I think that many legislators stand for school prayer because it is the only alleged educational reform that they can advocate that won't cost money. So instead of buying new textbooks they recommend prayer. I attended Fordham University, the voice of the Jesuits, in New York City for ten years, going nights and summers. One out of ten years of schooling. The Radical Religious Right does not really care about prayer in schools, per se.
School prayer is seen primarily as a wedge to bring religion, their true religion, into the schools.
They want tax money to support their parochial schools. They want some sort of conservative Christianity to become the established religion, perhaps two established churches, Protestant and Catholic. The crisis in public education is a manufactured crisis. National test scores are not down. Yet, school bashing is so prevalent that I am afraid that there are some people here that actually believe that public education is not worth saving.