Keep Ky. prayer law off the books

Last week I suggested members of the Kentucky General Assembly, facing a $400 million budgetary hole, keep their focus on that little problem rather than stroke their egos or pander to single interest voters with a bunch of bills that grab headlines, clog the calendar and accomplish little.

Royce Adams, D-Dry Ridge, apparently had other ideas. According to a story by Pat Crowley posted online Tuesday in the Kentucky Enquirer, as the legislature prepared to open, Adams was drafting a bill at the request of a Grant County church to allow Kentucky students to openly pray in public schools.

His constituents would be better off if he would leave the praying alone and work on improving the students’ reading.

I have nothing against prayer. I have nothing against a student asking the Lord to help him or her get through the school day. And as long as students keep their prayers between themselves and God there isn’t anything in the law that prevents that from happening now. What I do think is a waste of legislative time is to try to incorporate prayer into the curriculum; to have teachers, administrators, students or anyone else worry about organizing the activity or trying to formally fit it into a school day. And I certainly wouldn’t want anybody connected to the government telling me or my children when and how to pray.

It is a particularly obstinate waste of taxpayer money to try to pass a law that will be challenged and then futilely defended at public expense before the courts correctly rule that the government, which cannot interfere with people’s religion, also has no business trying to organize it.