Some legislators are unhappy with the Utah Board of Education's prohibition on paddlings in school but say the Utah Constitution apparently doesn't allow them to do anything about it.
The board imposed the ban on corporal punishment more than a year ago. That was contrary to a law enacted by the 1992 Legislature allowing teachers to spank with parental permission.The board "essentially said we want a policy different than the Legislature and we're going to do that by rule," Rep. Byron Harward, R-Provo, said.
"It concerns me greatly that we seem to have two Legislatures in the state of Utah when it comes to education issues," said Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper. "The buck needs to stop somewhere and it ought to stop with the Legislature."
Harward, Stephenson and other members of the Administrative Rules Committee heard an explanation this week from Board of Education attorney Doug Bates.
Bates said the Utah Constitution gives the board sweeping power for "general control and supervision of the public-education system."
"That's not to say that the state board is going to go around taking this (contrary) position on every issue," he said in a later interview.
"But I don't think (lawmakers) thought through the ramifications. . . . No parent can give someone else the right to harm their child," Bates said.
He also said selective, parent-approved spanking could hurt discipline.
"Say you have two kids in a fight - one they can spank and the other they can't. What's that going to do to discipline in school?" asked Bates.
While board members would have liked legislative approval, they acted by administrative rule "when they were requested by the schools to do so."
The two lawmakers said that Utah's Constitution appears to back up the board of education, but they don't like it.
Stephenson said under the constitutional provision, it appears board members could even levy their own taxes and set budgets.