Challenge:
Which institution would I de-fund 100%?
I would
eliminate all funding for education, including all of the military academies.
Most
people would probably choose a federal program to eliminate. I wouldn't. I
think all government begins with self-government, and then extends to three
institutions: family, church, and state.
My slogan
is "Politics fourth."
Judicial
sovereignty lies with the individual. Why? Because the individual is
responsible for his own actions. If individuals do not govern themselves, there
is not sufficient power anywhere else in society to force all men to do the
right thing, or the predictable thing, or the sensible thing. The only reason
why any institutional government works is because the vast majority of people
under some governmental administration govern themselves on the basis of
agreed-upon ethical and practical principles. In other words, if self-government
breaks down, we are faced with either tyranny or chaos. Because people will not
live in chaos, they will choose to submit to tyranny.
Second, I
am a traditional conservative. I am therefore a disciple of Edmund Burke. I
think most government in life is not political. I think most government has to
do with voluntary associations, personal commitments on a face-to-face basis,
and local organizations that deal with local problems.
Third, if
I wanted to call myself a liberal, I would call myself a disciple of Alexis de
Tocqueville, who took pretty much the same approach that Edmund Burke did when
Tocqueville analyzed and described the American commonwealth of 1830.
A
SUBSTITUTE CHURCH
I am
convinced that the American public school system is a humanistic attempt to
substitute the state for the church. This has certainly been the case in
American history. Massachusetts was the last state to get rid of tax funded
churches, which it did in 1833. Four years later, it created the state Board of
Education, and began pursuing the tax funding of primary education.
The main goal of the Yankees in 1837 was
essentially the goal of the Puritans in 1642, namely, to create the city on a
hill that would serve as an operational model for the rest of the world. The
Yankees were driven by the lust for money, social position, and political
power, whereas the Puritans were driven by the fear of God and the conviction
that men, if left to their own devices, would run to sin and destruction with
all deliberate speed. The Puritans wanted to achieve a decent society by means
of controlling the impulses of sinful men. The Yankees wanted to achieve a
decent society by not only controlling the impulses of sin, but also by
promoting righteous causes by means of state funding. The public school system
was the first great Yankee experiment in this regard.
There
were always opponents of the Yankees, but, region by region, state by state,
county by county, municipality by municipality, they all adopted the Yankees'
central institution, the public school system. By hook or by crook -- and in
the case of the Civil War, by means of military conquest -- the Yankees
exported the public school system, and then, in alliance with New York City
publishers, took over the production of textbooks that would be used to reshape
the rest of the country along Yankee lines. New York publishers were in it for
the money. The Yankees were in it for the reform possibilities. Of course,
Yankee authors were always happy to get book royalties for their textbooks. They
were content to let the New York publishers keep 90% of the revenues.
If you
look at the history of textbook production, begin with the place of
publication. You probably won't know the names of the publishing houses,
beginning in the 19th century, but you will recognize the cities. The cities
are these: New York and Boston. This was not random. Also, it has not changed
much over the years. You don't see major textbook publishing houses located in
Dallas, Seattle, Atlanta, St. Louis, or Denver. Maybe an occasional Los Angeles
or Chicago firm sneaks in.
The
public school system from day one has been run by Boston and New York.
Educators earn their Ph.D. degrees from Harvard or Columbia. Columbia has the
most influential of all the graduate programs in education. This has been true
for over a century. Columbia Teachers College has been by far the most
important training institution for public school teachers from the end of the
19th century until today. Its USP (unique selling proposition) is
straightforward:
Teachers College, Columbia University is the first and largest
graduate school of education in the United States and is also perennially
ranked among the nation's best. Its name notwithstanding, the College is
committed to a vision of education writ large, encompassing our four core areas
of expertise: health, education, leadership, and psychology.
The key
figure was John Dewey. He taught at Columbia University. He set the pattern for
Columbia Teachers College. Wikipedia correctly describes his position:
Known for his advocacy of democracy, Dewey considered two
fundamental elements--schools and civil society--to be major topics needing
attention and reconstruction to encourage experimental intelligence and
plurality. Dewey asserted that complete democracy was to be obtained not just
by extending voting rights but also by ensuring that there exists a fully
formed public opinion, accomplished by communication among citizens, experts,
and politicians, with the latter being accountable for the policies they adopt.
We are
also informed of the following: "From 1904 until his retirement in 1930 he
was professor of philosophy at both Columbia University and Columbia
University's Teachers College. In 1905 he became president of the American
Philosophical Association. He was a longtime member of the American Federation
of Teachers."
For
anybody who wants to understand the history of American education, there are
three authors to consider. One, Lawrence Cremin, is almost universally regarded
by the academic community as the official expert in the history of American
education. His books will give you the names and places. Second, you would be
wise to read R. J. Rushdoony's book, The Messianic Character American
Education. It takes you through the writings of the two dozen founders of
American progressive education. The title tells all: the public school system
was the humanists' self-conscious replacement of the churches. The third,
written by one of the great public school teachers in modern times, John Taylor
Gatto, is titled The Underground History of American Education. Gatto
quit teaching in the public schools of New York City after he had won teacher
of the year three times. His book shows you why American manufacturers wanted
to control the public schools.
