Federal Aid to Education Since World War II: Purposes and Politics

By Carl F.Kaestle

Hundreds of essays have been written about it, thousands of hours of Congressional testi- Prefacemony devoted to it, dozens of campaigns focused on it; yet the origins of federal aid to elementary and secondary education are murky, its present status controversial, and its future uncertain. In an attempt to sort out the complicated history of the issue, this essay focuses on the purposes that have been asserted for federal aid in education, and the politics that have surrounded those purposes. The federal role in elementary and secondary education of course extends far beyond legislation that provides financial aid to schools. Federal courts and agencies regulate education in many ways; and the President, the Secretary of Education and others use their “bully pulpit” to convene discussions, to frame issues, and to set agendas. Many agencies outside of the Department of Education carry on educational programs, not only providing money but disseminating innovations and evaluating programs. This paper, however, focuses on the major bills for federal aid to schools, a prominent topic of debate and a matter of great concern to states and to localities. It is not a chronological narrative but rather an examination of purposes and politics.

CONTEXT: Nonetheless, the federal role in education was neither AMERICA AFTER WORLD WAR II very controversial nor very consequential for most Most people seem to agree on at least one Americans and their politicians. To be sure, there thing about federal aid to education: there wasn’t were advocates of more substantial general aid to ele- much of it before World War II. In the first 150 mentary and secondary education, but they were reg- years of the country’s history, the Congress occa- ularly trounced in Congress.1 sionally announced that education was in the Indeed, the drubbing continued in the 1940’s national interest and from time to time devoted and 50’s — but by then the context was different. some resources to improve education, notably The Depression and the War had changed the through land grants to colleges, vocational educa- face of federalism in America. In response to the tion programs run through the states, and various economic crisis President Franklin Roosevelt had bills to support the education of native Americans. engaged the federal government in welfare and the The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 14

economy on a scale hitherto unknown. Federal porting, storing, and deploying the goods and construction projects, welfare programs, and personnel of war. The federal government thereby social security raised people’s expectations about entered into the lives of its citizens at home and what the federal government could do for people. abroad with unprecedented scale and authority.8 These expectations were reinforced by The momentum of the War mobilization carried Roosevelt’s enunciation of the Four Freedoms in into the years beyond. In the immediate after- 1941, including the freedom from “want” and math, there was the huge job of relocating men “fear.” He embellished these in his last annual and women from the armed forces back into the message in 1944, setting out an “economic bill of civilian economy. One of the results of manpower rights” that included health, education, shelter, planning discussions occasioned by this looming and employment. As David Kennedy points out, transition was the Servicemen’s Readjustment Americans in 1944, with the distractions of war Act, passed in 1944. This “GI Bill of Rights” was and the security of a booming wartime economy, intended in part to reward service to the country were much less attentive to this message than and in part to ameliorate the negative effects they had been earlier.2 unemployment might have on the economy. The Still, Roosevelt’s rhetorical expansion of bill provided unemployment compensation, Americans’ rights reflected a growing reality of grants for education and training, and loans for governmental activism. Federal grants in aid pro- home purchases.9 grams, ranging from agriculture to welfare, rose While the GI Bill addressed the sacrifices from three percent of the states’ total revenues in made by individuals, a second piece of legislation 1932 to ten percent in 1952.3 Liberal attitudes recognized the costs of the War to communities. toward welfare and social security survived As the War deepened, the federal government assaults on the New Deal and made gradual had built more and more defense plants and sup- progress in both Democratic and Republican ply depots in the United States. These federal administrations in the 1950’s.4 President Harry properties were exempt from local taxation. Thus, Truman embraced the expansion of rights and many communities were faced with housing expectations and put more emphasis on civil shortages and with children in their public rights, which met with modest success.5 schools for whom they had no matching tax rev- Although the venerable tradition of local and enues. Congress addressed the housing problem state control entered the post-War world in in the Lanham Act of 1940, providing construc- robust health, the New Deal had challenged state tion money. When that bill was reauthorized in governments by showing what government could 1941, the lawmakers tackled the education prob- do.6 Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of the 1930’s lem, providing funds for both the construction began to press the role of the federal judiciary in and operation of schools in federally affected civil rights. Led by Hugo Black, the Court areas. The legislation sternly promised that the increasingly applied the Fourteenth Amendment federal government would exercise no “supervi- and the Bill of Rights to the states.7 sion or control” over schools thus assisted.10 America’s entry into World War II entailed a Although these programs were seen as temporary, massive mobilization of technology, organiza- the federal impact on localities did not cease with tions, and human beings. The federal government the War. New “impact” legislation was passed in created a defense infrastructure — planning, 1950, PL 815 for construction and PL 874 for organizing, recruiting, training, producing, trans- operating expenditures.11 Like the GI Bill, The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 15 impact legislation proved uncontroversial and reform than those who have benefited from it and popular. Both of these forms of federal aid sur- no longer need it.”14 Thus, when proponents of vived well beyond the 1940’s. federal aid to elementary and secondary schools The War also created momentum for liberal like Democratic Senators Elbert Thomas of Utah changes in employment conditions and civil and Lister Hill of Alabama revived their pre-War rights. It raised expectations among unionized efforts, there was no shortage of opponents. workers, who had achieved some bargaining gains during the War, among black Americans, who had fought for and won some modest civil rights Opposition to Federal Aid gains in the military, and among women, many of Until the late 1930’s opponents had clung to whom were reluctant to give up the jobs they had a constitutional argument about the Tenth assumed during the War. Thus, there were forces Amendment, stating that the Constitution for change in post-War America, and there were reserved to the states all powers not specifically new expectations about what the federal govern- granted to the federal government in the ment could do. Constitution, and that therefore the federal gov- Yet there were equally potent forces for a ernment had no constitutionally defensible role return to “normal.” Many wanted a respite from in the provision of education. From 1937 onward, change after the successive crises of depression the Supreme Court endorsed the federal govern- and war. They did not want more government ment’s authority more expansively, essentially innovation and intervention. They wanted, in the rejecting the strict “enumerated powers” argu- words of Senator Robert Taft, to return to the ment.15 Still, opponents of federal intervention in “traditional American heart of things — liberty.”12 local public schools argued that it violated a valu- Many years earlier Alexis de Toqueville had wor- able tradition. It was valuable because local con- ried that the pursuit of equality in America would trol worked better. It worked better because local centralize the government’s power at the expense officials knew local problems and local people of liberty. Politics in America after World War II and could forge local solutions that worked. Why, were still tempered by this polarity. Many pre- then, did not the local school boards and their ferred liberty to more government because the Chambers of Commerce oppose state authority in economy had recovered nicely, and for many, stan- education, which, during the course of the twen- dards of living were up. Big manufacturing firms tieth century, had increased greatly? One would responded to some of labor’s raised expectations, think that state government posed the same offering more benefits and job security in return threat of strangers interfering with local schools; for a truce between labor and management.13 And faceless bureaucrats in the state capital making many people focused their attention not on the cookie-cutter solutions, the same for all commu- government but on the innovations coming out of nities. Indeed, localities had opposed the states’ appliance factories, the entertainment industries, role in elementary and secondary education in the and auto showrooms. Speaking of anti-New Deal first half of the nineteenth century, on just these sentiment, Eric Goldman wrote in 1955, “no grounds.16 But public opinion gradually swung nation can go through such rapid changes in its toward state involvement. At first it was limited domestic life without backing up an enormous to required reports, a modicum of state aid, some amount of puzzlement, resentment, and outright rudimentary regulations upheld by county agents opposition. …No group is more annoyed by of the state, laws encouraging the consolidation The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 16

