ABSTRACT
In 1872, a French parliamentary commission recommended a religious school voucher plan remarkably similar to those currently being championed in the United States, with government vouchers to be spent on private or religious education. In the 1950s, the idea of using vouchers for private schools was supported by economist Milton Friedman's high-flown conservative rhetoric about unfettered markets ensuring political liberty and material progress. Private school voucher proposals are often characterized by their supporters as a popular grassroots reform pushed by parents trying to seize the power now jealously guarded by bureaucrats and patronizing liberal elites. The Education Trust, with its broadly based board of directors, has never taken a position on private school vouchers. Free-market advocates of private school vouchers tend to deify parents in a way that would bring tears to the eye if it weren't so suspectful.
