Last week the South Carolina House voted again on school choice legislation, and again it was defeated. However the drama demonstrated in Columbia shows the political maneuvering when trying to pass a school choice bill.
Wednesday a compromise school choice amendment was attached to H 3175 – a $150 million bill expanding 4 year old kindergarten for “at risk” students statewide. This bill was supposed to be Democrats’ top priority, but they voted to kill this bill (by sending it to the Ways and Means Committee) rather than discuss the school choice amendment – presumably because they were worried there were enough votes to pass the bill.
Not to be deterred, legislative supporters of school choice attached the same amendment to another bill up for debate that same day, H 3124 (a bill allowing for public school choice only). Meanwhile, a separate voucher amendment was also attached. And while some advocates did not support this particular voucher amendment, it was to be used as a vehicle on which to attach the first school choice proposal.
Unfortunately, debate was adjourned late Wednesday before actual adoption of the bill occurred. That gave the education establishment and its “lobbying machine” needed time to pressure some of legislators who had agreed to support school choice to switch their vote. Consequently, the tabling motion that was defeated on Wednesday evening was offered again on Thursday morning and passed; thus ending an opportunity to attach school choice onto the bill.
Many of those legislators were Republicans who caved in and went back on their word by switching their votes between Wednesday evening and Thursday morning.
Lessons learned: you can?t count on one party to pass school choice legislation, passing a school choice bill is not for the faint of heart, and the education establishment?s lobby techniques remain gargantuan! Meanwhile, school choice advocates in South Carolina regroup and wait to see what might happen in the Senate.
