NJ MINISTERS SCHOOL CHOICE STATEMENT ON MORAL OBLIGATION TO SUPPORT OSA

We Have a Moral Imperative to
"Choose Life" for Our Children

May 4, 1967 Martin Luther King said it was better to shed a little blood than to have children graduating at a 5th grade reading level. Dr. King was stressing how far we must go, in order to avoid graduating people to lifelong suffering because they lack requisite skills to succeed.

Today, across America, urban youth are graduating, if they graduate, with the same reading level Dr. King warned us about many years ago. We have, now, a clear moral obligation to do whatever is necessary to put
an end to this carnage and genocide, in urban America. We have a moral obligation to act, regardless of where we believe fault lies.

The Opportunity Scholarship Act is a solution. It is legislation that
offers parents of children attending schools that have failed, an opportunity to attend another school that might be more beneficial to them.

As people of conscience, we realize if a river ran through our property, and we knew 7 out of 10 children going into that river were drowned by the undertow, we would be guilty of criminal negligence if
we allowed a single subsequent child to enter that river. But what would we be guilty of if we actually forced them into that same river?

As genocide takes place in our communities, I am reminded of Joe Welsh's penetrating question to Joe McCarthy (1954), Have we no sense of decency? At long last, have we left no sense of decency?

We are debating if poor parents of children indangerous, non-productive
schools should have a choice whether they should be condemned to obvious, statistically proven dead-zones, or not?

If the detractors of the Opportunity Scholarship Act are sincere, they can
simply call parents receiving Opportunity Scholarships, in DC. However,
most realize they won't find parents that regret being given an
opportunity to choose where their children are educated.

The families enrolled in the DC Scholarship Program have learned what
we want our leaders in New Jersey to learn: that "Choice matters!"

We advocate that you Choose Life, my friend.

We have a moral imperative, old as life itself to protect our children.  Martin Luther King said, "The time is always right to do the right thing. The Opportunity Scholarship Act is clearly, the right thing.