text: He believes that opposing capital punishment is consistent with being pro-life; in his book, Liberty Defined, stating "It's strange to me that those who champion best the rights of pre-born are generally the strongest supporters of the death penalty and preventive, that is, aggressive, war."
  In August, 2013, Paul stated,
  Education
  Elementary and secondary schools
  Paul sought in the 1980s and 1990s to eventually abolish all public schools; but by the 2008 presidential election campaign, he had adopted a more moderate stance. Paul insists that "the federal government has absolutely no role in education" under the Constitution, "regardless of what the Supreme Court has claimed." He argues that the best way to improve the quality of education while fighting rising costs, growing numbers of dropouts, and higher levels of violence and drug use among students is to reduce the reach of centralized government in the schools and return control over school curricula, funding, and administration back to parents and local communities.
  He has long opposed the idea of federally mandated testing being used to measure student performance against federally determined national education standards. He voted against national testing measures first proposed by the Clinton administration; and he similarly has never supported the federal No Child Left Behind Act, which he voted against when it was proposed in 2001.