J.C. Watts: “Mr. Chairman, I ask my 435 colleagues in the House of Representatives how can the Government say to any American parent…”

“Mr. Chairman, I ask my 435 colleagues in the House of Representatives how can the Government say to any American parent, regardless of their economic status, that they cannot send their children to schools that work? How can they force their kids to go to school on a daily basis, terrorized to walk down the halls, having to pass through metal detectors to enter the building, where discipline, achievement and values have been swept away by drugs and violence? Which of us in this Chamber, which of us, I would love for one of us to stand up and say that we would send our children to such a school. How many years of our children's education would we waste waiting for officials, whose children go to schools across town, by the way, to the schools that work, waiting for the latest experiment to solve these problems? How many of us would put our children into these schools tomorrow based on a politician's promise that they will be better next year? For these children, these schools are not the great equalizer the other side talks about. These are forgotten kids, the victims of a terrible experiment in education that has gone terribly wrong, an experiment that has failed them for life.”