THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VI, Issue # 198, September 8, 2004
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
SUBVERTING THE U.S. CONSTITUTIONAL SYSTEM
IN AMERICA'S PUBLIC HIGH SCHOOLS:
A CIVICS TEXTBOOK
By Alan Caruba
FULL STORY:
Parents of high school students would be well advised to look at We the People: The Citizen and the Constitution, a book that
is the federally mandated text for what these students learn about the founding and fundamental principles of this nation.
Some fairly lonely voices, like my own, have been saying that, not only has our educational system been deliberately “dumbed down”
to produce students ill prepared to compete in a complex society and world, but the schools are also being used to mislead and corrupt
a proper understanding of our political system. One would hardly think, however, that the people doing this represent our own
government. Wrong. They do.
I learned about this while reading Fed Ed: The New Federal Curriculum and How It’s Enforced. Written by Allen Quist and
published by the Maple River Education Coalition (1402 Concordia Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55104), it can be purchased for $15.00 by
visiting www.EdWatch.org.
Quist raises a very important question. Why, he asks, “should the federal government be involved in authorizing and subsidizing the
publishing of a high school textbook?” All others are privately published and compete for use in schools, but We the People
does not. Moreover, only one non-governmental organization was given the contract, the Center for Civic Education. Since Congress
did not set up any review process for the book, there is no way to know how accurate it is or whether it has a particular bias. Unless,
of course, you read it!
When you do, you will discover that the “self-evident truths” of the Declaration of Independence have been magically transformed
into mere “ideas” from the eighteenth century. The message is that they can be cast aside or changed in our times. It gets worse, a lot
worse. When this textbook looks at the Bill of Rights, those ten amendments that are the very heart of the protections extended to
individual American citizens, insuring that government cannot run rampant over them, neither the Second Amendment, nor the Ninth
or Tenth are even mentioned!
The Second Amendment, of course, protects the right of citizens to bear arms. The Ninth Amendment pertains to the reserved rights
of individual Americans -- individual rights and liberties, though not enumerated in the U.S. Constitution are nevertheless "retained"
by the people. The Tenth Amendment relates to the “reserved powers" of the states and requires the central government to recognize
that “The powers not delegated to the United States [the central government] by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states,
are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.” The United States of America is a federal republic composed of separate
autonomous (self-governing) regional republics, or states. The ultimate government of the United States of America is the people!
Naturally, Quist asks, “How can a textbook teach the meaning of constitutional government without teaching the Ninth and Tenth
Amendments?” And he answers, “It cannot be done.”
Instead, this vile and cancerous text exists to subtly subvert our constitutional system and our loyalty to the United States of
America by teaching students that they are members of a “global village” and are, in fact, “world citizens.” As Quist notes,
“The book is really propaganda. It is social engineering, not education. It is decidedly anti-American
and anti-freedom. It is designed to indoctrinate our citizens into being willing to give away our
national sovereignty and freedom, and to accept the establishment of world government, instead.”
“We have met the enemy and they is us,” said Pogo. Well, the enemy is definitely among us and definitely in our high school
classrooms. It is your child’s curriculum, and it is time to demand this book’s removal by writing to your congressmen, your state
department of education, and your local school board.
Let me make this as clear as I can. The federal government has no business in determining the curriculum of this nation’s schools! It
especially has no business underwriting the publication of a book that deliberately subverts key elements of the U.S. Constitution
and the American constitutional system.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Education & America's Schools
A Practical Guide to Homeschooling
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, Communications Director of the American Policy Center,
and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly
column, "Warning Signs," posted on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center
(www.anxietycenter.com). A compilation of his past columns, entitled Warning Signs, is published by Merril Press. In addition
to Warning Signs, Caruba is the author of A Pocket Guide to Militant Islam and The United Nations vs. the United States,
both of which are available from the National Anxiety Center, 28 West Third Street, Apartment 1321, South Orange, New Jersey, 07079.
Copyright 2004 Alan Caruba
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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