Republican Lawmaker Invokes Bible Scripture in Debate Against Banning Corporal Punishment Use on Disabled Children in Schools

An Oklahoma state senator voiced his opposition to a bill that would ban schools from inflicting corporal punishment onto disabled students after it passed the Senate earlier this week, citing Bible scripture as his reasoning.

Republican state Sen. Shane Jett voiced his opposition to the bill, stating that its implementation represented "a top down socialist aligned ideological, unilateral divorce between parents' ability to collaborate with their local schools to establish a disciplined regimen," reported the Oklahoma Voice.

Jett further stated that the bill violated biblical scripture, citing Proverbs 22:15, saying "folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him."

Senate Bill 364 aims to codify into law a ban against the use of corporal punishment against students with federally protected disabilities, a practice which is already prohibited by the State Department of Education.

"I have never, ever, ever met a parent of a disabled child call for the beating of their child to make them better," said Republican state Sen. Dave Rader, the bill's author.

Rader indicated that even if parents agreed to its use, schools could not use corporal punishment on students.

"Perhaps the parent of the child, in most cases, knows best what that child is going to respond to and how the child is going to perform his or her duties in the classroom," said Republican state Sen. Warren Hamilton, who voted against the bill.

While Oklahoma lawmakers generally leave such decisions up to the discretion of local districts, a law implemented in 2017 first prohibited the use of corporal punishment upon students with the most "significant cognitive disabilities."

The state's Department of Education then banned the practice for all disabled students at the beginning of the 2020-21 school year, after federal statistics demonstrated that 20% of students receiving physical punishments were disabled.

The bill passed in a 31-16 vote.