of small districts into town-wide systems, and joined with Democrats in the Senate to propose a pressure for communities to mute or abandon bill guaranteeing a minimum per pupil expendi- distinct religious doctrines in public schooling. ture across the country.17 But many of his col- But by the mid-twentieth century, states were leagues thought he had lost his much-vaunted providing substantial aid to local school budgets, Republican mind and abandoned the principles of and in return they were in many states regulating fiscal restraint and limited federal intervention. curriculum content, teacher certification, and the Indeed those principles were the core of the oppo- length of the school year. sition. They were well expressed by Sylvia One benefit of this shared funding and Anderson, a citizen of Leurstown, Montana who shared governance was that the states could make wrote to the Secretary of Health Education and modest attempts to ameliorate the harsh inequal- Welfare, Marion Folsom, in 1956. Like a lot of ities of district-level school finance. Somewhat Republicans, she was dismayed at the endorse- uncomfortable partners, united by regional pref- ment of federal aid by President Eisenhower’s erences and a shared apprehension of federal White House Conference on Education. With control, opponents of federal control drew from clarity and force she expressed the arguments that both the local control and the states’ rights tradi- have held so much sway on this issue over the tions and tried, successfully if incongruously, to decades and are thus worth noting in detail: weld them together. My husband and I are against any Federal aid The first argument against a federal role — to education because: 1.) Federal aid means that it was unconstitutional — had waned (but not federal control, 2.) No one will be able to stop disappeared) by the 1950’s. The second argument the snowballing effect once it got started… — that decisions about local schooling were best 3.) Uncle Sam is $280 Billion in debt — I’m left to local decision-makers — was central. ashamed to tell my kids that — they will have Although it was often challenged by civil rights that mess to clean up. 4.) A certain amount of advocates from the 1950’s on, it has many sup- money will be lost in the shuffle from State to porters to this day. The third argument was that Federal and back to State. 5.) Federal aid federal intervention was not needed because local- means more people on federal payroll, ities, with help from their states, could provide therefore more centralization of government good education for their children. Thus, Robert which we are absolutely against. 6.) Our state Taft, opposing “emergency” assistance for schools can take care of itself. 7) Catholics will want in 1943, argued that states did not lack the Federal aid too which will lead to a State- resources to do the job, and for Taft such a lack of Church government, which we are against. 8.) state capacity would have been the only justifica- We feel there is a conspiracy to undermine tion for federal aid. Two things are noteworthy and bankrupt the U.S.A… . This was evident about this argument. First, it represents an early at the White House Conference on version of the equal opportunity argument, but Education… 9.) Pressure put upon you by the unit of analysis is the state, not localities or professional educators may be sincere, but we individuals. Second, this criterion allowed the feel too many of them are not practical possibility that in the future such an incapacity minded — they’re idealists. 10.) If you raise would be demonstrated. And that is exactly what taxes any more you’ll defeat our economy — happened. In 1946 Taft changed his mind, having we already feel the pinch of years of pork- again studied the state data on school finance. He barrel socialism.18 The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 17

The national Chamber of Commerce and its Thus the anti-centralization argument had a local affiliates echoed Mrs. Anderson’s senti- particular anti-Communist twist in the 1950’s. ments. The Detroit Board of Commerce wrote When Alabama Congressman Carl Elliott, an Folsom, “We believe that citizens of a community ardent New Dealer, talked about the obstacles to are best able to determine what type of educa- federal education aid in the 1950’s, he named the tional program they wish to support” and that “3 R’s,” which included Race, Religion, and “citizens will recognize the folly of asking for “Reds.” This mantra of three “R’s” has lived on, financial assistance from a government that is repeated again and again by historians: federal aid operating at a deficit.”19 bills failed because of a combination of religion This positive affirmation of the capacity of (aid to parochial schools), race (the threat that localities and states to provide education, and the federal aid would be coupled with demands for positive wisdom of leaving decisions closer to the racial desegregation), and traditional anti-central- communities, had their negative corollary in dis- ization arguments, including the anti- trust and apprehension of big, centralized govern- Communist version.21 ment. These negative associations flowed from However, if we look at the work of scholars two related sources: anti-New Deal sentiment, who have closely dissected the failure of federal and the conviction that big government was a step aid to education legislation from the 1940’s toward totalitarianism. Those who rejected the through the early 1960’s, we find that there were New Deal argued that it was a wrong-headed more than three obstacles. In a famous article, departure from Jeffersonian principles of limited Hugh Price used the phrase “3 R’s” but instead of government. These views became reinforced and “Reds,” he substituted the Rules Committee of linked with two international contexts, in swift the House of Representatives, referring to the succession: the fight against fascist nations in stranglehold that the Rules Committee and its World War II and the struggles with Communism chairman could employ to block legislation.22 To in the Cold War. In the 1950’s, arguments against this nondemocratic aspect of House procedures federal aid as a big-government menace ranged could be added the powers of committee chair- from the long-standing, calmly stated positions of men more generally, as in the example of the national Chamber of Commerce, to the more Congressman Graham Barden, Democrat of extreme views of the radical right. In his regular North Carolina and chair of the House radio broadcast on Mutual Broadcasting System, Committee on Education and Labor, who exer- John T. Flynn editorialized, cised every wile and every procedural power he had to delay or defeat federal aid to education There has been a powerful element in this bills he did not favor.23 In their useful mono- country promoted mainly by the socialist graph Frank Munger and Richard Fenno dis- elements. It is part of the general scheme to cussed a few important additions to the list of take power away from the states and give it to obstacles. Before they got to the “3 R’s,” they Washington… The scheme has been pointed out that people disagreed strongly about promoted for a number of years by the whether federal aid should be largely across the National Education Association… . [It] is a board or strongly equalizing in its allocation for- movement to enable the federal government to mulas. A certain level of reallocation can be a take over the job of turning out a whole positive factor in gaining support (fairness, share generation of little socialists and pinkoes of the wealth), but strongly reallocative legislation is various hues.20 The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 18

a tough sell, because opponents always do a chart fore insufficiently summarized by the “three R’s.” of the winners and losers (which, in this case, are A more comprehensive list might be called the states). Second, lest we forget, Munger and Ten Gremlins: Fenno noted that people disagreed strongly about Anti-centralization what the purposes of federal aid should be (the The politics of equalization leading candidates in the 1940’s and 50’s were per Fiscal restraint pupil expenditures, school construction, and Lack of consensus on purposes teacher salaries). After reminding us of these Parochial school aid additional obstacles, Munger and Fenno turn to a Party politics chapter about the usual triumvirate: federal con- Segregation trol (the centralization issue), parochial schools, Competition with higher education and racial segregation.24 The power of committee chairs In one of the best monographs on educa- Presidential inattentiveness tional legislation in the 1950’s and 60’s James Sundquist lists the three traditional factors as It is no wonder that one of the liveliest books key, but substitutes fiscal restraint for the central- on this topic is called Obstacle Course on Capitol ization issue. Fiscal restraint is related to the Hill.28 Prior to discovering that book, I had settled anti-centralization theme but flows more from on a similar metaphor. I imagined two slalom ski concern with balanced budgets than from devo- runs, next to each other, both with icy surfaces and tion to local control.25 One further obstacle, so hairpin turns. One is the House Slope, the other obvious that analysts don’t list it, is party politics. the Senate Slope. In order to secure passage of a bill Bipartisan cooperation was sometimes achieved for federal aid to schools, two teams, one on each on federal aid to legislation, but it was transitory, slope, must ski down to the bottom of the hill. The and, at some crucial points (as in President upper reaches are called the Subcommittee Run, Eisenhower’s last year) election-year politics after which comes a series of turns known as the scuttled cooperation on federal aid bills. A fur- Committee Run. On the House Slope there is also ther obstacle is mentioned by Gordon Ambach, a treacherous area known as the Rules Run. Then who worked in the Office of Education on both slopes have bumpy, lower reaches called the higher education issues during the early 1960’s. Floor. If skiers from both teams make it that far, the After 1958, when higher education began to get two slopes merge in a final dizzying down- significant help in the form of scholarships, con- hill straightaway through Conference Pass. Then struction and other assistance, there arose com- the paths separate briefly again, for the Second petition between the higher education commu- Floor Run. At every turn, all the way down, oppos- nity and those still pressing for substantial aid to ing teams are allowed on the ski slope to set traps, elementary and secondary schools.26 Finally, lack trip the skiers, or throw gravel on the ice. At the of Presidential leadership has been charged very bottom, where the trails meet again, against President Truman, President Eisenhower an official called the President has the opportunity and President Kennedy for the failure of educa- to close the ski run with a key called the Veto. tion aid legislation during their administrations.27 The obstacles to passage of federal aid to elementary and secondary education are there- The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 19

