What do we tell children when what we teach does not comport with what is happening in their world? The daily news in our country hands us this dilemma. Today there is a clear dissonance between civics lessons and federal governmental actions. Thomas Paine’s words, “These are the times that try men’s souls…” apply again today. What we teach our children should clarify their point of view about current times and shape how these children live their lives in the future.
What do we know?
Let us keep it simple because there are simple truths. Our nation’s founding secured for us several basic human rights written in the first amendments to the Constitution. These are our Bill of Rights. A strange resurgent nationalism insists we teach our founding documents to all public-school children. That nationalism is hollow because many leaders of the resurgence are now primary actors in quashing the rights of their fellow citizens.
We teach children that the First Amendment to the Constitution says Congress shall not make a law prohibiting or abridging the freedom of speech, the press, the right of the people to peaceably assemble or the right to petition the government for a redress of their grievances. The Second Amendment protects the right to bear arms. The Third Amendment says a specific warrant is required for the government to search our person or home. The Fifth and Sixth Amendments assert that a person is innocent until proven guilty. I repeat, these are in the Bill of Rights for all Americans.
Our current “originalist” Justices on the Supreme Court do not equivocate on these. They tell us that the language of the Founding Fathers holds for all time, including today.
Yet today we see our federal government violating these solemn truths. Spoken and written speech are punished. People gathered for a civic purpose are abused and arrested. The gun rights of an individual favoring the government are upheld, but not the rights of a person opposing the government. And government officials proclaim citizens to be guilty and treat them as guilty without any evidence but their say so.
Today’s times are very trying.
What to do!
We teach. All children need to know and understand and learn to apply their birthright freedoms. Our teaching will cause their learning and will inform their lives.
Teaching is not partisan when it sticks to the language of the Constitution. We must clearly state and define each basic right with the historic illustrations that caused the Constitution’s authors to carefully choose their words. Children need to learn these truths without prejudice or bias.
As with all teaching and learning, we will make an early assessment of what our children learn. We will test them. That is how we measure knowledge. However, it will take years or decades for us to know that children today understand the depth of their basic rights and if their understanding shapes how they live as citizens. Still, we must teach.
The Big Duh!
Government of the people, by the people, and for the people can become fixated on wielding governmental power and forget the rights of the people. History is replete with leaders who twisted their popularity into a personal pedestal of perceived power. That is when humble and correct teaching is required to remind the next generation of voters that the right to lead is a responsibility not a privilege and the first responsibility of leadership is to guarantee the freedoms that have defined our nation.