OPPOSITION TO TUITION TAX CREDITS AND VOUCHERS

WHEREAS, tuition tax credits and voucher schemes continue to pose a serious threat to public education even though attempts to pass federal legislation have been opposed effectively by the AFT and its allies over the past 10 years; and

WHEREAS, a tuition tax credit bill was last voted on and defeated by the U.S. Senate in 1983; and

WHEREAS, the Reagan administration's proposal for a voucher plan to provide parents with a certificate that, when presented to a private school, would allow that school to receive from the federal government the money that the Chapter 1 aid to the disadvantaged program would have provided to a public school was defeated in Congress without a vote because of the opposition of Democrats and Republicans alike; and

WHEREAS, this string of defeats in Congress has caused proponents of tuition tax credits and voucher schemes to reevaluate their strategy and seek enactment of these programs at the state level, with Iowa becoming in 1987 the second state, following Minnesota, to provide tax aid to private elementary and secondary education; and

WHEREAS, the majority of taxpayers do not support the use of public monies for private education; and

WHEREAS, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that such state legislation is constitutional under certain circumstances:

RESOLVED, that the AFT continue to work to defeat tuition tax credits and vouchers on the national level while working with its state affiliates to defeat similar proposals that are now being advanced at the state and local level; and

RESOLVED, that AFT state affiliates be apprised of this change in strategy, which has led to the new tax credit/deduction law in Iowa and present initiatives in many states such as California, Wisconsin and New York.