STUDYING LEGISLATION: “general” aid, that is, legislation to aid school dis- A REVIEW OF SOME MODELS tricts that did not tightly specify how the funds are to be used. The closest thing to purely general aid Given this impressive list of obstacles to fed- was the bill sponsored unsuccessfully by Senators eral aid, proponents continually failed, and their Taft,Thomas and Hill in 1947, which proposed to failures continually inspired them to innovate. supplement local school funds to create a mini- The obstacles played out differently depending mum per-pupil expenditure of $55 per child upon how the federal aid was defined and nationwide. Part of the impact aid funds also went explained, so advocates kept pursuing the elusive for general operating expenses of school districts. bill that could make it all the way down the But the word “general” is something of a mis- slalom. In doing so, they fashioned categories and nomer because the label is also used for aid limited theories about the purposes and politics of legis- to school construction and aid limited to teachers’ lation, and some of those have persisted as analyt- salaries. Nonetheless, the term is used to cover ical categories today. They can be helpful or mis- proposals for all these purposes. It is a convenient chievous, depending upon how they are used. way to summarize the early post-War history of Four sets of terms are discussed in the remainder federal aid: bills recommended before 1958 were of this paper. Specifically, they are: first, the general, and they all failed, while those in 1958 familiar dichotomy between “general” and “cate- and 1965, which succeeded, were “categorical,” gorical” aid to schools; second, my distinction that is, they specified more carefully what the between “episodic” and “incremental” factors in money was to be spent for. This tale, of course, the development of the federal role, which res- masks many differences in the political attractive- onates with Nelson Polsby’s distinction between ness and fate of different kinds of “general” aid. “acute” policy innovation and “incubated” policy The Eisenhower administration approved of con- innovation; third, Theodore Lowi’s venerable dis- struction aid but not teachers’ salaries, arguing tinction between “developmental,” “regulatory,” that the risk of federal control was much greater in “redistributive,” and “constitutive” legislation; and the latter case. The Catholic Church’s policy arm fourth, a set of terms devised for this paper, dis- (the National Catholic Welfare Conference) was tinguishing between the “original,” the “discre- willing to consider construction aid to public tionary,” and the “mandatory” purposes of a fed- schools if it was mixed with some concessions to eral role in elementary and secondary education. private religious schools on transportation or In every case, as we shall see, the terms are not as other services, but it opposed aid to teachers’ precise or as mutually exclusive as they superfi- salaries. Another complexity arises from the fact cially appear. Their usefulness depends upon rec- that most debates about general aid also involved ognizing that in the real world of legislation there the question of whether the aid would be targeted will be hybrid proposals and gray areas, and thus at the poorer states, and what formulas would be there will be participants who have different per- attached to eligibility. Nonetheless, this era in the ceptions of the same proposal. history of federal aid is often summarized as simply a period of unsuccessful attempts to pass “gen- “General” versus “Categorical” Aid eral” aid bills. The big debates about school aid in the period In contrast, the National Defense Education from the 1940’s to 1957 were about proposals for Act (NDEA) of 1958 specified that the funds The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 20

were to be used for summer institutes for teacher that same categorical nature of the legislation, training in math, science and languages, for lan- with its attendant regulations, soon aroused guage and science laboratories, and other enumer- another fount of traditional opposition to federal ated activities. While the prospects of general aid aid: resistance to federal control. And the other had been paralyzed by disputes over aid to reli- “R”, race, loomed important in the implementa- gious private schools, the NDEA afforded some tion of ESEA. In the South, ESEA’s Title I pro- benefits to these schools and their teachers. James vided the lever for the Office of Education to Sundquist writes that the NDEA “had shown that press for racial desegregation, relying upon the special-purpose aid, carefully designed, could be fulcrum of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which enacted at a time when general-purpose aid could forbade discrimination in any program receiving not be.”29 Also, of course, the bill benefited from federal money. This could have been the case its association with an urgent Cold War crisis, the regardless of whether the aid was general or cate- Soviets’ launching of Sputnik. The Elementary gorical, but the categorical nature of ESEA put and Secondary Education Act benefited from the the federal government in a posture of consider- same characteristics. The Johnson administration able active intervention overseeing the way its presented it as a response to a crisis of poverty and money was being spent, so the resistance to racial disharmony that could be alleviated by edu- desegregation was reinforced by resistance to cational opportunity. The bill specified that the detailed federal management of education. money was to be used for the education of chil- If the politics of enactment pushed legisla- dren in poor districts who needed help on basic tion from the general toward the categorical, the skills, although the definition of poverty was politics of implementation tended to the reverse. defined broadly in order to elicit widespread sup- Paul Peterson argued that the NDEA, which port for the bill. Other titles within the ESEA appeared to be tightly categorical, in fact had provided for library purchases, experimental proj- hands-off, weak oversight from the federal gov- ects, educational research and other targeted ernment, making it quite popular with school activities.30 It sidestepped the religious issue with officials and providing it with a reliable con- the same sort of compromises NDEA proponents stituency. Impact Aid, which had been quite had employed.31 Sundquist argues that “politics” “general” from the beginning, enjoyed the same dictated the shift to special- purpose (categorical) loose oversight and the same popularity among aid, resulting in “a complex structure of special local school officials and the Congress.34 purpose assistance,” a shift that no one would have Whether we can therefore generalize that federal recommended a decade earlier.32 The politics of programs only succeed when they are loosely enactment pushed it that way because of church- supervised is problematic. Some programs state issues. But one could argue that local school (for example, aid for the education of children districts would actually have been less threatened with disabilities) have succeeded in Congress by general aid to construction or teacher salaries, because of widespread public support, despite because such purposes were not so tightly pre- considerable levels of regulation. The point to scriptive, while categorical legislation sets the take from Peterson’s discussion of NDEA, it agenda and then monitors the expenditures.33 seems, is that appearance and reality are two dif- Thus, while the categorical nature of the ferent things when assigning labels like “general” 1958 and 1965 legislation allowed federal officials and “categorical.” More important, legislation some bargaining room on the church-state issue, may look like one thing when enacted and The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 21 migrate into something else when implemented to ensure that federal funds would “supplement, over several years. not supplant” local and state expenditures. Yet In some cases, not only the purposes but the even as early as the 1960’s, local school officials eligibility for participation widens. For example, surveying federal programs — though they might successive reauthorizations over the years fret over the bureaucratic burden of receiving the widened the definition of federal “impact,” thus grants — could reap considerable benefit to their widening the number of districts eligible. The budgets from programs for vocational education, same process occurred with Title I of ESEA: as science, math, and language training and facili- the formula defining “poor” families widened, the ties, compensatory education, library purchases, number of eligible schools continually increased. reform projects, and other purposes. This point In both cases, the legislation became, in this — that the more categorical programs there are, sense, more “general.” the more they act like a form of general aid — is a more speculative and metaphorical point, but it Critique: underscores the general caution that the distinc- The deceptively simple distinction between tion between “general” and “categorical” aid is “general” and “categorical” aid is therefore quite fuzzy. complex. It can be analytically useful and inter- esting if we keep the following caveats in mind. First, the pair of terms is better seen as a contin- “Incremental” versus “Episodic” uum than as a set of mutually exclusive cate- Factors Influencing the Federal Role gories. Some “general” aid bills are more targeted This distinction relates more to the politics of than others (e.g., aid for teachers’ salaries is more an expanding federal role than to its purposes. specific than aid for per pupil expenditures). One explanation for why the federal government Conversely, some categorical programs are continually assumes more authority and engages broader than others (e.g., ESEA was broader than in more activities points to periodic crises that NDEA, and NDEA was broader than vocational overcome our otherwise reluctant attitude toward education). Second, “categorical” legislation can, federal intervention. The solution to the crisis is a over the years, become more “general” as eligibil- piece of legislation, or the creation of an agency, ity widens or regulations allow more discretion to to address the problem. Perhaps the program local authorities. The research literature on helps solve the problem, often not, but by the implementation used to say “all implementation time the crisis has receded, the program has is local,” meaning that top-down regulation didn’t developed a bureaucratic momentum, including work very well at all; in the 1980’s, a body of employees, regulations, and constituents. Thus, research suggested that implementation of federal the agency survives, and the federal government programs was a long process of negotiation is at a new plateau of activity in that area. The between federal, state, and local actors, some- escalation continues with the next crisis.36 times leading to mutually acceptable, workable This “Leviathan” interpretation seems plausi- programs that retained a measure of categorical ble when applied to the federal role in elementary direction and oversight.35 Third, and paradoxi- and secondary education since World War II. cally, the more categorical programs there are, the After years of failure for general aid, the NDEA more they collectively act like general aid for a succeeded on the heels of the Sputnik Crisis. And district. The federal government did what it could the Civil Rights movement of the 60’s played a The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 22

