John H. Jackson is president of the Schott Foundation for Public Education, one of the few philanthropies that unequivocally supports public schools. He writes here that Trump’s efforts to suppress the 1619 Project—a history of African Americans—is “unworthy of a democracy.”
More than that, the president has no business interfering in school curriculum. Federal law specifically prohibits any federal official from interfering with curriculum or instruction. In this case, Trump is openly appealing to his white suptemacist base, encouraging them to believe that he can prevent schools from teaching black history. He can’t and he shouldn’t.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
trump is a RACIST and a FASCIST and totally UNFIT to serve. He’s scum.
trump is also really stupid, too. That’s why Putin loves the dumb, who can be manipulated via false praises and of course, rubles.
“Federal law specifically prohibits any federal official from interfering with curriculum or instruction. ”
You might inform Arne Duncan of that fact as well.
For those at the top, the law is little more than a quaint relic of a bygone age
Duncan broke that law but had the awareness to outsource his meddling to Bill Gates so he could falsely claim he had nothing to do with ramming Common Core down the threats of America’s teachers and children.
yes
LOL. The Trump Administration wades into public school issues only when they want to use our kids and schools as a political battering ram.
If they can’t contribute any positive work or effort to public schools, and they haven’t, perhaps they could have the decency to just stay out of it.
Stop using our kids. Take your campaigns somewhere else. We’re all swamped trying to manage the pandemic they failed to do any work on- we don’t have time for this nonsense.
Every public school in the country is struggling to stay open and these government employees want to issue uninformed opinions on what is taught in the public schools they didn’t attend, don’t send their children to, don’t support, and don’t lift a finger to assist.
KH: “We cannot understand and address the problems of today without speaking truth about how we got here.” BINGO
TC: “…account of history that threatens the integrity of the Union…” BINGO
Beyond the quibble fest, rest a “litmus test” for consciousness.
Is there a greater example of a white supremacist, than a SLAVE OWNER?
As Diane has pointed out many, many times on this blog, it is against federal law for the federal government to involve itself in curricula.
From the law creating the Department of Education{Department of Education Organization Act (Public Law 96-88)]:
No provision of a program administered by the Secretary or by any other officer of the Department shall be construed to authorize the Secretary or any such officer to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, over any accrediting agency or association, or over the selection or content of library resources, textbooks, or other instructional materials by any educational institution or school system, except to the extent authorized by law. (Section 103[b], Public Law 96-88)
And this is from the No Child Left Behind Act (Public Law 107-110):
SEC. 9527. PROHIBITIONS ON FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND USE OF FEDERAL FUNDS.
Nonetheless, Trump vowed at the 2020 Trump Convention (formerly the Republican Party Convention) that in a second term he would ensure that U.S. curricula were changed to teach “patriotism” and “American exceptionalism” (i.e., fascist, blind obedience to the state).
This attack on the outstanding 1619 Project is utterly disgusting. An ideal response: most states in the United States respond by adopting the curriculum officially.
Let’s abolish the US Department of Education. 😊🔔
We have Chicago Public Schools, New York Public Schools. etc. We don’t have schools labeled “American Public Schools” or “US Public Schools”. Schools have always been local, since Miss Beadle and earlier. 😊🔔
I looked at the website of the Schott Foundation for Public Education for the first time yesterday. I am really impressed with their activities and values. John H. Jackson”s statement is needed and timely.
Trump does not care what the law says he can and cannot do. He does not really care about anything but keeping attention to himself, and the more controversy the better.
According to son-in-law, Jared Kushner, all of Trump’s publicity amplifies attention to what he is doing and that is a good thing.
The principle that “fame follows publicity” is credited to the Pop artist Andy Warhol, who certainly exploited it well before Trump. Like Trump, Warhol had a cult-like following.
But then so did the Manson guy and the preacher who enticed people to go from California to a jungle in Johnstown where they later followed instructions to drink Kool Aide laced with poison.
Jim Jones
Jonestown, Guyana
I am not a fan of the 1619 Project, but the content should be immaterial. Either the federal government can control local curriculum or it cannot. Congress has said it cannot. End of story.
Can you say more on your issues with the 1619 project?
I’m obviously not a historian. But the 1619 project is not a work of history—it’s a work of journalism. It’s a series of articles written in the NY Times. I don’t think any (perhaps one, max) of the articles were not written by people specializing in Early American history or the American Revolution, even though those periods were the crux of the series. The central premise—that the primary motivation for the American Revolution (later revised to be “one of the primary motivations”) was to preserve the institution of slavery—is a tenuous theory that has been convincingly repudiated by the leading historians of that period including Gordon Wood and James McPherson). Early American history, the history of the American revolution, Black American History—these are all things that should be studied and taught. But the idea that schools should “teach” a series of newspaper articles as a history curriculum because the spirit of the age demands it, or something, it doesn’t sit right with me. Others can feel free to disagree.
But, that said, the U.S. Department of Education should not have any say over the content of state and local school curricula.
In case it helps, federal law prohibits any officer of the federal government from interfering with curriculum or instruction. Yes, I know Arne Duncan did it with Common Core but he got Bill Gates to pay for it, and the US Government paid for the two testing consortia, which have nearly disappeared ($360 million wasted).
Some noise has been made by some historians about an assertion in the pamphlet that the American Revolution was in part fueled by the desire of the revolutionary leaders to perpetuate slavery. Of course, that many of these revolutionaries were dependent upon it, directly or indirectly, is not deniable. But making the case for the claim that this was a major reason for support of the Revolution is much harder, if not impossible. A stronger case can be made that rich colonial planters and merchants didn’t want to pay English taxes and levies on trade.
