TOUGH ON SCHOOL CRIMINALS

Gov. Mel Carnahan recently received a great deal of media coverage, in Cape Girardeau as in other stops in a two-day statewide fly-around, for his proposal to make it a felony for a student to strike a teacher. The matter of violence in public schools was accentuated this fall when a St. Louis elementary school teacher suffered an assault at the hands of a 9-year-old and later died. Enter Gov. Carnahan, who is pushing a school safety bill to crack down on the youthful hooligans who increasingly threaten teachers.

The governor's proposal will doubtless receive lots of attention during the legislative session beginning Jan. 3 in Jefferson City. One who has already shown interest is Sen. Steve Ehlmann, R-St. Charles, the husband of a teacher and himself a former high school history teacher. The 1996 session of the General Assembly will be the third year in a row in which Sen. Ehlmann has fought to enact a similar school safety measure. In the 1995 session, Sen. Ehlmann's bill passed the Senate and was actually only five bills down on the House calendar on the last day, which is where House leaders allowed it to die.

With the governor's announcement, Sen. Ehlmann released a press statement welcoming Carnahan to the ranks of those fighting for passage of such a bill. Now if the governor follows through and convinces the legislative leaders of his party who let the measure die last session, perhaps Missouri teachers will receive the enhanced protection Sen. Ehlmann has been trying to extend to them for nearly three years.