role in the passage of ESEA. But to some extent, of time, with robust consideration of alternatives the association of landmark legislation with social and strenuous, partisan debate.37 crisis is required rhetoric. The proponents of general aid loudly proclaimed an “emergency” short- Critique: age of classrooms and teachers in the early 1950’s, In Polsby’s scheme, legislation is either to no avail. And the widely successful promotion “acute” or “incubated.” In reality, of course, there of crisis mentality by the 1983 Nation at Risk are hybrid cases, or, more important, cases in report, did not lead to a growth of the federal which some observers see the innovation as a Leviathan, even though the rhetoric of crisis was sudden outcome of a crisis and other observers supported by malaise from the 1980’s recession argue that it resulted from a more long-term and was accompanied by reports of America’s deliberative process. In an exchange with Daniel declining productivity and declining test scores. Patrick Moynihan, Elliott Richardson (then an However, because the Reagan administration was Assistant Secretary of Health, Education and firmly committed to a reduction in the federal Welfare), cautioned against the belief that role, the legislative aspect of this crisis played NDEA emerged suddenly, as a result of the itself out mostly at the state level. So there are Sputnik scare.38 Indeed, I had already tracked educational “crises” without landmark federal leg- Richardson through the archival paper trail, from islation. the White House Conference on Education in The converse can also be true. Public Law 1955, to the Committee on Education After 94-142, for the education of children with dis- High School in 1956, to the HEW task force on abilities, which was passed in 1975, followed a higher education legislation in 1957, which pro- gradual and profound professional shift of duced a bill that was nearly identical to NDEA approach, not a sudden crisis. Such developments during the year preceding the launch of Sputnik. may be called “incremental.” In the history of the That bill became NDEA. Similarly, with regard federal role in education they include such factors to ESEA, there appears at first glance a great dis- as the public’s gradual habituation to the federal junction between Kennedy’s failed attempts at role in other areas like housing and transporta- legislation for elementary and secondary education, evolving constitutional concepts relevant to tion, and Johnson’s swift, dramatic victory in education, expanding consciousness about rights, 1965; yet, various elements of that victory had and trends in immigration. These and other been “incubating” in the Kennedy years, most developments create the context and conditions notably, the idea of an omnibus bill and the idea that lead to policy innovations. of tying the education legislation to the economic My distinction between “episodic” and and social health of the nation. “incremental” factors echoes Nelson Polsby’s dis- Therefore, as in the case of “general” and tinction between “acute” and “incubated” policy “categorical” aid, we cannot treat the “episodic” innovations. Studying eight cases, including both and the “incremental” as mutually exclusive, but foreign and domestic policy initiatives, Polsby rather they combine, in different measure, in dif- posited two types of policy initiatives. “Acute” ferent legislative situations. That perception initiatives develop quickly, in reaction to a press- seems supported by the recent literature on polit- ing crisis, with few alternatives developed, and ical agenda-setting: first, the argument that suc- constraints on partisanship and debate. cessful legislation often comes about from the “Incubated” initiatives develop over a long period combination of an available, relevant set of policy The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 23 ideas (the policy “stream”) and the opening of a between four types of legislation. “Distributive” policy “window” that provides the opportune legislation targets money at specific clients or moment; and second, the idea that stability and purposes (it is called “developmental” by some instability in policy-making is related to the cre- political scientists). Such statutes include subsi- ation and decay of policy “monopolies.”39 This dies, land policies, aid to airports, river and har- literature can contribute to a more rounded pic- bors, and in education, vocational education or ture of how the federal role has developed. the GI Bill. Such initiatives generally flow out of Still, the Leviathan thesis reminds us of two the executive branch or from committees; they important points: first, that the politics surround- are perceived as creating only winners, not losers; ing new federal programs often encourages the thus, they are often uncontroversial and some- assertion of a crisis to justify a new intervention; times have low visibility. “Redistributive” legisla- and, second, that once implemented, legislative tion reallocates resources from some groups to programs often create a bureaucracy and a con- others in a more obvious fashion, as in Social stituency that guarantees their continuation. The Security, farm aid, progressive income taxes, or Leviathan thesis runs the risk, however, of over- Title I of the ESEA. These initiatives tend to looking the incremental processes that also breed strong coverage in the press and conse- encourage new federal initiatives, and second, quently a lot of activity on the floor of the overestimates the inexorable, linear upward Congress. “Regulatory” legislation implies the climb. The thrust of Johnson’s liberalism unrav- rule of law but nonetheless similarly generates eled by the late 1970’s; the share of local educa- much floor activity. Decision-making is domi- tion budgets provided by the federal government nated by Congress, not the Executive branch. went back down from 9 percent to 6 percent; and Examples would be labor relations legislation, or the late 1980’s consensus on national standards the regulation of advertising or drugs; at the local got politicized in the Clinton administration, level, it could be rent control. Regulatory legisla- over issues like whether standards would be tion affecting education includes Title IX of the developed to measure students’ “opportunity to 1972 Education Amendments, prohibiting sex learn.” While the trajectory of federal involve- discrimination in federally funded education pro- ment in education was generally upward from grams, or Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1958 to 1978, it was always bumpy, contested ter- 1964. “Constitutive” legislation, not important rain. And from the late 1970’s to the present, each for our purposes here, deals with such issues as administration has had to reinvent the federal the reapportionment of districts or the creation of role in education. new agencies. Lowi found that these categories behave differently with regard to who does the development of the legislation, who does the Theodore Lowi’s Enduring debating, and how much public and press Legislative Taxonomy scrutiny they receive.40 Proceeding from his skepticism about the Does Lowi’s taxonomy provide a key to “imperial Presidency” literature in the era of understanding the federal role in education? Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, Theodore There are two aspects of Lowi’s enterprise that Lowi tracked legislative proposals from their need not detain us here, one empirical, the other planning stages, through committees and in the theoretical. First, Lowi concluded that the “impe- press, to the floor debates. He distinguished rial” presidency had been overrated, and that The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 24