Slavery had been illegal in England itself for many centuries. The Somerset case of 1772, reaffirmed its illegality once again. So, there was considerable anti-slavery sentiment in England at the time of the Revolution, and this doubtless disturbed and worried colonial slaveholders.
BTW, Britain passed an Abolition of the Slave Trade Act in 1807 and a Slavery Abolition Act in 1833, affecting its colonies, so there was reason for the American colonial slaveholders to have been worried.
Of course, the English didn’t need slavery in England itself because they had de facto enslavement of the working poor in the mines and mills.
FLERP!, you make many good points. But here’s where I differ with you, respectfully. I can’t remember who said and I’m paraphrasing here, but journalism is the first draft of history. I think there is great value in learning about it with, and I agree with you here, as long it is balanced with retrospective scholarship (using the examples of Gordon Wood and James McPherson is a bit of a substantive low blow, however!). I think there is great value in reading first drafts. As you may know, I was obsessed for a short time with reading through the posts and comments on this blog four years ago. I have also touted the virtues of Nicholson Baker’s Human Smoke. When I was a 9th grade student working on an independent study on the Rosenbergs and their trial, I spent days and days reading newspapers and magazines from their contemporary times. There is great value in learning about how people thought about the issues of their time in their time. Perhaps that’s why I’m not so tough on, for example, Woodrow Wilson, Ulysses S. Grant, or the 11th president of the U.S. (writing his name is a sure way to get into moderation) as others today are.
Doggone it! Still went into moderation even though I did not name the 11th president of the U.S. No need to answer, Diane. Tried to outwit the WordPress god and it wouldn’t let me. Seems like 18th and 28th presidents or one of two esteemed historians (but I guess not since they were mentioned above) do the same.
Sorry, Greg. It happens.
I wrote: No need to answer, Diane! Too funny. Just for kicks, James K. Polk.
See, Greg. Polk put your comment in moderation.
Neither Gordon Wood nor James McPherson is writing K-12 history books, as far as I know.
A textbook used by elementary or middle school students is not a “work of history”. It is a recounting of history, which is what the 1619 project is, and there isn’t a history textbook written that can’t be criticized for something or other that it emphasizes or ignores — and not mentioning something is the same as saying it has NO importance, which is just as appalling an error as putting too much emphasis on it, although apparently white historians aren’t bothered by that. I’m pretty sure women didn’t even talk or have opinions in America until the 20th century, based on what I was taught in my “historian-approved American History textbook”. Wait, I did learn that Harriet Beecher Stowe was the main reason that there’s no slavery! I’m sure that the “historians” who wrote the history books that taught me came up with the exact amount of importance that Uncle Tom’s Cabin had so that’s why there aren’t a lot of white historians perusing everything ever written about American history to make sure that the importance that every history book gives to Harriet Beecher Stowe is exactly the same. Certainly all historians have an amount of influence (15%? 50%?) that her book had and they peruse every history book and attack every book that doesn’t conform to that (15%? 50%?) percentage of influence.
The fact that some fragile snowflake historians or right wing racists have extreme agita that their children might be taught something other than “the founders were perfect and totally didn’t like slavery” seems pretty absurd when no one can explain why legalized slavery was enshrined in our country’s founding without accepting that preserving slavery was important. The people in power may have “personally opposed slavery” but clearly the small matter of men, women and children — including babies — being the property of white men to do with as they pleased was not nearly as important to them as not having their tea taxed. Given the growing abolitionist movement in England at that time, it is not entirely unreasonable to think that there existed slaveholders who might be more inclined to support revolution from Britain when reminded of the abolitionist movement there, which, as slaveholders in a British colony, they would certainly be aware of.
Bob Shepherd, your comment is so spot on. What bothers me is how much this is a matter of semantics. The 1619 project never said that the American Revolution was entirely about protecting slavery, nor did the 1619 Project even say slavery was the single main reason for the revolution. (That is a mischaracterization by the critics). But the 1619 Project did correctly do something nearly all the books that were never criticized did not do and the 1619 Project actually acknowledged that protecting slavery from what was an increasingly pro-abolitionist England was one of the reasons that the revolution got support.
One of the reasons. The 1619 Project never said protecting slavery was the only reason. Nor did it ever say that protecting slavery was the single main reason.
There is certainly a legitimate argument to be made about how important an issue preserving slavery was to those who supported the American Revolution. Was it of no importance to anyone at all, as the critics seem to be insisting is a known fact that justifies their attacks on the 1619 project? That is highly unlikely. Was a concern for preserving slavery important to some people? that is very likely. So instead of the attacks, there could have been a good discussion of the amount of importance preserving slavery had — just like historians disagree about the amount of influence Harriet Beecher Stowe had. But instead, that disagreement was used to discredit a worthy project, which (in my opinion) can only be explained by racism.
NYCPSP,
You make a good point. The K-12 history textbooks can be readily criticized for sins of omission, as well as the cardinal sin of “mentioning.”
Thanks for all the thoughtful replies. There’s also a good discussion here, if you haven’t already seen it, that touches on many of these points: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/20/magazine/we-respond-to-the-historians-who-critiqued-the-1619-project.html
bethree5,
I readily confess that my comment above was informed by what I read at the link you helpfully posted (which includes the letter from the historian critics) and a few other articles, including some good ones at the Atlantic.
Thanks for posting it, as I can never seem to manage to post links in my replies here.