Graduate Center for the Study of Early Learning

The University of Mississippi School of Education

Independence Day: Is this what the Founding Fathers envisioned?

Posted on: June 24th, 2019 by Melody Musgrove

Today I got out my flags and bunting and other decorations to prepare for the Fourth of July. We will soon celebrate the wisdom and bravery of our founding fathers who declared and fought for independence from Great Britain, typically with food, fireworks, family and friends,

I love history and as I contemplate how the founders envisioned a new representative form of government, I read again our Constitution—-a beautifully crafted document that reflects intense negotiations among men who agreed on a democracy but had vastly different ideas about how to create and preserve that democracy. 

The U.S. Constitution famously begins with the following Preamble: 

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

One of the most intensely debated provisions of the Constitution was the division of power between federal government and state governments. The compromise reached was the Tenth Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. 

At the start of each semester I ask my students the following question: “Does the U.S. Constitution include the right of citizens to receive an education?” After a lot of puzzled looks, classes are typically split on their responses. The correct answer is no; the Constitution does not provide for education. Under the Tenth Amendment, education is a function left to the states, so each state determines how their system of public education is structured and funded. 

Mississippi has diminished support for public schools and underfunded the formula to ensure equitable and adequate financial support. Since 2009, state appropriations for the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP) have resulted in a whopping loss of over $2.5 billion to our schools, and the state ranks 47thnationally in school spending. Nobel Prize-winning economist Professor James Heckman has found that  human development iseconomic development,  so it should be no surprise that Mississippi has one of the worst economies in the country, ranked 46thby Business Insider. Other southern states are leaving Mississippi in the dust in terms of growth in GDP (Gross Domestic Product) according to the U.S Bureau of Economic Analysis. We are also losing population faster than any other state as the best and brightest young people are leaving the state to seek opportunities elsewhere. 

In contrast, last month Oregon’s Gov. Kate Brown signed a bill to increase funding for public education by a billion dollars per year.  That state’s economy is a consistent top performer, ranked fifth by U.S. News and World Report.  Oregon already spends over $2,000 more per student than Mississippi and the increased commitment to the state’s children by its leaders will widen that gap significantly.  States with visionary leadership to invest in their people can attract good jobs and increase prosperity for its citizens. 

The framers of the U.S. Constitution gave extensive powers to states with, I must believe, the expectation that elected officials would make decisions in the best interest of their respective states.  Neighboring states have chosen to equip their people with knowledge and skills and thus propel those states to greater economic growth and opportunity…which attracts many Mississippi college graduates to move there. 

Thomas Jefferson was principal author of the Declaration of Independence, our third President, and first Secretary of State. He believed strongly in the importance of education as critical to maintaining our democracy, stating, “Educate and inform the whole mass of the people. They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.” As we celebrate the birth of our nation, I hope we will consider the jeopardy that lack of education poses to Mississippi’s present and future, and dedicate ourselves to improving access to high quality early childhood and education opportunities for all. 

Happy Independence Day! 

by Dr. Melody Musgrove