ustxtxb_obs_1981_06_12_50_00009-00000_000.pdf

The clearest example of what was going on was the Grant Jones amendment to Truan’s bill for bilingual education. At present the state requires bilingual education for English-deficient students from kindergarten through the third grade and provides it optionally through the fifth. This is the system Justice held unconstitutional and ordered replaced by a six-year phase-in of a program through the 12th grade. The amendment by the Abilene Democrat limited a student’s participation in bilingual classes to four consecutive years, after which he or she would have to be shifted to a program stressing intensive English. Obviously the present program, kindergarten through the third grade, is exactly four years long. By the time the Jones amendment reached the floor Truan knew the opponents of bilingual education had set out to kill his bill, even though he had cut it back from a 12th-grade proposal to mandatory bilingual courses through the elementary grades. Testimony at the committee stage, never disputed in the Senate debate, tended to show that $150 per pupil is about the right amount for adequate bilingual education. Truan nevertheless cut the spending he proposed to $100 per pupil. Sen. Pete Snelson, Midland, an adversary of bilingual education, but like White determined on the passage of some kind of bill, cut this back to $50 by amendment, the while assuring Truan that the Senate conferees would try for more in the appropriations conference committee. Truan went along, even though present spending per-pupil in the program, he said, is $45 per pupil, and about half that stays at the state level. But how much would he go along with? Little by little, Senate amendments chewed at the Truan bill until finally Jones came forward with his killer. Truan told the Senate clearly that this proposal gutted the bill; the Senate promptly enacted it. Truan had fought the amendments of the opponents for hours, but at this point, the fight over, he seemed relieved. He made it perfectly clear to reporters that while he would think about it a day or two, he was prepared to withdraw his proposal entirely. This was his hole card. If in disgust he withdrew his bill, the message to the courts, considering Justice’s ruling on appeal, would be unmistakable. White moved into action to get Jones to withdraw his amendment, which after a weekend had passed Jones did. But then, despite similar pleas by Rep. Matt Garcia of San Antonio, the House of Representatives enacted a carbon copy of the Jones amendment. Basically, like the Senate majority, the House majority supported teaching Spanishlanguage children English, but not a bilingual program they suspected might aim at keeping the student proficient in both Spanish and English. With only minor difficulty Truan persuaded the Senate to reject the House amendments, and in conference, once again, the fouryears-only amendment was withdrawn. As finally passed, Truan’s bill requires bilingual education through the elementary grades \(either the fifth or the sixth, programs for school districts that want them through the eighth grade. Snelson said the Senate conferees on appropriations tried hard, but could get only $57 per student for the program. Rep. Garcia had said, “When it’s for some Austin In the Senate during the closing days of the legislature’s closing session, the Observer asked a cross-section of the 31 members what they had accomplished personally and what were the best and worst things the legislature has done. The most remarkable response came from Sen. Carl Parker of Port Arthur. This session? “Aaaghr!” he replied. “There was the solid waste act. I did good things locally. . . . But good this session, anything really outstanding? Naw. In the drug bills, the only thing we did that might abate the big-league dealers’ activity is the million-dollar fines that can be collected in their property. That gets to the folks that pal around with Ross Perot at the Country Club, it ain’t people sellin’ bongs at Oat Willie’s.” Well, what were the worst things the session did? “The worst bill I ever voted for,” Parker said, “was the wiretapping, and I did it because most of my constituents wanted it and as a noble experiment and to see if it will do any good. I really don’t think it will, but maybe it will.” This didn’t answer the question, what was the worst law passed by the session. The morning of the last day Parker approached the Observer reporter and added, “After thinking about it, I think wiretapping was probably the worst bill we passed.” thing like a brucellosis control program, there’s no problem coming up with the money. But suddenly when we have children who are defenseless and need the help, suddenly it’s not there, it’s not there in the appropriations bill.” And that is the way it turned out. So if Judge Justice’s ruling brought the solons to bat on bilingual education, the Senate struck out, the’ House struck out, and fmally Truan,got on first when he was beaned for the second time by players on his own team. Whether he gets on around the bases to score, or the game is called because of darkness in Washington, or Judge Justice is declared the winner and bilingual education is instituted through the 12th grade, remains now to be seen. R.D. The sponsor of that bill, Ed Howard of Texarkana, naturally did not share Parker’s view. “I feel good about the wiretapping bill,” he said. “I do believe that it is a tool that we need. I get concerned about rights of the individual, and that’s a difficult one to come to grips with. But which is the overriding factor, that or drugs? If that means some incursion of their rights. . . . Now, the innocent, of course: but there’s that presumption of the probabilty that the people Howard lauded, too, establishment of an adult probation system and most of the war on drugs bills. He said that after voting for all amendments to reduce the 30% interest-ceiling bill to 24%, he voted for the 24% “reluctantly.” The Senate’s only woman member, Betty Andujar of Fort Worth, said the legislature’s chief accomplishment is going home. “I don’t believe in the passage of a lot of legislation,” she said. “I just service my constituents. I’m not trying to do anything.” She was worried that the law setting curriculum requirements for the public schools, including Texas history and free enterprise and its benefits, left enforcement in the hands of the same educational establishment that’s been running things up to now. Kids these days, she said, think that what’s right or wrong concerns things like “not squealing on their friends.” Meanwhile, “our govern THE TEXAS OBSERVER 9 Senators Look Back On Gains and Ruin