The perennial pet legislation of the Utah Legislature's deeply conservative leaders was soundly defeated by a power greater than they: the people of Utah. Now we'll see whether the Republican-controlled legislative branch will see the vote as the anti-voucher statement it is, or ignore the result and try to foist another version of this far-right invention on Utah's more sensible electorate.

We urge the proponents of taxpayer-funded private school vouchers to graciously admit defeat of their effort to create an expensive and constitutionally suspect public/private system and, instead, to invest the same wholehearted effort in adequately funding Utah's public schools.

Elsewhere, voters in West Jordan wisely defeated the other education question on Tuesday's ballot - whether the Jordan School District should be divided. They recognized that existing law leaves too many questions unanswered, particularly whether school capital costs will be equalized. But in five cities on the Salt Lake Valley's east side, the question remained too close to call by our press deadline.

The defeat of the nation's first universal voucher system was resounding. It cannot, however, be interpreted as unconditional support for the current state of public education, which has problems identifiable by test scores and dropout rates. Yet the lopsided vote sends one clear message: Vouchers are not the right way to go about solving the system's deficiencies.

Many of the public system's shortcomings can be addressed by reducing class sizes, offering quality teachers a substantial salary increase, fully funding all-day kindergarten and early-grade reading and math programs, and by making remedial help available to older students.

Utah has the youngest population and highest birth rate in the nation, so it is not surprising that our schools have the largest class sizes. And they will continue to grow. The best antidote would be to abandon a tax system that subsidizes families with many children, and to drop the cockeyed notion that paying private-school tuition with tax dollars will somehow improve the public system.

It's clearly time to get serious about making public education work, and Tuesday's vote is an indication that Utah residents feel a sense of urgency to do just that.