The Case Against Compulsory School Attendance Laws

In result of 12 years of formally-structured public school education, plus six years of college, this blogger comes to the conclusion that schooling on voluntary basis is far preferable to schooling on the basis of government coercion and compulsion. Here are the reasons for that conclusion:

1)"God loves a cheerful giver." The Bible, II Corinthians 9:7. The heart of a volunteer is sincerely devoted to his/her cause, purpose or activity, as contrasted with grudging attitude and lack of enthusiasm from those acting under compulsion. We want students in school because they want to be there, not because they have to be there.

2)The U.S. Constitution First Amendment freedom of assembly is also the freedom not to assemble, if one so desires. Compulsory school attendance may violate this Constitutional right.

3)The Declaration of Independence, as a back-drop raison d'etre for the Constitution, speaks of the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as being God-given, and thus inalienable and inviolable by human governments. Thus, people have a right to pursue happiness on their own terms, and not on the government's terms, so long as they do not violate the just Constitutional rights of other people.

4)School administrators and teachers should have to sell their services in context of a free and open market-place, just as every other service and commodity must do. Guaranteed customer clientele means the service or commodity being sold requires coercion to sell it, thus casting doubt upon its value to society.

5)School must not be a substitute for prison, keeping youth occupied just to keep them out of trouble with the law. Also, school may, even though perhaps unsought, nevertheless teach would-be criminals how to commit more sophisticated crimes. Education is no final guarantee of obedience to law.

6)No names mentioned, but some of this blogger's high school classmates from 1964 found magnificent and splendid careers based on skills not learned in public schools. One classmate even flunked a grade in junior high school, but today still has a very successful business.

7)The Col. Zadok Magruder High School(where this blogger's daughter attends) Music Department is very popular, participated in by many of the school's students, all volunteers. There is no obligation for students to sign up for these music courses, either chorus or orchestra. Yet, the school has a nearly-full-sized student symphony orhestra, a jazz band, and several choruses. The truly successful teacher is the one who can inspire his/her students to pursue his/her subject on their own initiative, even after they have left his/her classroom. The high school's Music Department belies any claim that, without government coercion, nobody would go to school. Compulsory school is merely a guarantee of a captive student audience for mediocre teachers.

8)Even if we make mistakes in our life choices, it is far better that we make them, than that government make them for us. When government makes our mistakes for us, it rarely, if ever, takes any corrective measures to redress any injuries it may have inflicted upon us resulting from its decisions concerning our lives.

Before government tells students in school to quit bullying, it should first take a hard, honest look at its own policies, to see where it might be engaging in administrative bullying, just to feed its own ego. If we are to treat our youth like young adults, they must learn to take full responsibility for their own decisions. True enough, ability of responsible adult citizens to earn their own way without becoming a societal welfare charge is a legitimate concern, and to address that concern, the use of social welfare programs should be limited exclusively for the relief of those physically and/or mentally unable to work. Others must learn to put aside something for themselves for another time, when on the mountain-tops of life, so they may survive when they find themselves sojourning in its valleys.

-LKM