A historian explains the key mistakes Texas Republicans are making in their new education bills

[Nevilledog]

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Dr. Mia Brett
@QueenMab87
In their rush to ban education about white supremacy conservatives are missing opportunities to teach American triumphalism in schools. My latest for @johnastoehr @AlterNet

A historian explains the key mistakes Texas Republicans are making in their new education bills
Education bills are being passed around the country to protect children from the "evil" critical race theory and 1619 Project. They might make white children feel bad. Forget that those railing...
alternet.org
12:28 PM · Jul 26, 2021

https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/texas-history-bills/

Education bills are being passed around the country to protect children from the "evil" critical race theory and 1619 Project. They might make white children feel bad. Forget that those railing against these academic efforts rarely understand them or their purpose correctly, or that sexist and racist education has been making students feel bad for generations. The latest bill to gain attention is a Texas Senate bill passed in response to a House bill, set to become law in September, that included a bunch of conservative ahistorical requirements, but also had too many women and marginalized groups on the required list. While claiming to fight indoctrination, these bills miss historically accurate opportunities to paint the United States in a positive light, because they're so worried kids might learn about white supremacy in the process.

The first mistake these bills make is introducing "morality" into an analytical historical education. Morality is usually a personal or religious judgment that can be culturally dependent. It's not useful for analyzing history. Bigotry, violence, discrimination, white supremacy and harm impact are concepts we should be considering. Both bills require students be taught "the fundamental moral, political and intellectual foundations of the American experiment in self-government," and prohibit teaching that "an individual's moral character, standing,or worth is necessarily determined by the individual's race or sex." However, only the House bill includes a requirement "that the history of white supremacy, including but not limited to the institution of slavery, the eugenics movement, and the Ku Klux Klan, and the ways in which it is morally wrong." Both bills mandate that teachers don't teach that "with respect to their relationship to American values, slavery and racism are anything other than deviations from, betrayals of, or failures to live up to, the authentic founding principles of the United States, which include liberty and equality."

This last statement included in both is one of the most problematic requirements of these educational mandates as it forces teachers to elide important aspects of America's history and ultimately participate in nationalistic propaganda. We know that the first African slaves arrived in 1619 (don't worry I didn't cite the 1619 Project), only 12 years after Jamestown, Virginia, was founded. We know the first laws "racializing" slavery and making it an inheritable state were passed in Virginia in 1662.

At the time of the Declaration of Independence, slavery was legal and existed in all 13 colonies. The first gradual abolition law was passed in 1780 in Pennsylvania with all Northern states following until New Jersey passed the last one in 1804. Since most Northern states passed graduation emancipation acts, meaning enslaved people would be freed once they reached a certain age, slavery existed in many Northern states until the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865. Slavery was also inscribed in the Constitution with the Three Fifths Compromise, that enslaved peoples would be counted as three-fifths of a person for census purposes and representative apportionment.

*snip*

[rickyhall]

1. I don't know but my kid and grand kids don't know shit about American History.

I learned history in Texas and Arkansas public schools and the University of Arkansas and they all were a little different from each other and none said much about the Civil War.