School choice and our Catholic vice presidential candidates

For the second election in a row, both major-party candidates for vice president identify as Catholic. Republican governor Mike Pence was raised in an Irish Catholic home, served as a Catholic youth worker, and aspired to be priest. He now describes himself as an “evangelical Catholic” after undergoing a conversion experience as a young adult and later attending a nondenominational church. Democratic senator Tim Kaine was also brought up in a Catholic home, attended a Jesuit high school, worked at a Jesuit missionary in Honduras, and continues to be a practicing Catholic today.

Despite their common faith background, the two candidates hold divergent views on the issue of school choice, which allows parents to select from an array of educational options other than traditional public schools—including receiving vouchers and tax credits, sending their children to charter or magnet schools, and homeschooling.

In the past, Catholics have possessed a wariness about public schools. The Common School Movement of the early 19th century—a precursor to today’s public schools—insisted its instruction was nonsectarian. In reality, it favored Protestant Christianity. Catholics, acutely aware of this bias, sought to provide their children with a distinctly Catholic education. In 1840, Catholic leaders petitioned the aldermen of New York City for access to public school funding, noting the prejudice exhibited toward them by the objectives of the Public School Society: