The Libertarian Challenge to Public Education

Notes

• John Hospers , “What Libertarianism Is,” in The Libertarian Alternative , ed. Tibor R. Machan ( Chicago : Nelson-Hall , 1974 ), pp. 3 – 20 Also see John Hospers, Libertarianism (Los Angeles: Nash Publishing Co., 1971).
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• Murray N. Rothbard , “Historical Origins,” in The Twelve-Year Sentence , ed. William F. Rickenbacker ( LaSalle , Il. : Open Court Publishing Co. , 1974 ), pp. 11 – 32
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• Gerrit H. Wormhoudt , “Supreme Court Decisions,” in The Twelve-Year Sentence , p. 64 . Also see Joel Spring's argument against compulsory schooling in The Twelve-Year Sentence, pp. 155–57.
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• E. G. West , “Economic Analysis, Positive and Normative,” in The Twelve-Year Sentence , pp. 171 , 187–88. An occasional Libertarian will support compulsory schooling, however. See: Robert L. Cunningham, Education: Free and Public (Wichita, Ks.: Center for Independent Education), p. 2.
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• For further discussion, see: Lawrence Kotin and William F. Aikman , Legal Foundations of Compulsory School Attendance Laws ( Port Washington , N.Y. : Kennikat Press , 1980 ), Chapter 12 .
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• M. S. Katz , “Compulsion and the Discourse of Compulsory School Attendance,” Educational Theory 27 ( Summer 1977 ): 179 – 85
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• Gerald M. Reagan , “Compulsion, Schooling, and Education,” Educational Studies 4 ( Spring 1973 ): 1 – 7
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• E. G. West , Education and the State ( London : The Institute of Economic Affairs , 1965 ).
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• Herbert H. Hyman , Charles R. Wright , and John Shelton Reed , The Enduring Effects of Education ( Chicago : University of Chicago Press , 1975 ); Harold Hodgkinson, “What's Right with Education,” Phi Delta Kappan 61 (November 1979): 159–62; Arthur J. Newman, ed., In Defense of the American Public School (Berkeley, Ca.: McCutchan, 1978); George F. Madus, Peter W. Airasian, and Thomas Kellaghan, School Effectiveness: A Reassessment of the Evidence (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980); and Herbert H. Hyman and Charles R. Wright, Education's Lasting Influence on Values (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979).
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• John E. Coons and Stephen D. Sugarman , Education by Choice: The Case for Family Control ( Berkeley , Ca. : University of California Press , 1978 ), p. 10 . The same argument is also presented by other Libertarians: West, Education and the State, p. 13; and Cunningham, Education: Free and Public, p. 6.
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• Richard A. Bumstead , “Educating Your Child at Home: The Perchemlides Case,” Phi Delta Kappan 61 ( October 1979 ): 97 – 100
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• Coons and Sugarman , Education by Choice , Chapters 3–5.
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• Some of these problems are explored in Kenneth Keniston and The Carnegie Council on Children, All Our Children ( New York : Harcourt Brace Jovanovich , 1977 ).
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• R. Freeman Butts , “The Public Schools: Assaults on a Great Idea,” The Nation , April 30, 1973 , pp. 553 – 60
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• Ralf Dahrendorf , Life Chances ( Chicago : University of Chicago Press , 1979 ), pp. 30 – 39
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