Congress was the key player in legislation more versial than the recommendation that it should than people thought. Second, he attempted to divest itself of the distributive programs. Nobody develop a predictive theory based on the four likes pork-barrel giveaways (except those who types. But for our purposes the importance of the benefit), but that hardly exhausts the repertoire of categories lies in the fact that they became federal grants-in-aid. What should the federal enshrined in the literature on federalism, and government do when it sees a national interest in some analysts have used them to make normative helping states and localities do something they judgments about what types of legislation can be are not currently doing and perhaps are unable to best handled by each level of government — fed- do? Peterson recognized this problem when he eral, state or local.41 Paul Peterson recommended worried at the end of his book about the fate of in 1995 that the federal government focus on its cities and their poorer residents.45 The advice of primary strength and responsibility, which lay in Peterson and Rivlin leaves us with few tools to redistributive policies for social security, welfare, decide carefully which developmental initiatives health care and the like. At the same time he rec- the federal level should take. It is a huge area that ommended that the federal government should in education would include most curriculum take a more cautious stance toward developmen- development (including virtually all of the NSF’s tal legislation, especially the kind that leads to work on elementary and secondary education), pork-barrel allocation of funds by enterprising assessment, teacher training, libraries, guidance, Congressional representatives.42 Alice Rivlin had vocational education, and a large host of other made a similar recommendation in 1992, essen- issues. This dilemma leads me in the next section tially that the federal, state and local roles should to take one further excursion into the making of be clarified, that overlap should be reduced, and taxonomies. that the federal government should stick mainly to redistributive actions.43 The “Original,” the “Discretionary,” Critique: and the “Mandatory” Purposes of the As with the previous taxonomies, Lowi’s cat- Federal Government in Elementary egories are not mutually exclusive. One person and Secondary Education may see Title I as a form of general aid, another By the “original” purposes of the federal role, as fundamental redistributive policy. As Beryl I mean those modest functions originally Radin says, “In many cases, policies emerge from assigned to the Office of Education and fre- the political process containing a combination of quently cited as the uncontroversial, basic federal these policy types. Coalitions are devised to max- functions in education. The Department of imize political support, not to enhance policy Education Act (1867) assigned to the new agency design coherence.”44 Like the other analytical the responsibility for collecting statistics and categories, Lowi’s are more useful if they are seen information about the condition of education in as aspects of legislation, not clear-cut types. the country and disseminating such information, Even if the distinction between redistribu- including observations about school organization tive and distributive legislation was always clear- and teaching methods. While there was some cut, we would still be in a quandary. The advice controversy about the functions and the perform- that the federal government is especially well- ance of the new Department (soon Bureau) in its suited to the redistributive role seems less contro- early years, the first two commissioners devel- The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 25 oped a set of activities that became the accepted education have not been strongly reallocative nor function of the Bureau in the late nineteenth cen- have they been required by some constitutional tury. Henry Barnard and his successor, John mandate. As with many of Lowi’s “distributive” Eaton, who served from 1870 to 1886, gathered laws, winners and losers are not perceived, the statistics, hired professional writers to write sources of the money are diffuse, and the recipi- reports, developed a fledgling national library of ents of the aid are numerous and widely dis- books on education, and published compendia of persed geographically. Such was the case with the statistics, minutes of national meetings about first federal law for categorical aid to elementary education, and surveys of knowledge on various and secondary schools, the Smith-Hughes Act of educational topics.46 With no power to enforce 1917, providing funds for vocational education, compliance in any matter, the Bureau of through voluntary grants administered by the Education sought to compile and disseminate states.48 As noted above, federal grants-in-aid information, report to Congress on the condition mushroomed after World War II, as the govern- of the nation’s schools, and write reports on ment got active in development projects in many promising developments in education. In the sectors, including health, transportation, housing, twentieth century, these functions withstood and education. Discretionary legislation in edu- assaults on the federal role in education. Donald cation at the federal level has escalated as the Senese, who was Assistant Secretary for the national interest in education has expanded into newly created Office of Educational Research campaigns for more equal opportunities and for and Improvement during the Reagan administra- higher general standards of excellence. Over the tion, emphasized that many Republicans, includ- past five decades the federal government has ing the President, drew upon the Heritage offered grants for school libraries, for science and Foundation’s publication, Mandate for Change, language labs, for school-based experiments in and that it recognized educational research and teaching and learning, for metric education, for statistics as a legitimate function of the federal the development of content standards and assess- government.47 ments, and for many other purposes. To these original functions were added a As voluntary and consensual as these pro- wide variety of functions I would call “discre- grams may seem, citizens, educators, and politi- tionary,” that is, Presidents and members of cians differ wildly in their judgments about how Congress found them consistent with the involved the federal government should be in ele- national interest in education, and sufficiently mentary and secondary education. Political posi- attractive, and they approved them through legis- tions on such discretionary legislation range from lation. Once a new initiative was passed, how- those who wish to curtail virtually all of it, abol- ever, various obligations ensued: the federal gov- ishing the Department of Education and putting ernment was obligated to provide the money as much federal aid as possible into block grants to promised; states and local school districts who the states; to theorists who urge much more cau- voluntarily participated were required to meet tion in selecting among developmental grant pro- certain requirements, often including the provi- grams, leaving most of it to the states; to a variety sion of matching funds. Such programs fall under of middle-of-the-road groups, including many the term “grants in aid.” They also generally fall interest groups who advocate ever greater federal under the “distributive” or “developmental” cate- aid in their target programs; to the advocates of gory of Lowi’s scheme. Most federal programs in national standards and national assessment, who The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 26

would like to see an authoritative (if shared) role Hot controversy of a different sort has long for the federal government in comprehensive con- been generated by my third category, issues that tent standards and accountability systems. The are “mandatory.” Carried largely by the courts and differences of opinion here are not, for the most involving only a small portion of legislative part, about what is being proposed — many agree actions taken by the Congress, these interven- that someone should regulate curriculum and tions are nonetheless the most coercive and con- develop test programs. Disagreement is over the troversial elements of the federal role in educa- level from which such authority is exercised. tion. These issues include civil rights matters like Opponents of federal prerogatives prefer to see protection from racial discrimination, First authority in the hands of the states, or mostly at Amendment matters concerning the separation the district or school level, or even in the hands of of church and state and the free exercise of reli- individual teachers. In this era of standards-based gion, and other constitutional issues, including reform, the federal government’s involvement has students’ rights and the educational rights of lan- ranged across curriculum development, ass-ess- guage minorities. Because these issues and the ment policy, whole-school reform methods, advo- rulings about them arise from the U. S. cacy of a voluntary national test, the relationship Constitution, they are inherently federal and, in a of Title I ass-essments to state standards, and a host of other thorny Since World War II the federal government had problems. Because the introduced a wide variety of such programs, yet policy frameworks of Sthere seems little consensus and no firm princi- standards-based reform and school-based reform ples about which are “proper” functions of the (in-cluding its free-mar- federal level. Choices seem to depend upon the ket choice version) are so inventiveness and the persuasiveness of the pro- profoundly at odds, debates about the fed- ponents, the economic resources available to the eral government’s proper federal government, and the level of partisanship role in developmental on the issue in the Congress and the electorate. legislation have become intense. Redistributive (or reallocative) legislation, an sense, mandatory. Of course, the enforcement of important category in the Lowi scheme, is not constitutional decisions in education varies required of the government. The U. S. tremendously from one period to the next; but Constitution does not specify how progressive the the government is not at liberty simply to ignore tax structure must be, and the Rodriguez case an issue once raised properly and forcefully declared that the Fourteenth Amendment does through the courts. The executive and legislative not require equalization of school district finan- branches may delay prodigiously, as in the well- cial resources.49 Thus, at the federal level, redis- known history of the Brown decision, and the lax tributive policy is another important and often enforcement of the Bible and Prayer decisions of controversial purpose within the discretionary the early 1960’s.50 But the nonjudicial branches of category. the government have to face these issues, to The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 27 resolve their positions, and, ultimately, either there seems little consensus and no firm principles enforce or challenge the decisions. Just as the about which are “proper” functions of the federal issues are pressed in a mandatory way on the gov- level. Choices seem to depend upon the inventive- ernment, when the enforcement mechanisms ness and the persuasiveness of the proponents, the finally get in motion, the solutions are applied economic resources available to the federal govern- coercively on the country’s schools and families. ment, and the level of partisanship on the issue in Unlike grant-in-aid programs, constitutionally- the Congress and the electorate. The challenge of related educational issues are not optional. Some the civil rights, church-state, and other constitution- Supreme Court decisions, to be sure, are permis- ally-based mandates, is that they are not discre- sive, as when they declare that a certain practice is tionary. The administration cannot do without a not unconstitutional, and is thus available to position on racial segregation, or affirmative action, states or localities who wish to adopt it. Such is or aid to religious schools. The question is what the case with decisions like Everson (1947) that solutions to espouse and how hard to press them. allowed states to provide busing of children to Like the other taxonomies, these categories religious private schools, but did not coerce any are not mutually exclusive. The “original” modest state to do so. But when practice is declared purposes, including statistics and research, have unconstitutional, the federal government disal- mushroomed into activities that affect the discre- lows it as a matter of law. The enforcement may tionary and mandatory purposes, as in recent be very uneven or dilatory, but compliance is not debates about the uses of the National voluntary. Assessment of Educational Progress, the prospect of a Voluntary National Test, or the statistical Critique: demands of Title I. And the promotion of good As with the Lowi scheme, we may now ask educational practices, which has been in the fed- whether these three categories I have proposed — eral repertoire since Henry Barnard’s time, may about the original, the discretionary, and the sound innocuous, but it can involve competition mandatory educational purposes of the federal gov- among policy alternatives, as in the recent Obey- ernment — are useful in laying out the evolving tra- Porter bill, which anointed a set of school reform ditions and the options for the future. The original strategies. There are also important overlaps purposes of the federal government in education — between the mandatory and discretionary cate- statistics, research, and information — are now seen gories. At a simple level, discretionary funding is as both acceptable and minimal. There may be spe- sometimes attached to mandatory purposes, as in cific debates about how the statistics agency handles the Emergency School Aid Act (1972), which the interpretation of data, or why the research provided transportation funds to districts agency doesn’t seem more useful, but not much attempting to desegregate schools through bus- debate about whether gathering statistics, sponsor- ing. At a grander scale, the Elementary and ing research, and publicizing best practice are Secondary Education Act of 1965 was a merger appropriate federal activities in elementary and sec- of civil rights concerns and a reallocation of ondary education. The biggest challenges are in the resources across districts, all surrounded and two other categories.The challenge with the discre- assisted by various developmental provisions for tionary category is the proliferation of programs. school improvement, libraries, research, and Since World War II the federal government had improved state departments of education. It was introduced a wide variety of such programs, yet an artful blend of categories. The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 28

