A recent Wall Street Journal editorial noted that the National Education Association’s California chapter has contributed more than one-third of all money raised by opponents of that state’s proposed constitutional amendment to define marriage as exclusively the domain of man-woman couples.
The high school dropout rate is 1-in-4 in California and 1-in-3 in the Los Angeles public school system … so you might think the California Teachers Association would have other priorities (than gay marriage).
Yet last week the union donated $1 million to the “No on Proposition 8” campaign.
“What does this have to do with education?” said Randy Peart, a public school teacher in San Juan. “Why not put that money into classrooms, into making a better place for these kids.”
Oh, but this is the union’s money; they wouldn’t want to use it to improve education.
In fact, the CTA and its parent organization, the National Education Association, have used tens of millions of dollars in mandatory teachers dues to advance all manner of left-wing political causes. In some years barely a third of the NEA’s budget has gone toward improving the lot of teachers themselves.
…[T]he NEA has directly (or via state affiliates) bankrolled ACORN, the Democratic Leadership Council, the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation and, naturally, the Human Rights Campaign, which lobbies for “lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equal rights.”
Public school teachers of America, take note. This is your dues money at work.