A Florida appeals court ruled 2-1 Monday that the state's voucher program -- allowing children to choose religious or secular private schools -- is unconstitutional.
The court majority said the Florida constitution prohibits any public money from going to sectarian schools, no matter how it gets there.
If this ruling stands at the state supreme court level, that will mean that thousands of poor and mostly minority students who have begun to demonstrate success in private schools will be forced to return to the failed government schools from which they were recently liberated, virtually guaranteeing them a dismal future.
The children have been getting a tuition credit and the parents, not state government, decide where to send their kids.
That's the way it works with pell grants for colleges. Why shouldn't it be allowed to work for grade schoolers?
It's all about politics and union money. It's not about the children who deserve a future.
But if this ruling stands, only the politicians will have a future. Poor children won't.
It is an outrage.
I'm Cal Thomas in Washington.
Cal Thomas is a nationally syndicated columnist based in Washington, D.C. Watch his television show, After Hours with Cal Thomas, on the Fox News Channel, Saturdays at 11 p.m. Eastern Time.