The principal provision of the ESEA, Title tion for financial assistance to schools. The dis- I, for the basic skills training of children in cussion of mandatory, constitutionally-based poorer school districts, is an important example issues has expanded our horizon to include judi- of a federal purpose that bridges my categories of cial influence, which often operates independent “mandatory” and “discretionary.” Although the of grant funds. I shall broaden our canvas further Supreme Court declared (in Rodriguez, 1973) before we conclude, by mentioning two nonjudi- that the equalization of expenditures across cial modes of federal influence, neither of which school district lines was not constitutionally creates federal programs per se. First, block grants required, there are nonetheless two senses in have become a familiar feature in educational dis- which compensatory education for children in cussions and legislation, especially since the poor districts (and, indeed, the equalization of Education Consolidation and Improvement Act educational opportunity more broadly) is virtu- of 1981. They serve as a revival of the “general ally mandatory. First, since the 1960’s the right to aid” proposals in the 1950’s. In a block grant, the equal educational opportunity has come to be an government allocates funds with no strings (or article of faith among many Americans, whether few strings) attached. Here the government is it is a right protected by the Fourteenth assisting education by being a good producer of Amendment or not. The rhetoric is belied by the staunch resistance of Americans to the equalization of per Since 1980 each administration has pupils costs, but the rhetoric seems to had to reinvent the federal role. Even keep alive programs aimed at softening Sin the creation of goals-based reform, the harshness of the inequality, and the many cases of the past two decades in and the successive reauthorizations of which state courts have ruled that their major programs like Title I, there has constitutions demand equalization of been an aura of instability and contes- school resources have reinforced the public’s awareness of this inequity. tation quite different from the heady Second, as standards-based reform days of 1965. moves toward student accountability, attaching high stakes to student per- formance (such as retention in grade, assignment revenue and by leaving the decisions about educa- to tracks, or failure to graduate), equal protection tional purposes to the local or state level. Second, issues will be raised on behalf of students who the “bully pulpit” function of the federal govern- have not had a sufficient opportunity to learn the ment was much talked about during the first material tested. There is, then, an intermediate Reagan administration, when Secretary Bell’s category of virtually mandatory federal education pulpit was the Nation at Risk report (1983), programs, including those aimed at increasing which strongly influenced reform at the state equal opportunity. One can imagine a lot of level. Again, during the second Reagan adminis- things happening to Title I, but it is hard to tration, William Bennett relished the role and imagine Congress abolishing all federal efforts at used the phrase. Perhaps no federal official has providing more equal opportunity. ever been so visible and vociferous while trying at Until now I have focused mainly on legisla- the same time to reduce the authority and budget The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 29

of his own agency. The bully pulpit role was Kennedy omnibus bill of 1963, and the ESEA of revived in the Clinton administration after the 1965.The permanence issue became more ambigu- 1994 elections, which installed many conservative ous. Although these bills were justified as responses Republicans in Congress, complicating the Goals to crises, it was less clear that they would be phased 2000 legislative program and deflecting much of out. In his exchange with Elliott Richardson after it to the state level. Secretary Richard Riley, well- the passage of NDEA, Daniel Patrick Moynihan suited to the persuasive role, took his skills to wrote that it had ended the debate over a federal role in education. Richardson, the lead author of NDEA, qualified this, saying that Postwar educational policy has con- NDEA had indeed been “a crushing — even tinually faced the challenge of provid- mortal — defeat for the all-out opponents of Ping both equity and excellence. Each Federal action,” but that it was a middling approach, from “those who endorse short- administration had to decide how term programs to meet specific needs.” A much emphasis to put on each, and third participant in the debate, said how these goals can be combined. Richardson, had outlined the third alterna- tive. Representative Stewart Udall favored Neither can be jettisoned. permanent federal aid, and that issue, said Richardson, was still undecided.52 The passage of ESEA in 1965 was seen as even such venues as a meeting between conservative more decisive. Writing three years after the event, Christians and public school educators, trying to political scientist James Sundquist said that ESEA find common ground on religion in the curricu- “took the issue of federal ‘control’ out of the realm lum.51 of ideological debate and thrust it into the area of practical administration. Some measure of federal leadership, influence, and control is now with us. The Impermanence of the Federal Role Federal money is now being used, and will continue We have examined several sets of terms used to to be used, as a lever to alter… the American edu- characterize the purposes of federal education leg- cational scene.”53 It seemed to some that incre- islation. In the 1940’s and 50’s there was yet one mental and episodic factors had combined in 1965 more pair of terms that frequently entered the to escalate the federal role, and that it would be a debates. Would federal aid to education be tempo- permanent escalation. But the Leviathan interpre- rary or permanent? Many participants in the tation has proven only partly true. While ESEA debates — Republicans, Roman Catholics, others Title I has survived, NDEA slowly receded and its nervous about new schemes for federal involve- provisions were eventually absorbed into other leg- ment — argued that if there was to be federal aid, it islation or terminated. And Goals 2000, President should only be temporary, aimed at a present crisis, Clinton’s distinctive attempt to redefine the federal with a definite sunset in view. This rhetorical role, was substantially curtailed within a year of its weight against permanent federal aid for operating passage, due to the negative reactions of conserva- costs, construction, or teachers salaries was effec- tives elected in the elections of 1994. After that tive. But then legislative innovators turned to reversal, Under Secretary Marshall Smith wrote omnibus categorical bills — the NDEA, the failed that the age of big federal programs was over; that The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 30

the future lay in the bully pulpit and in dramatic, what it was to be an American and what the fed- temporary jolts of money or policy from the federal eral government should do to provide opportuni- level.54 There is, to be sure, a large legislative legacy ties. ESEA touched only incidentally on the from the period 1965 to 1979. The Department of excellence side — the quality of the core curricu- Education has survived, and there are regular reau- lum. Reviving such a focus on equity would thorizations of the Elementary and Secondary require the federal government to address two Education Act, with its centerpiece Title I. There widespread concerns that are stronger today than are bills for the education of children with disabili- in 1965. First, many people believe that there has ties, for vocational education and training, and for been too much emphasis on rights without a cor- other familiar federal initiatives. These have sur- responding emphasis on responsibilities. Second, vived through two decades of debate about the fed- there is more concern about the general quality of eral role. Nonetheless, while some federal educa- the public education system for all of its students. tion programs have been protected by popular The next big synthesis that attracted consid- purposes and sturdy constituencies, others have erable bipartisan support was standards-based ebbed and flowed. Even those constitutionally- reform. It tried to address both equity and excel- related purposes that I have called mandatory are lence by aiming at high standards “for all stu- pursued vigorously or weakly, depending upon the political complexion of a Reviving such a focus on equity would given administration. Since 1980 each administration require the federal government to has had to reinvent the federal role. Raddress two widespread concerns that Even in the creation of goals-based are stronger today than in 1965. First, reform, and the successive reauthorizations of major programs like Title many people believe that there has been I, there has been an aura of instability too much emphasis on rights without a and contestation quite different from corresponding emphasis on responsibili- the heady days of 1965. How would one achieve the consensus and ties. Second, there is more concern about momentum of 1965 again? Returning the general quality of the public educa- to the theme of this paper, let us look tion system for all of its students. once again at purposes and politics.

dents.” Yet its inspiration was in fact the opposite TOWARD THE FUTURE: PURPOSES of ESEA; it was about the core academic program of the schools for all children, not focused Postwar educational policy has continually on disadvantaged groups. And its equity con- faced the challenge of providing both equity and cerns, when they emerged in the Clinton admin- excellence. Each administration had to decide istration, caused cracks in the consensus.55 how much emphasis to put on each, and how Both ESEA and Goals 2000 embodied pol- these goals can be combined. Neither can be jetti- icy frameworks that reflected majority opinion soned. ESEA emphasized the equity side of the about the problems and purposes of American K- polarity. It drew on expanding expectations of 12 schooling in their day. The legacies of both are The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 31

