Obama's Speech to Children is a Seriously Flawed Civics Lesson

Whether done by Democrats or Republicans, it is inappropriate for the President of the United States to use the nation's schoolchildren as political props or junior lobbyists.

It is not surprising that millions of Americans are suspicious of the President's intent in the address he will deliver today from Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. Americans resent this intrusion into their children's education because the teaching materials prepared by the U. S. Department of Education, withdrawn or not, reveal the President's intent. Those materials do not ask students how they might improve their grades, they ask how each student might help Obama. That this administration has undertaken one of the largest, unconstitutional power-grabs in U.S. history, only adds to the suspicion.

Certainly, government has an interest in a well-formed, educated citizenry. Government has an interest in a safe, high quality, and secure food supply also; but they don't (at least not yet) propose to collectivize the farms. The ultimate authorities over schooling in the United States are known as "chief state school officers," and those are state officials. But even that degree of government involvement in education is a recent phenomenon. The Cato Institute describes how schooling in the United States has evolved from a responsibility of families, churches, and local communities:

"Many people do not realize that for most of American history— from the early Colonial period through the end of the Civil War— not only was there no federal involvement in education, there was comparatively little state or local government involvement, either.

One sign of centralization is the migration of school financing from the local to the state and federal levels. In 1930 only 0.4 percent of funding for education came from the federal government, 17 percent from state governments, and 83 percent from local sources. By 1997 the federal government provided 7 percent of all funding, state governments’ contributions had ballooned to 48 percent, and the local government share had shrunk to 45 percent. Also by 1997, schools in 35 states received less than half of their revenues from local taxes.

In 1930 there were 262,000 government schools in America— one for every 470 people. Today those schools have been reduced to only 90,000 for a population more than twice as large— roughly one school for every 3,055 people. With the closing of small schools came the opening of large school districts. In 1932 there were 127,531 school districts nationwide. By 1994 only 14,881 school districts remained.

But long before the federal government got heavily involved in education, young America had waged a successful revolution against a titanic empire and founded a unique republic based on individual rights and responsibility. Alexis de Tocqueville would describe the ordinary citizens as the best educated in history."

As government's role has increased in education, schools and districts have become fewer and larger, and government regulation has made them more uniform, less personal, "one-size-fits-all " institutions. They have become less accountable to families for success, and more accountable to government for compliance, and everywhere throughout the nation, in rich districts and poor, the literacy and student achievement that awed de Tocqueville, has seriously declined. Today, government schools are mediocre at best. In many cities and states, including South Carolina, more than half of all students entering high school fail to graduate.

Americans would rightly resist government ownership of the nation's news media. We would not want politicians to control our access to information and be able to influence what Americans think. And yet we allow government to form the nation's children during the twelve most important years of their lives.

Socialized education has not worked any better than socialized health care will work. The President's address to the nation's schoolchildren starts the academic year with a seriously wrong civics lesson -- that the federal government, much less the President of the United States, has a role in education. America does not need more government involvement in education; it needs far less.