[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 142 (Saturday, October 10, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S12273]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               EDUCATION

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, let me just say briefly, Mr. President, on 
the education issue, it is very difficult to deal with these 
negotiations fairly and honestly and productively when you have the 
President and the Democratic leadership coming out and bashing 
negotiators on issues like education. It also makes it difficult, when 
you have that happen, to be able to work with people with whom you 
disagree philosophically, although you try to work in good faith, but 
also it begins to diminish respect and trust.
  That is one of the biggest problems we have right now. It is so 
difficult to maintain a sufficient level of trust to be able to get 
your work done. I think most people who know me--Senators on both sides 
of the aisle--know that is very important to me. I strive to be 
trustworthy myself and to keep my word, and I find it very hard to work 
with people who I don't have that same feeling about.
  When it comes to education, I will stand aside to nobody, especially 
a bunch of people who went to private schools and then holler and 
scream about what ought to happen in public schools. I went to public 
schools from the first grade right through college. I went to Duck Hill 
Elementary and Grenada Elementary and Pascagoula Junior High School. My 
wife went to public schools. My children went to public schools.
  I believe and care about education and public schools. I worked for 
the University of Mississippi. My mother was a former schoolteacher. 
She taught school for 19 years.
  For the President to get up down there and demagog this issue about 
how he is not getting his principles in education is very hard for me 
to accept, Mr. President. What he wants is a Federal education program. 
He wants it dictated from Washington. He wants it run by Washington 
bureaucrats, and he wants it his way.
  I don't have faith in Washington bureaucrats. When the money comes to 
Washington and it trickles down through the Atlanta bureaucracy and 
trickles down to the Jackson bureaucracy, by the time it gets to the 
teachers and the kids, half of it is gone. And they are told, you must 
spend it this way or that way, when it may not be the way it is needed.

  I have faith in local school administrators, local teachers, parents, 
and, yes, the children, to make the decisions about what is needed for 
reading, what is needed in remedial math, what is needed to fight the 
drug problem. And so that is the basic difference for the American 
people. I ask you, who do you trust on education? The local officials, 
the local school officials, the parents, or Washington bureaucrats? 
That is the choice.
  President Clinton and his bureaucrats, the liberals in Washington, 
they want to run education and manipulate education from Washington, 
DC. The Republicans say we should return the money to the local level. 
If the schools want to use it for reading, fine. If they want to use it 
for extra teachers, great. If they want to use it for more school 
construction, that is their choice. If they want to use it for a drug-
free school program, great; do that.
  That is the difference. Who do you trust? Local officials or national 
officials? Who do you trust on education? The son of a schoolteacher 
and people who went to public education, or pampered people who went to 
private schools and then stand on their mounts and look down their 
noses and tell us what ought to happen in public education?
  I have about had it on this issue, and I am sending a warning to the 
President of the United States: I am not going to tolerate a whole lot 
more demagoguery on this subject.
  Mr. THURMOND addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina.
  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I want to commend the able majority 
leader for his remarks on just what he said. Are the local people going 
to control education or the people in Washington going to control it? I 
am in thorough, thorough agreement with the able majority leader in 
what he has had to say.

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