First, having gain, and abandon common purposes and expe- made the states the main players riences.57 Thirty-five years of debates over the purposes of education have put us in a very dif- Ffor two decades, and having ferent position today than that of Lyndon increased their capacity to Johnson and his generation as they set out to develop and implement educa- imagine a federal role for education and build consensus around it in 1965. tional policy, it is difficult to imagine federal officials putting those genies back in the bottle. TOWARD THE FUTURE: POLITICS Reinventing the federal role in education will written in the daily life of public schools. Each involve daunting challenges for the new adminis- was a major synthesis, but each has evolved away tration. First, having made the states the main from some of its early components. ESEA players for two decades, and having increased their remains a huge program but became detached capacity to develop and implement educational from its most controversial feature, its use in pro- policy, it is difficult to imagine federal officials moting school desegregation, and Title I funds putting those genies back in the bottle. Of course, are less concentrated on high poverty districts state-based standards reforms do not exhaust the than was originally envisioned. Standards-based federal government’s involvement in education. reform has also had a huge influence, but has had Many programs still move from Washington to to forego two controversial features, the federal classrooms in a mode that would seem familiar to role in approving content standards and the pro- policy makers from the 1960’s. Congress and the posal for national testing. It became primarily a administration formulate and legislate policy, fed- state-level activity, with the encouragement of the eral officials confer with people in the field and federal government. then issue guidelines. Then they disburse funds, Is a new synthesis of federal purposes in edu- monitor and negotiate state and local compliance, cation possible? A good, new synthesis would and they adjust guidelines. States and districts, have to meet the twin demands of excellence and along with various other interest groups, take equity. That would take some imagination at this active roles. But the capacities of the state agencies point in our history, because those competing of education are no longer the subject of derision purposes have the capacity to pit people against by the federal level. They have been heavily each other. A new synthesis would also have to shaped by federal funding and federally-funded address the thorny question of the duties of citi- personnel within state agencies, but they are also zenship. Critics of the integrative, liberal state willing and necessary partners in education say that its policies have put too much emphasis reform. A new synthesis of federal purposes in on group rights, that identity politics spelled the education, then, would have to acknowledge this doom of liberalism as defined in the Johnson change in the role and capacity of the states. era.56 On the other hand, critics of the increas- Second, the politics of education (and ingly influential free-market, pluralist, laissez- national politics in general) have been highly par- faire position say that its key policy goal — tisan recently. The fact that education is a much vouchers for school choice — would privatize the more prominent issue with the electorate today purposes of education, emphasize individual than in 1965 creates as much controversy as con- The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 32

sensus. If a new synthesis of federal purposes in agenda from endless possibilities? How will education is to succeed politically in the new the agenda-setting and the conduct of pro- administration, it will have to do much work in grams be creatively shared with states and the political center. The education reform scene is localities? more fragmented than in 1965. There is a sub- • What balance shall we strike between an stantial interest in choice and privatization. emphasis on equity and an emphasis on Within the reform of public schools, there are excellence? How can we best pursue simulta- differences between standards-based reformers neously the improvement of the schools’ per- and school-based reformers that will demand formance as a whole, for all children, and great skill to reconcile. their success with students who are disadvan- As a historian, I have no special wisdom to taged? craft an program that would make it to the bottom of the treacherous ski slope, crossing the fin- • How shall we approach constitutionally- ish line with a new omnibus bill raised in tri- based education issues amidst thickets of umph. Arm-chair theorists would like to see philosophical, political, and technical prob- federal policy makers address the purposes and lems? How can we broaden consensus among politics of their education program in a system- Americans about the principles of fairness atic way. Actual policy occurs in a more haphaz- and inclusiveness that lie behind such issues? ard way, driven by many existing commitments • How can we make the traditional purposes of and political factors. Nonetheless, a little dash of federal involvement in education — conduct- historical reflection, political theory, and broad ing research, gathering statistics, and dissemi- policy analysis might help bring coherence to the nating information about good practice — day-to-day agenda. Among the persistent ques- serve the rest of the agenda without politiciz- tions policymakers will face in reinventing the ing those functions? federal role in elementary and secondary education are these: The times may not seem auspicious for a new consensus about the federal role in education, but • How much equalization of resources shall we one might reasonably have thought that in 1963 attempt, and through what means? What as well. In any case, whatever the odds, every new strategies, incentives, and human resources administration, along with the Congress, educa- can be employed to increase the likelihood tors, and the electorate, must face the challenge of that additional material resources will trans- assessing worthy purposes and making politics late into good educational outcomes? work in the service of those purposes. In the pres- • How many and what kind of discretionary, ent environment — as so often in the past — the developmental programs shall we pursue, choice is between creative, constructive synthesis and how will we fashion a parsimonious or stalemate. The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 33

ENDNOTES 8 Kennedy, Freedom From Fear, Chapter 18; George Q. Flynn, The Mess in Washington: Manpower Mobilization in World The research that informs this essay is part of a larger project enti- War II (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1979); David tled The Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education, Brinkley, Washington Goes To War (New York: Ballantine 1950 - 2000, funded by The Spencer Foundation, whose support Books, 1988). the author enthusiastically acknowledges. 9 Keith W. Olson, The GI Bill, the Veterans, and the Colleges (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1974); Charles B. 1 Gordon C. Lee, The Struggle for Federal Aid: First Phase. A Nam, “The Impact of the ‘GI Bills’ on the Educational Level History of the Attempts to Obtain Federal Aid for the Common of the Male Population” Social Forces 43 (October, 1964): Schools, 1870-1890 (New York: Teachers College Bureau of 26-32. Publications, 1949); Ward M. McAfee, Religion, Race, and 10 The Lanham Act, PL 76-849 (1940) and PL 77-137 (1941) Reconstruction: The Public School in the Politics of the 1870’s 11 I. M. Labovitz, Aid for Federally Affected Public Schools (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998), chapter (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1963). 5; Charles A. Quattlebaum, Federal Aid to Elementary and 12 Taft quoted in Eric F. Goldman, The Crucial Decade — And Secondary Education: An Analytic Study of the Issue, Its After: America, 1945-1960 (New York: Random House, Background and Relevant Legislative Proposals… [1919-1948] 1960), p.55. (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, Legislative 13 Edward D. Berkowitz and Kim McQuaid, Creating the Reference Service, 1948); Carl F. Kaestle, “Education,” in Welfare State: The Political Economy of 20th-Century Reform Donald C. Bacon, Roger H. Davidson, and Morton Keller, (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, revised edition, eds., The Encyclopedia of the United States Congress (New 1992), chapter 8. York: Simon and Schuster, 1994), pp. 682- 691. 14 Goldman, Crucial Decade, p. 121. 2 David M. Kennedy, Freedom From Fear: The American People 15 Laurence H. Tribe, American Constitutional Law (Mineola, in Depression and War, 1929-1945 (New York: Oxford NY: The Foundation Press, second edition, 1988), pp. 305- University Press, 1999), pp. 469-470, 784 310. The watershed case is NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel 3 W. Brooke Graves, American Intergovernmental Relations: Corp. 301 U.S. 1, (1937). Their Origins, Historical Development, and Current Status 16 Carl F. Kaestle, Pillars of the Republic: American Society and (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1964), p. 571. Common Schooling, 1780-1860 (New York: Hill & Wang, 4 James T. Patterson, America’s Struggle Against Poverty 1983) (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), p.93 17 James T. Patterson, Mr. Republican: A Biography of Robert A. 5 David McCullough, Truman (New York: Simon and Taft (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1972) pp. 236,262. Schuster, 1992), pp. 642, 915. 18 Sylvia Anderson to Marion Folsom, January 14, 1956. Office 6 James T. Patterson, The New Deal and the States: Federalism Papers of the Commissioner of Education. Box 20, Folder in Transition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), #1. National Archives and Records Administration, Archives pp. 196-197; Harry N. Scheiber, “Federalism and the States,” II, College Park, Maryland. in Stanley Kutler et al., eds., Encyclopedia of The United States 19 Seldon B. Daume to Marion Folsom, December 29, 1955. in the Twentieth Century (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, Ibid. 1996), Volume I, pp. 427-450. 20 Transcript, John T. Flynn program, “Behind the Headlines,” 7 Gerald T. Dunne, Hugo Black and the Judicial Revolution July 8, 1956, enclosed in correspondence, R. F. Heckel to (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1977), Chapter 12; for a Marion Folsom, December 9, 1956. Office Files, cautionary, gradualist approach to the “revolution”, see Barry Commissioner of Education, Box 19, Folder 7. National Cushman, Rethinking the New Deal Court: The Structure of a Archives and Records Administration, Archives II. Constitutional Revolution (New York: Oxford University 21 Carl Elliott, Sr., and Michael D’Orso, The Cost of Courage: Press, 1998). The Journey of an American Congressman (New York: The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 34

