The Missouri Legislature is considering two problematic bills that threaten secular public education. Your lawmakers need to hear your opposition.
H.B. 2065, the “Show Me a Brighter Future Scholarship Program,” will give families a tax credit to send their children to private schools. This neo-voucher scheme diverts money away from the already underfunded public education system and puts the most vulnerable students at risk. Private schools, very often religious, are able to deny admission to students for any reason and skirt state-mandated civil rights protections for students. This bill would let them do so on the taxpayers’ dime with no government oversight.
H.B. 1345 allows school districts to offer elective social studies courses on the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. While politicians often claim that these laws are intended to teach the bible in the context of U.S. history, we know their true agenda is to abuse their access to young and impressionable children and indoctrinate them with religious orthodoxy. Besides the obvious inherent bias in requiring classes only on a specific set of religious texts, public school bible classes across the country have invariably ended up unconstitutionally promoting religion.
Both of these bills have passed out of committee and are headed to the full House for a vote. Please urge your Missouri representative to vote no on H.B. 2065 and H.B. 1345 and to reject these theocratic efforts to undermine secular public education.
