Congressional Votes

During consideration of an education-policy bill (H.R. 5), Representative Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) offered an amendment to express the sense of Congress that the authority of the Department of Education “to operate or administer any office or program related to elementary or secondary education should be terminated on or before December 31, 2023.”

The House rejected Massie’s amendment on March 24, 2023 by a vote of 161 to 265 (Roll Call 156). We have assigned pluses to the yeas because education is not the role of government, let alone among the limited and specified powers enumerated for Congress in Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. A child’s education is the responsibility of, as well as a fundamental right of choice retained by, his or her parents. Forcing American citizens to furnish taxpayer money for a compulsory, failing, and government-run K-12 school system violates their individual liberties.

The STOP School Violence Act of 2018 (H.R. 4909) would authorize $75 million a year through fiscal year 2028 for the Justice Department’s Secure Our Schools grant program. SOS is a grant program of the Justice Department’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, which has been instrumental in laying the foundations for nationalizing local police by providing federal “assistance” in the form of funds, equipment, training, and development of guidelines to local law-enforcement agencies.

In a podcast interview with Conservative Review, Representative Thomas Massie (RKy.) said the “STOP School Violence Act was bad enough for nationalizing defense of our schools,” but he further revealed, “There is money in that bill that is going to go to gun control groups. It literally says in there you can give it to the 501-C3s, and then it also says in there it can’t go to train anybody on gun safety. It’s got to go for all the liberal sort of agendas.”

The House passed H.R. 4909 on March 14, 2018 by a vote of 407 to 10 (Roll Call 106). We have assigned pluses to the nays because school safety is not a proper function of the federal government, and no action the federal government has ever taken would actually make schools safe. School safety should be addressed at the local level. Furthermore, the nationalizing of local police and school security, as well as any other gun-control measures contained in the bill, are all strictly unconstitutional.

The final version (conference report) of H.R. 1 would overhaul education proposals to increase school accountability and reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) for six years. This bill would require states to test students in reading and math in grades three through eight annually, provide new accountability measures for schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress, and give schools greater flexibility to spend federal funds. It would include about $26.3 billion for federal elementary and secondary education programs and $13.5 billion for Title I programs for disadvantaged children in fiscal 2002. According to Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas): "H.R. I will lead to de facto, if not de jure, national testing.... Under the United States Constitution, the federal government has no authority to hold states 'accountable' for their education performance. In the free society envisioned by the founders, schools are held accountable to parents, not federal bureaucrats...."

The Senate adopted the conference report on December 18, 2001 by a vote of 87 to 10 (Roll Call 371). We have assigned pluses to the nays.

The final version (conference report) of H.R. 1 would overhaul education proposals to increase school accountability and reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) for six years. This bill would require states to test students in reading and math in grades three through eight annually, provide new accountability measures for schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress, and give schools greater flexibility to spend federal funds. It would include about $26.3 billion for federal elementary and secondary education programs and $13.5 billion for Title I programs for disadvantaged children in fiscal 2002.

The House adopted the conference report on H.R. 1 on December 13, 2001 by a vote of 381 to 41 (Roll Call 497). We have assigned pluses to the nays.