Americans think it astounding that
people in Massachusetts in 1832 and people in Connecticut in 1815 still
believed that tax money should be used to subsidize local Congregational
churches. Yet the vast majority of Americans do not blink an eye at the idea
that tax money should be used to fund the institution that correctly has been
identified as America's only established church. This is what Rushdoony
called it in 1963, and this is what liberal historian Sidney Mead also called
it in 1963 in his book, The Lively Experiment: The Shaping of Christianity
in America. But the churches only really shaped the thinking of the public
on Sundays, and only for a few hours. Attendance was not compulsory. The modern
humanist state has established its church, and attendance is compulsory in most
cases, five days a week, eight hours a day. They even send out yellow buses to
bring the parishioners' children into the churches.
INDOCTRINATION
FOR THE NATION
The reason
why I think this would be the starting point of any serious shrinking of the
federal Leviathan is this: the opinions of the next generation of voters are
set in the public schools. To imagine the tax-funded schools will produce
anything except taxpayers who are committed to the messianic power of the state
would be naïve. The government gets what it pays for. Since the late 1830's, it
has paid for docile citizens who are ready, willing, and able to provide the
funding of the modern messianic state.
You can
fight the IRS. You can fight some regulatory agency. You can fight any
cabinet-level agency. You can fight them all, but if you let state-certified
teachers educate the next generation, the state's agencies of control will
sprout once again. Ideas have consequences, and the ideas taught in the public
school system are the central ideas of the modern messianic state.
Around
the world, the last institution that national governments are willing to
surrender to the private sector is the public school system. In most countries,
attendance at such government schools is compulsory. The United States is an
exception, and about 15% of the population opts out of the public schools.
Don't try this in Germany.
The great
philosopher of the public schools in the United States was Lester Frank Ward.
He was a self-taught polymath who is an expert in several fields. He was a
senior government statistician, but he was the philosopher of government
interventionism on a comprehensive scale. He was a Darwinist. He was a
Left-wing social Darwinist. He was an educator. He recognized early that the
key institution that social Darwinist performers had to gain control of is the
public school system, precisely because it is here that students can be kept
away from ideas that threaten central planners. He realized that it was not
possible in the United States to control the population by burning books. So,
he recommended an alternative program, namely, screening out rival ideas in the
public schools, so as to immunize students in their formative years from rival
opinions. He outlined all this in his two-volume work, published in 1883, Dynamic
Sociology. In 1907, he was elected president of the American Sociological
Association.
He hated
two things in life: Christianity and free market social Darwinism. He was a
defender of Left-wing social Darwinism, which was the Darwinism of state
planning. More than any other intellectual in American history, he was the
great defender of the concept of central planning.
I devoted
a long section in Appendix A of my economic commentary on Genesis to Lester Frank
Ward.
ALL
POLITICS IS LOCAL
I agree
with former Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill: all politics is local.
Here, at
the local level, Americans once had the power to abolish the single greatest
institution against liberty. But state regulations have long since mandated
compulsory attendance, and these regulations are enforced locally. The federal
courts would not allow such legislation to pass today. But the schools of done
their work. No political figure has launched a successful career based on this
platform: the de-funding of all education.
By law,
Christianity may not be taught in the public schools. But the religion of
humanism is not only taught in the public schools, it is required. We get
occasional stories about some witchcraft group or some Muslim group that gets
the right to participate on campus, but no textbooks are written in terms of
Wicca or Islam.
Students
and parents do not perceive the nature of the religious catechisms that are
imposed on all participants in the public school systems. The theology of the
catechisms is so ingrained in the thinking of the vast majority of Americans
that, by the age of 18, they no longer sense just how religious these
confessional statements are.
They do not begin with the doctrine that God is
the creator. They begin with the doctrine that the universe was originally
autonomous and without purpose. Then, lo and behold, life evolved out of out of
non-life on earth, 3.6 billion years ago. Then mankind evolved out of life in
general. And it is man, because of the power of his brain, who now exercises sovereignty
in history. Man has become God, but it took 13.7 billion years, more or less.
(Actually, it is never less, always more.)
So, my
target for 100% de-funding is the public school system. Your target may be on
some other institution. But I warn you: in all projects of wholesale reform,
don't start at the top. Start at the bottom. Significant reform is always
bottom-up. When it starts at the top, it too often winds up as a revolution.
The revolution soon eats its children.
If you
complain that your taxes are too high, but you turn over your children to the
state to be educated, politicians will not take your tax protest seriously.
When
the Tea Party movement adopts this slogan, it will be serious: "No more
school taxes!"
http://www.garynorth.com/public/15930.cfm