Doubleday, 1992), p. 307; Hugh Davis Graham, “The 31 Dean M. Kelley and George R. La Noue, “The Church- Transformation of Federal Education Policy,” in Robert States Settlement in the Federal Aid to Education Act,” in Divine, ed., The Johnson Years, I (Austin, TX, 1951), 155- Donald Giannella, ed., Religion and the Public Order: An 157; Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and his Annual Review of Church and State and of Religion, Law and Times, 1961-1973 (New York: Oxford University Pres, Society. 1965 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966). 1998), p. 197; Gerald L. Gutek, American Education, 1945- 32 Sundquist, Politics and Policy, p. 217. 2000 (Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2000), p. 9. 33 Sundquist indeed makes a similar point, pp. 218-19. 22 Hugh Douglas Price, “Race, Religion, and the Rules 34 Paul E. Peterson, “Background Paper,” in Twentieth Century Committee,” in Alan F. Westin, ed., The Uses of Power (New Fund Task Force on Federal Elementary and Secondary York: Harcourt Brace and World, 1962), p.3 ff. Education Policy, Making the Grade (New York: The 23 Andree E. Reeves, Congressional Committee Chairmen: Three Twentieth Century Fund, 1983), pp. 73-76. Who Made An Evolution (Lexington: University Press of 35 On the limits of top-down implementation, see Jeffrey L. Kentucky, 1993). Pressman and Aaron Wildavsky, Implementation: How Great 24 Frank Munger and Richard Fenno, National Politics and Expectations in Washington Are Dashed in Oakland (Berkeley: Federal Aid to Education (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University University of California Press, third edition, 1984); Jerome Press, 1962), chapters 2 and 3. T. Murphy, “Title I of ESEA: The Politics of Implementing 25 James Sundquist, Politics and Policy: The Eisenhower, Kennedy Federal Education Reform,” Harvard Educational Review 41 and Johnson Years (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings (1971): 35-63; and Beryl Radin, Implementation, Change, and Institution, 1968), Chapter 5. the Federal Bureaucracy: School Desegregation Policy in H.E.W., 26 Gordon Ambach, interview with the author, July 14, 2000. 1964-1968 (New York: Teachers College Press, 1977). On 27 On Truman, see Maurice J. Berube, American Presidents and implementation as negotiation, see Michael Kirst and Education (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1991), p. 38; on Richard Jung, “The Utility of a Longitudinal Approach in Eisenhower, Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower: Soldier and Assessing Implementation: A Thirteen-Year View of Title I, President (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1990), pp. 417- ESEA” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis 2 419; for Kennedy, see Lawrence J. McAndrews, Broken (September, 1980): 17-34; Paul E. Peterson, Barry G. Rabe, Ground: John F. Kennedy and the Politics of Education (New and Kenneth K. Wong, “The Maturation of Redistributive York: Garland Publishing, 1991), pp. 1-2 and passim. Programs,” in Allen R. Odden, ed., Educational Policy 28 Robert Bendiner, Obstacle Course on Capitol Hill (Toronto: Implementation (Albany: State University of New York Press, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1964. 1991), pp. 65-80; and Milbrey McLaughlin, “Learning from 29 Sundquist, Politics and Policy, p. 206. On NDEA see Barbara Experience: Lessons from Policy Implementation,” in Clowse, Brainpower for the Cold War: The Sputnik Crisis Odden, Educational Policy Implementation, pp. 185-196. and the National Defense Education Act (Westport, CT: 36 Robert Higgs, Crisis and Leviathan: Critical Episodes in the Greenwood Press, 1981). Growth of American Government (New York: Oxford 30 Elementary and Secondary Education Act, PL 89-10. A University Press, 1987) brief summary is Carl F. Kaestle, “Elementary and 37 Nelson Polsby, Political Innovation in America: The Politics Secondary Education Act,” in Bacon, Davidson, and Keller, of Policy Initiation (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, Encyclopedia of the U.S. Congress. See also Hugh Davis 1984). Graham, The Uncertain Triumph: Federal Education Policy in 38 Elliott L. Richardson, “The NDEA Idea,” The Reporter, July the Kennedy and Johnson Years (Chapel Hill: University of 23, 1959. North Carolina Press, 1984; and Julie Roy Jeffrey, Education 39 John W. Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies of the Children of the Poor: A Study of the Origins and (New York: Harper Collins, 1984); Frank R. Baumgartner Implementation of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and Bryan D. Jones, Agendas and Instability in American of 1965 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1978). Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993). The Future of the Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education page 35

40 Theodore J. Lowi, “Four Systems of Policy, Politics, and 51 Marshall S. Smith, Jessica Levin, and Joanne E. Cianci, Choice,” Public Administration Review 32 ( July-August, “Beyond a Legislative Agenda: Education Policy 1972): 298-310. My thanks to Beryl Radin for urging me to Approaches of the Clinton Administration,” Education Policy consider the Lowi categories. 11 ( June, 1997): 209-226.. 41 See Beryl A. Radin, “American Federalism and Public 52 Daniel Patrick Moynihan, “A Second Look at the School Policy: A Landscape of Contradictions,” in Balveer Arora Panic,” The Reporter, June 11, 1959; Richardson, “The and Douglas V. Verney, Multiple Identities in a Single State: NDEA Idea”; Stewart L. Udall, “Our Education Budget Indian Federalism In Comparative Perspective (New Delhi: Also Needs Balancing,” The Reporter, June 18, 1959. Konark Publishers, 1995), Chapter 6. See also Thomas 53 Sundquist, Politics and Policy, p. 219. Anton, American Federalism and Public Policy: How the 54 Smith, Levin, and Cianci, “Beyond a Legislative Agenda.” System Works (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 55 On the standards movement, see John F. Jennings, Why 1989). National Standards and Tests: Politics and the Quest for Better 42 Paul E. Peterson, The Price of Federalism (Washington, D.C.: Schools (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1998); and The Brookings Institution, 1995), Chapter 8. Diane Ravitch, National Standards in American Education: A 43 Alice M. Rivlin, Reviving the American Dream: The Economy, Citizen’s Guide (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings the States & the Federal Government (Washington, D.C.: The Institution, 1995). Brookings Institution, 1992). 56 Michael J. Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent: America in Search of 44 Radin, “American Federalism,” p. 187. a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University 45 Peterson, Price of Federalism, p. 195. Press, 1996). Two books that trace the development of rights 46 Donald R. Warren, To Enforce Education: A History of the consciousness are James T. Patterson, Grand Expectations: Founding Years of the United States Office of Education The United States, 1945-1974 (New York: Oxford University (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1974), chapters Press, 1996); and Gareth Davies, From Opportunity to 4- 6, and Appendix 1. . Entitlement: The Transformation and Decline of Great Society 47 Donald Senese, interview with the author, August, 1991. Liberalism (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1996). 48 Federal Vocational Education Act, 9 Stat. 929-936. See 57 Jeffrey R. Henig, Rethinking School choice: Limits of the Marvin Lazerson and Norton Grubb, eds., American Market Metaphor (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, Education and Vocationalism: A Documentary History, 1870- 1994). 1970 (New York: Teachers College Press, 1974). 49 San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez. 401 The research that informs this essay is part of a larger project enti- U.S. 1, 93 S.Ct. 1278. (1973). tled The Federal Role in Elementary and Secondary Education, 1950- 50 Gary Orfield, The Reconstruction of Southern Education: The 2000, funded by the Spencer Foundation, whose support the Schools and the 1964 Civil Rights Act (New York: Wiley- author enthusiastically acknowledges. Interscience, 1969); K. M. Dolbeare and D. E. Hammond, The School Prayer Decision: From Policy to Local Practice (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971).