue, government
hardly seems to be making a law respecting an establishment of religion
simply by letting parents use tax dollars to educate their own children
- -not anyone else's - at schools of their choice.

Voucher foes also fear a loss of funding to public schools - something that
under most voucher proposals only would happen to an extent. Fundamentally,
though, if public schools aren't getting the job done in a way that pleases
their customers - parents and students - why shouldn't they face a loss of
revenue? Vouchers introduce the element of competition into education in a
way that forces the public education bureaucracy to respond to parents'
concerns by teaching students better.

Vouchers stand to give low-income parents the opportunity to take their
children out of schools that are failing them to move them into schools
that won't.

Arguably, then, everyone wins with vouchers. Schools facing the possibility
of losing students will respond by improving or closing. And in either
case, those students will end up in schools that will give them the
education they need.

Will the high court factor in such considerations?

Also on the Supreme Court's plate is a case involving police searches of
bus passengers' baggage. The court will decide whether police can board
buses or other public transportation and ask to search baggage to look for
drugs or other contraband. Police insist they need this power to thwart
drug smugglers.

Civil libertarians contend that such searches are a breach of the Fourth
Amendment. That amendment safeguards "The right of the people to be secure
in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable
searches and seizures ... and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable
cause ... ."

When the Founders wrote that amendment, it was common practice for British
soldiers to stop citizens on the streets and search them for proof they
were involved in the freedom movement that led to our independence.

The soldiers didn't need any reason or warrant; they could search anyone,
anytime. The amendment recognizes that such searches were an insult to
basic human dignity and so forbade them.

In modern times, government officials have used the war on drugs as a
reason for all manner of practices that ignore the Bill of Rights. If the
court allows such searches, what's to stop the police from not only
searching baggage but also searching passengers as well?

And all without any suspicion of a crime. That certainly seems to be
unreasonable by most anyone's definition.

The justices have heard the arguments, read the briefs and done the legal
research. Now they must make their individual decisions and pool them into
a single decision for each case. Since we all have to live with those
decisions, let's hope they make them in favor of the ideals upon which this
country was founded.