Progress Report at the Capitol

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May 11, 2004

Progress Report at the Capitol

The Legislature's constitutionally mandated adjournment date is next Monday, May 17th. The two biggest education issues this session have yet to be resolved.

1. Commissioner Yecke's confirmation remains in limbo.
2. The Senate passed its illegitimate and radical social studies standards last Tuesday. A House/Senate conference committee was appointed and met today. They will negotiate the differences between the House and Senate versions of the education bill.

See the voting record for Senate votes.

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1. Commissioner Yecke's confirmation remains in limbo.

Despite having taken endless hours of committee testimony, Sen. Kelley and the DFL dominated Senate are leaving the confirmation of the Commissioner hanging. It appears Senate DFLers hope to extort some leverage by holding denial of confirmation over her head indefinitely.

From the Star Tribune:

Kelley insisted that DFLers on the Education Committee aren't using Yecke's confirmation as a bargaining chip to leverage legislative concessions out of either Gov. Tim Pawlenty or the Republican-dominated House. But Sen. Sandy Pappas, DFL- St. Paul, wondered if a little horse-trading might come into play, especially if a confirmation vote is put off indefinitely.

"The longer it goes on, the more likely that the governor could try to make deals with individual legislators," said Pappas, one of six committee Democrats who voted to recommend Yecke's dismissal. "I don't really like linkage, but that does go on around here."

The public appears to believe there is 'linkage' also. The Star Tribune instant poll of April 28, 2004 asked the question: Why did the committee reject Yecke?

Of the 20,303 people who voted,
87% believed that the DFLers were playing political power games or that the vote simply reflected sentiments opposing Governor Pawlenty. 12% believed that the committee rejected the Commissioner because she is not the best choice for the job. 1% didn't know or didn't care

Yet the Senate Majority continues holding out, paying little heed to public sentiment.

2. Social Studies and Science Standards

Last week the radical Kelley standards came before the full Senate. Many call them anti-American for a number of reasons, one being that his standards remove the requirement to teach national sovereignty. The Kelley standards replace the concept of sovereignty with numerous references to globalism. The Kelley standards passed the full Senate on a strictly party line vote, 31 to 34, with Kiscaden and Marko absent.

The DFL Senators voted in lockstep with Sen. Kelley's leadership. One after the other, they defeated amendments to:

Substitute the citizen standards in place of the Kelley standards. (See our review of the Kelley Standards)
Include the teaching of national sovereignty and self evident truth (Sen. Kelley asked Sen. Bachmann to point out where national sovereignty was found in the Declaration).
Require all scientific evidence be presented on controversial Life Sciences issues, such as evolution. (A recent Minnesota Zogby poll indicated that 82% of the MN public favors presenting the full range of scientific data on controversial issues, such as evolution.) (See our update.)
Restore the traditional B.C. (Before Christ) and A.D. (Anno Domini) in place of "B.C.E." (Before Common Era) and C. E. (Common Era) The Kelley standards adopted the new way of marking history right from the National History Standards. These changes are part of the systematic and deliberate censorship in our schools of any reference to a western Christian heritage. (This is one of the reasons that the National History Standards were opposed by the U.S. Senate in 1995 on a vote of 99 to 1.)
Include the benchmark that Abraham Lincoln considered that the principles of the Declaration were believed by the founders to be true for all people in all times;
Require schools and libraries to use software that blocks internet pornography.

Here are the Senators who voted to oppose the citizen standards:

Anderson, Bakk, Berglin, Betzold, Chaudhary, Choen, Dibble, Foley, Higgens, Hottinger, Dean Johnson, Kelley, Kiscaden, Kubly, Langseth, Lourey, Marty, Metzen, Moua, Murphy, Pappas, Pogemiller, Ranum, Rest, Sams, Saxhaug, Scheid, Skoe, Skoglund, Solon, Sparks, Stumpf, Tomassoni, Vickerman, Wiger.

Marko was absent. All Republicans voted FOR the citizen standards. Not a single DFL Senator supported a single amendment listed above. Every DFL Senator followed Sen. Kelley's lead on every vote.

See the voting record for each of those votes.

Last Friday, a House/Senate conference committee was appointed. In the House, the conferees are:

Sykora, Seagren, Jeff Johnson, Klinzing, and Nornes. None of these voted to support the important Buesgens amendment which would have preserved some of the better citizen standards. See our updates.

In the Senate, the conferees are:

Kelley, Skoe, Tommasoni, Marko, and Neuville.

The conference committee will negotiate the entire education omnibus bill this week. The science and social studies standards are part of that bill. (HF 1793)

There is room for compromise in the education bill as a whole, and there is room for compromise on other policy issues before the House and the Senate. But there is no room for compromise between the Kelley standards and the already significantly compromised House social studies standards.

We may see the final agreements before the week has ended.