Gov. Tony Evers of Wisconsin just needed to make a few minor edits to successfully push through a long-term increase in financing for public education.

Long term is what we mean when we say it. i.e., for the following 400 years.

On Wednesday, Mr. Evers, a Democrat who is currently the state superintendent and a former teacher, took advantage of a peculiar Wisconsin legislation that has long granted governors a partial veto and allowed them to change laws by creative editing.

Governor Evers increased the amount of property taxes that school districts could collect by $325 per student year. The increase was planned to last through the 2024–2025 academic year.

But Mr. Evers modified 2024–25 to 2425 by cutting off a hyphen and removing a “20.”

State Republicans swiftly denounced the veto, which also rejected a Republican tax cut plan that offered assistance for the highest income levels. They have made a speciality of opposing Governor Evers’ agenda.

“Legislative Republicans worked tirelessly over the last few months to block Governor Evers’s liberal tax and spending agenda,” Robin Vos, the Republican speaker of the State Assembly, said in a statement. “Unfortunately, because of his powerful veto authority, he reinstated some of it today.”

Without a trace of irony, Mr. Evers announced the reforms after saying that the incumbent governor, Republican Scott Walker, had not spent enough on schools to win his first term in 2018.

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