In the 1840s, nativist movement leaders formed official political parties and local chapters of the national Native American Party (later the American Party), although they continued to be commonly known as the Know-Nothing Party. Politicians sought to insert provisions into state constitutions against Catholics who refused to renounce the pope. The Know-Nothing movement brought bigotry and hatred to a new level of violence and organization.
The party’s legacy endured in the post-Civil War era, with laws and constitutional amendments it supported, still today severely limiting parents’ educational choices. A federal constitutional amendment was proposed by Speaker of the House James Blaine prohibiting money raised by taxation in any State to be under the control of any religious sect; nor shall any money so raised or lands so devoted be divided between religious sects or denominations. These were then named the Blaine Amendments of 1875.
in recent decades, often in response to challenges to school choice programs, the U.S. Supreme Court has demonstrated great interest in examining the issues of educational alternatives and attempts limit parental options. Massachusetts plays a key role in this debate. The Bay State was a key center of the Know-Nothing movement and has the oldest version of Anti-Aid Amendments in the nation, as well as a second such amendment approved in 1917. Two-fifths of Massachusetts residents are Catholic, and its Catholic schools outperform the state’s public schools, which are the best in the nation.
Teacher Contracts in Massachusetts
/0 Comments/in Academic Standards, Education /by David BallouThis report is an initial effort to provide systematic information on teacher contracts in Massachusetts. In the summer of 1999, the Pioneer Institute solicited copies of the current contract from all districts in the state. From those that responded, 40 districts were selected to reflect the diverse makeup of the Commonwealth. Although there was no attempt to make the sample statistically representative, the three largest urban systems were included, along with a sample of suburbs and small towns.
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An Economic History of Health Care in Massachusetts 1990-2000
/0 Comments/in Better Government, Healthcare, Press Releases, Press Releases: Government, Press Releases: Health Care /by Editorial StaffAuthor: Jerome H. Grossman, M.D.
This report examines the Massachusetts health care system during the tumultuous period from the late 1980s to the close of the 1990s. This timeframe begins with the attempt in 1988 to become the first state in the country to ensure universal entitlement to health insurance and ends with the fiscal crisis of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and the general climate of uncertainty and angst that has beset the state’s health care system. Apart from describing the important events of this timeframe—and highlighting the pivotal decisions of earlier decades that set the stage for this period of upheaval—the report aims to illustrate more broadly ways in which the health care system in Massachusetts (and in the United States generally) has evolved in a highly dysfunctional manner, one which made some of the marked changes of the past decade not only inevitable but in many respects desirable.
An Economic History of Health Care in Massachusetts 1990-2000
Teacher Contracts in Massachusetts
/0 Comments/in Press Releases, Press Releases: Education, Related Education Blogs /by Editorial StaffAuthor: Dale Ballou, University of Massachusetts at Amherst This report is an initial effort to provide systematic information on teacher contracts in Massachusetts. In the summer of 1999, the Pioneer Institute solicited copies of the current contract from all districts in the state. From those that responded, 40 districts were selected to reflect the diverse make- up of the Commonwealth. Although there was no attempt to make the sample statistically representative, the three largest urban systems were included, along with a sample of suburbs and small towns. Care was taken to ensure a mix of high-, medium-, and low-income communities. In these 40 contracts, five topics were closely examined: 1) compensation; 2) teacher evaluation and discipline; 3) transfers; 4) layoffs; and 5) the length and structure of the work day.
Teacher Contracts in Massachusetts