Given the choice, parents in Newark are enrolling their children in charter schools by overwhelming margins.
The reason is simple: Students in the charters, even the poorest kids, are doing much better than those in traditional schools. The most respected national study on charter schools, from Stanford University, found that Newark's charters are among the best in the country.
The expansion of these schools is one the great success stories in New Jersey over the last decade. At the two best chains, North Star and TEAM, nearly all graduates go on to college. Over the last decade, as they have expanded, the chances that a Newark student is enrolled in a good school that beats the state average on test scores has tripled.
So why is Phil Murphy, the likely Democratic nominee for governor, ready to tap the brakes on this success story?
Murphy is a board member of the NAACP, the sclerotic civil rights organization, which is considering a resolution on Saturday to freeze the expansion of charter schools nationwide. As of Thursday evening, Murphy would not say where he stands on it.
That's not the first bad sign. Murphy said earlier this year that local school boards should be granted more power to block the establishment of new charter schools. That's like giving General Motors the power to block Chrysler from building a new plant. In most school districts it would be tantamount to a moratorium.
Why would Murphy be hostile to charter schools? With the NAACP waging political war on the charter movement, why is he AWOL?
The most charitable explanation is that he is searching for common ground in the charter wars, and wants to establish himself as a neutral arbiter. It could be that he doesn't know the issue well, a sign that his lack of political experience comes with a cost.
But there is a darker possibility. Murphy could be selling out to the state's largest teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, which recently endorsed him.
The NJEA is hands-down the most powerful special interest group in the state, always in the top ranks in lobbying and campaign spending. And it has done all it can to kneecap the charter school movement, which relies mostly on non-union labor.
Murphy filled out a questionnaire to get the union's endorsement. But he will not release his answers, bowing to the confidentiality request of the union.
That is a rookie mistake. The union is not his master, and he is free to discuss his views on charter schools, with or without union permission. His refusal to do so says, in effect, that the union has a right to know his views but the public does not.
The Democratic Party's alliance with the teachers union is poisonous, and undercuts the party's claim to represent the interests of the poor and disadvantaged. The union fights to protect bad teachers by opposing strong tenure reform; it opposes testing that can expose the rampant failure in urban schools; and it opposes the growth of charter schools, even when they are proving successful and popular.
Many Democrats, including President Obama, have shown real courage by breaking with the union on each of these issues. So the question is whether Murphy stands with orthodox liberals like the unions and the NAACP -- or with the party's more progressive voices on education, like Obama. Stay tuned.
In Newark, most charter schools expand by one grade per year, as the oldest class moves up the ladder. To block that expansion would force these kids back into the conventional district schools, from which they fled. Who wants to break that news to the family?
This is not a close call. Charters are not magic; they sometimes fail. But New Jersey has been managing this expansion well, closing down those that are failing, and ensuring that charters in Newark and Camden take their fair share of at-risk kids. Murphy needs to make it clear that he won't derail this success.
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Tom Moran may be reached at tmoran@starledger.com or call (973) 836-4909. Follow him on Twitter @tomamoran. Find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.