[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 74 (Thursday, May 20, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1047-E1048]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                         WORKING ON A SOLUTION

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. BOB SCHAFFER

                              of colorado

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 20, 1999

  Mr. SCHAFFER. Mr. Speaker, in the matter of the Columbine Massacre, I 
hereby submit to the Record a statement issued by the Colorado State 
Board of Education.
  These remarks, I commend to my colleagues upon consideration of 
various proposals pending this Congress. Clearly, the thoughts offered 
by the Colorado State Board of Education, signed a thoughtful approach 
to any legislative initiatives we might consider here and establish a 
reasonable framework from which to view our responsibilities.
  The statement of the Board is as follows:

        What Is To Be Done: Searching for Meaning in Our Tragedy

       In the aftermath of the most terrible day in Colorado 
     education, when the pain and

[[Page E1048]]

     grief of those who have suffered loss is beyond what words 
     can express, all of us are asking the questions: ``Why? How 
     did this happen? What can we do to keep it from happening 
     again?'' The State Board of Education, adhering to its 
     Constitutional responsibility, joins the Columbine community 
     and the rest of the State in seeking the lessons that may be 
     drawn from the awful tragedy of April 20, 1999.
       As we seek the why behind this infamous event, we must find 
     answers beyond the easy and obvious. How weapons become used 
     for outlaw purposes is assuredly a relevant issue, yet our 
     society's real problem is how human behavior sinks to utter 
     and depraved indifference to the sanctity of life. As our 
     country promotes academic literacy, we must promote moral 
     literacy as well, and it is not children, but adults in 
     authority who are ultimately responsible for that.
       Our tragedy is but the latest--albeit the most terrifying 
     and costly--of a steadily escalating series of schoolhouse 
     horrors that have swept across the nation. The senseless 
     brutality of these calamities clearly reveals that a 
     dangerous subculture of amoral violence has taken hold among 
     many of our youth.
       We cannot pretend that we have not known about this 
     subculture or about those elements of the mass media, from 
     films to video games, from which it derives sustenance. 
     Further, we must honestly admit that essentially we have done 
     nothing to prevent these cultural cancers from spreading 
     through our schools and society.
       How often have adults questioning highly dubious youth 
     speech, dress, entertainment, or behavior been decried as 
     old-fashioned, or worse, attacked as enemies of individual 
     expression? How often have parents or teachers reporting 
     alarming predictors of violent behavior been told nothing can 
     be done until someone actually commits a crime? So we do 
     nothing, and then look upon the ruin of so many young lives 
     while hearing those saddest of words: Too Late.
       As a Board we believe, with Edmund Burke, that all that is 
     required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. 
     We further believe that society must act now before it is too 
     late for more innocent children. We also recognize that 
     failing to act shall make us all accomplices in such future 
     tragedies as may engulf our schools.
       Accordingly, we make the following recommendations for 
     renewing that unity and strength of purpose that has 
     historically bonded our schools, our homes, and our society.


