We the People -­ Still a Terrible Textbook


We the People -­ Still a Terrible Textbook

By
Allen Quist

Issues and Action in Education

An e-letter produced
by
EdWatch, a nonprofit organization.


December
22, 2005

 
In
her recent article on civics education, Nancy Salvato defended the
textbook We the People: the Citizen and the Constitution and its
publisher, the Center for Civic Education (CCE). In this article Salvato
chose to not mention the fact that both the textbook and the CCE are funded
by federal tax dollars (as written in “
We the Proletariat“). She praises the CCE, however, by saying: “The best
thing about it [CCE’s We the People program] is that schools can
implement it at no cost.” She avoids the real issue, however, by not saying
that the reason We the People is available to schools at little or no
cost is because it is funded by federal tax dollars.

Salvato additionally neglects to tell her readers
that she is the Illinois Sixth Congressional District Coordinator for the
CCE. This means that her article is not an arms-length, objective defense of
We the People and the CCE. On the contrary, the article is really the
“spin” that the CCE uses to promote its programs and its ongoing requests
for federal money.

The CCE should be free to write any kind of materials
it wishes, including textbooks which push the ideology of the radical left
— its forte. (See

Textbook Review of We the People.) The federal government, however,
should not be subsidizing the CCE and its textbooks, or any other textbooks
(as stipulated by the proposed
“Freedom in Education Act”). The CCE should be required to compete in
the free-marketplace of ideas along with other publishers of school
textbooks. Salvato can not begin to defend the CCE without avoiding the real
issue.  Under present circumstances, the CCE uses some of its substantial
financial resources to lobby Congress for more money. That money will be
used to lobby Congress for more funding in the future as well as put various
people on the payroll who will be expected to defend the CCE.

In its last budget proposal to Congress, the Bush
Administration wisely zeroed out funding for the CCE. Was that a problem for
the CCE? Not at all. The CCE simply used its influence, paid for in part by
federal dollars, to lobby Congress to have its funding put back in the
budget and has actually managed to have its proposed appropriations
increased over the current budget. To minimize the potential for this kind
of abuse of centralized power, perhaps education policy should be left to
the states and the people, as the Tenth Amendment clearly indicates. (Not
surprisingly, the CCE undermines the Tenth Amendment in its materials.)

Because of the left-leaning nature of the its
materials, in addition to the federal funding issue, the CCE understandably
specializes in misleading the public about its works. The Salvato article is
typical of the CCE. In this article, for example, Nancy Salvato attempts to
explain the fact that the Second Amendment is conspicuously absent from the
second portion of the textbook, the unit titled: “What Rights Does the Bill
of Rights Protect [Today]?” (How can a government text have a unit with this
title and not mention the right to bear arms?) Salvato’s defense of this
Second Amendment disappearing act is stated as follows:

“Yet on page 240, right there in black
and white, the second amendment is listed with a definition that
includes both of these ideas [state militias and private ownership
rights].”

Unfortunately, Salvato
neglects to inform the reader that page 240 is in the Appendix! It is in
that part of the Appendix that includes the Constitution (all government
textbooks include the Constitution some place, usually in the Appendix). For
Salvato to argue that the book gives the Second Amendment adequate treatment
because the Constitution is in the Appendix is absurd. This is not a
legitimate argument; it is manipulation — the kind of propaganda that is
typical of the CCE.

 The rest of the Salvato article has no more substance
than the argument described above. Let the buyer beware. The writings of
Nancy Salvato regarding the CCE and its We the People program are
nothing more than the rhetoric of the CCE. Is it too much to ask that the
“talking points” of the CCE be labeled as such?
 

[Allen Quist is Adjunct Professor of Political Science at Bethany Lutheran
College. He is a former three-term member of the Minnesota House of
Representatives and the Minnesota House Education Committee. He is author of
three books and numerous articles on education policy. He is a frequent
speaker at various national conferences on education issues. Several of his
articles and books are available at
EdWatch.org.

Ed
Watch
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