No Gold in the Golden Rule Act

Don't get me wrong, Governor Steve beshear should sign the anti-bully HB 91. The poisionous provisions penned by Senate President David Williams have been removed by a conference committee.

And, I'm not holding myself up as an example for anyone when it comes to religion.

But I don't know why the press continues to identify House Bill 91 as the "Golden Rule Act." Williams removed the Golden Rule as soon as he got his hands on it in mid March.

Mike Cherry's excellent measure passed the House 96-0 with the following language, "Amend KRS 158.440 to identify the Golden Rule as the model for improving attitude and the rule for conduct for all public school students..."

Williams took that language out.

For a guy who supports posting the Ten Commandments on public buildings, William's move seems ...unenlightened to me.

So, I wrote to Senator Williams recently in an effort to learn his rationale.

It went something like this...

Senator Williams,

It seems you have always supported posting of the Ten Commandments.

For that reason, I'm confused as to why you took language out of the HB 91 that would have required schools to use the central teaching of Jesus in disciplining Kentucky students. Can you help me understand that?

Do you have a better foundation for public school discipline in mind?

Are you not concerned that rejecting the Golden Rule, which is common to all major religions and therefore might survive a court challenge, while promoting the Ten Commandments, which are uniquely Judaeo-Christian, only serves to give the court more evidence that posting the Commandments is truly an unconstitutional attempt to establish religion?

Respectfully,

Richard Day
Kentucky School News and Commentary

I haven't heard back yet.

No ancient law or prophesy could possibly be more "Christian" than the teachings of Jesus himself. Clearly "the Golden Rule" is central to Christianity. A public school disciplinary code that keeps the Golden Rule, keeps the faith.

But that's NOT why it should be the basis for student discipline in the public schools.

The Golden Rule should be the basis for all student discipline because it is also central to all major religions - and I've never heard an atheist or agnostic object to its principles either.

Because of its wide-spread acceptance among the world's religions, it does not establish religion the way that posting the Ten Commandments would. ...or requiring daily reading from the Qur'an would. ...or requiring transcendental meditation would. ...or teaching transubstantiation would. Those acts would be specific to a particular religion, and would therefore be unconstitutional.

For some, posting the Ten commandments is a political ploy. For most, I hope, it is a sincere desire to see our children reared with moral principles. In the latter sense, it's the right idea - but the wrong number. We should post the "second commandment" only.

One of the problems facing Ten Commandments-posting advocates is, once the courts have evidence that the true motivation behind the desire to post them is religious, and therefore unconstitutional, it's hard to get the court to forget by simply adding on a few other documents.

Whining about the Ten Commandments while rejecting the Golden Rule is counter-productive to our children's best interest.

A synopsis of the surviving language in the Conference Committee Report from KyVotes.org follows:

Create a new section of KRS Chapter 158 to require school personnel to report incidents of student felony offenses under KRS Chapter 508 to law enforcement and parents of students involved;

amend KRS 158.444 to require a local school district to include in its statewide data report all incidents in which a student has been disciplined by the school for a serious offense, including the nature of the offense, and all incidents in which a student has been charged criminally for any offense identified in KRS Chapter 508 or in Section 4 of this Act that occurred on school premises, on the school bus, or at school functions;

require the Kentucky Department of Education to submit to the Office of Education Accountability and the Education Assessment and Accountability Review Committee an annual statistical report, rather than a monthly statistical report, to include the number and types of incidents of violence or assault against school employees and students, possession of guns or other deadly weapons on school property or at school functions, and possession or use of alcohol, prescription drugs, or controlled substances on school property or at school functions;

require the annual statistical report to include monthly data and cumulative data for the reporting year; set the reporting period as an academic year, delivered by August 31 of each year;

amend KRS 158.148 to require the Kentucky Department of Education, in consultation with various professional agencies, to develop or update as needed, a model policy to be distributed to schools by August 31 of each even-numbered year, beginning August 31, 2008;

amend KRS 525.070 to identify specific activities done by a student as harassment;

amend KRS 525.080 to identify specific activities done by a student as harassing communication.