                           I. IN OUR SCHOOLS

       While our schools are at once the mold and the mirror of 
     the democratic society they serve, they are not democracies 
     themselves. Schools are founded and controlled by adults for 
     the benefit of children.
       The adults accountable for running schools must have the 
     courage, ability, and authority to establish and maintain a 
     safe and orderly environment maximally consonant with the 
     purposes of schooling, i.e. the fullest possible achievement 
     for every single child.
       We recognize that in every time, and every society, there 
     is tension between liberty and license, and frankly, we 
     believe that the pendulum has swung too far in the direction 
     of the latter.
       Be that as it may, our school children should not be 
     routinely victimized by the quarrels of the wider society. 
     They deserve the shielding mantle of adult authority while 
     they form and strengthen themselves for their own entry into 
     adulthood.
       We also recognize the routine cruelty and torment that can 
     occur among adolescents in an unchecked peer culture. This is 
     all the more reason for a strong and vigilant adult authority 
     to prevent victimization of the vulnerable.
       We know this won't be easy, and that it must begin with a 
     decisive rollback of those harmful precedents that have so 
     undermined the confident and successful exercise of 
     legitimate adult authority upon which every good school 
     depends.
       We must stop disrespecting those who urge discipline and 
     values. We must recognize that their cry is the legitimate 
     voice of the American people. We must listen to respected 
     voices--liberal and conservative--like Albert Shanker and 
     William Bennett--when they tell us flat out that our ``easy'' 
     schools will never get better or safer without a massive 
     renewal of their values, discipline, and work ethic.
       Finally, we must remember, respect, and unashamedly take 
     pride in the fact that our schools, like our country, found 
     their origin and draw their strength from the faith-based 
     morality that is at the heart of our national character.
       Today our schools have become so fearful of affirming one 
     religion or one value over another that they have banished 
     them all. In doing so they have abdicated their historic role 
     in the moral formation of youth and thereby alienated 
     themselves from our people's deep spiritual sensibilities. To 
     leave this disconnection between society and its schools and 
     unaddressed is an open invitation to further divisiveness and 
     decline. For the sake of our children, who are so dependent 
     upon a consistent and unified message from the adult world, 
     we must solve these dilemmas. Other civilized nations have 
     resolved divisions that are far more volatile. Surely, 
     America can do as well.


                            II. IN OUR HOMES

       We routinely preach about cooperation between home and 
     school, yet too often our actions tell a different story. Too 
     often, we undermine rather than support the values and 
     authority of parents. Too often, we find them handy 
     scapegoats for our own failures.
       When countless surveys show our parents to be deeply 
     concerned about the state of public education, something is 
     seriously wrong and we ignore this at our peril.
       This alienation has as much to do with parental concerns 
     about safety and values as it does with persistent learning 
     deficiencies. If we are to ask parents to use their authority 
     to support those educating their children, then educators 
     must use their authority to support the work and values of 
     parents. Some schools are already doing this, but sadly in 
     too many instances, these historic bonds of trust and mutual 
     support have frayed badly or broken altogether.
       We deeply believe that without a unified adult world, our 
     children will continue to suffer the consequences of our 
     doubts and divisions.


                          III. IN OUR SOCIETY

       The connection between murder in our schools and elements 
     of the mass culture is now beyond dispute. Only those who 
     profit from this filth, and their dwindling bands of 
     apologists deny the evidence of violence, hatred, and sadism 
     routinely found in films, video games, and the like.
       We believe it is no longer acceptable for an entertainment 
     industry that spends billions to influence the behavior of 
     children to deny that their efforts have consequences or that 
     they have no accountability for sowing the seeds of tragedy.
       If a utility poured sewage into our streets, an outraged 
     public would not tolerate it. Should those responsible for 
     the stream of moral sewage entering our homes and communities 
     be any less accountable?
       If we deem it proper to boycott, withhold public 
     investments, and otherwise impose an economic penalty on 
     companies for their labor practices, environmental policies, 
     or countries in which they operate, how could we fail to move 
     at least as aggressively against those who create, promote, 
     and distribute media and other products for which there is no 
     imaginable justification.
       In closing we should be reminded that throughout our 
     history our people have demonstrated a remarkable capacity 
     for moral courage and self-renewal in times of great danger 
     and challenge.
       Perhaps across the ages we can hear the timeless words of 
     Abraham Lincoln, and, applying them to our own circumstance 
     renew his pledges, ``that we here highly resolve that these 
     dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under 
     God, shall have a new birth of freedom''.
       With history as our judge, let us go forward together with 
     a strong and active faith.
       Authorized at a Special Meeting of the State Board of 
     Education, April 21, 1999 and issued by our hand in the city 
     of Denver, Colorado, at the regular meeting May 13, 1999.
         Clair Orr, Chairman, 4th Congressional District; Pat M. 
           Chlouber, Vice Chairman, 3rd Congressional District; 
           Ben Alexander, Member-At-Large, John Burnett, 5th 
           Congressional District; Randy DeHouff, 6th 
           Congressional District; Patti Johnson, 2nd 
           Congressional District; Gully Stanford, 1st 
           Congressional District; William J. Moloney, 
           Commissioner of Education.

           

                          ____________________