[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 45 (Thursday, March 20, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4157-S4159]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                TEACHING OF AMERICAN HISTORY AND CIVICS

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text 
of a speech I gave before the Heritage Foundation on March 14 be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                   Remarks of Senator Lamar Alexander


   putting the teaching of american history and civics back into our 
                               classrooms

                   out of many, one: e pluribus unum

       I am glad to have this privilege to come to Heritage today 
     to talk about the two subjects I care about the most: the 
     education of our children and the principles that unite us as 
     Americans. I salute Heritage for providing public forums on 
     issues that are important to our nation.
       At a time when we are asking young Americans to give their 
     lives to defend our values, we are doing a poor job of 
     teaching just what those values are.
       That is why, last week, in my maiden address--we still call 
     it that in the United States Senate--I proposed ways to put 
     the teaching of American history and civics back in our 
     schools so our children can grow up learning what it means to 
     be an American.
       The Senate will hold hearings on April 10 on my proposal. 
     The proposal is to create Presidential Academies for Teachers 
     of American History and Civics and Congressional Academies 
     for students of American history and Civics--residential 
     summer academies at which teachers can learn better how to 
     teach, and outstanding students can learn more about the key 
     events, persons and ideas that shaped the institutions and 
     democratic heritage of the United States of America.
       Today I want to discuss, first, why America is 
     exceptional--not always better than other countries, but in 
     important ways different; second, how the teaching and 
     learning of American history and civics has declined and why; 
     and, finally, why the three Latin words that were the first 
     motto of our nation, E Pluribus Unum, are still in the right 
     order--Out of Many, One--even though some are trying mightily 
     to turn them around to say that we are ``Many, out of One.'' 
     In other words, in the United States of America, I believe 
     unity still trumps diversity.


                       you can't become japanese

       Now to do this, I want to ask for your help.
       So, will you please imagine that we are in a federal 
     courtroom in Nashville, where I was on October 2001. It is 
     naturalization day. The room is filled with anxious persons, 
     talking among themselves in halting English. They are 
     obviously with their families and closest friends. They are 
     neatly dressed, but for the most part, not so well dressed.
       Most faces are radiant. Only a few faces are white. There 
     are 77 persons from 22 countries who have passed their exams, 
     learned English, passed a test about American government, 
     survived a character investigation, paid their taxes and 
     waited in line for five years to be a citizen of the 
     United States.
       The bailiff shouts, ``God Save this Honorable court,'' and 
     the judge, Aleta Trauger walks in. She asks each of the 
     applicants to stand.
       Now--here is where I need your help.
       I will be Judge Trauger.
       I want you to be the 77 new citizens.
       Will you please stand, actually stand, raise your right 
     hand, and repeat after me. I want you to listen carefully to 
     this oath.
       ``I, and state your name.
       ``Hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely 
     renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any 
     foreign prince, potentate, state or sovereignty, of whom or 
     which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen;
       ``That I will support and defend the Constitution and laws 
     of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign 
     and domestic;
       ``That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same;
       ``That I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when 
     required by the law;
       ``That I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed 
     Forces of the United States when required by the law;
       ``That I will perform work of national importance under 
     civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take 
     this obligation freely without any mental reservation or 
     purpose of evasion:
       ``So help me God.''
       You may be seated. Thank you for doing that.
       Now, that is quite an oath.
       Sounds like it might have been written by some rowdy 
     patriots in Philadelphia or Williamsburg, and I wonder if 
     anything like that could be written into law today?
       Judge Trauger then addressed the new citizens in Nashville 
     with these words:
       ``You are now an American citizen. On behalf of your fellow 
     countrymen, I congratulate you. You have studied hard and 
     achieved much. You know more about the matters of citizenship 
     than many of us born into it. Even so, I would like to speak 
     to you for a few minutes about what I think it means to be an 
     American citizen,'' she said.
       Continuing to quote, ``Americans, unlike many other people, 
     are not Americans simply because of accidents of geography or 
     centuries of tradition. Instead, we Americans based our 
     citizenship on our foundation of shared ideals and ideas 
     brought from many countries, races, religions and cultures.''
       The judge said, ``We are Americans because we also share 
     certain fundamental beliefs.

[[Page S4158]]

     We are bound together by the unique set of principles set 
     forth in documents that created and continue to define this 
     nation. We find our heritage and inspiration in the profound 
     words of the Declaration of Independence: 'All people are 
     created equal and endowed with unalienable right to life, 
     liberty and the pursuit of happiness.' We pledge allegiance 
     to the Republic as one nation under God, indivisible, with 
     liberty and justice for all. But the greatest expression of 
     our national identity is the constitution of the United 
     States which established the responsibilities and rights that 
     go with citizenship.'' And the judge continued.
       These were the words that fall day in 2001 of Judge Aleta 
     Trauger to 77 incredibly happy new citizens, their families 
     and friends in the Nashville courthouse.
       This happens almost every month, in almost every federal 
     courthouse. That same year, about 900,000 new citizens took 
     this oath and heard words like this.
       Judge Trauger, may I say, is not some right wing, super 
     patriotic extremist nominated for the federal bench by the 
     Bush White House. She was appointed by a Democratic 
     president.
       But Democrats as well as Republicans--almost all of us as 
     Americans--agree with what Judge Trauger's exposition of what 
     it means to be an American.
       For example, after 9/11 President Bush spoke of the 
     American character.
       Former vice-president Al Gore said the next day we ``must 
     defend the values that bind us together.''
       Judge Trauger, the President and the former vice-president 
     were invoking a creed of ideas and values in which most of us 
     believe. ``It has been our fate as a nation,'' the historian 
     Richard Hofstader wrote, ``not to HAVE ideologies but to BE 
     one.''
       Those who love and hate the United States love and hate us 
     not so much for what we do but for who we are.
       And it IS different being an American. One major difference 
     is how you get to be an American, just as those citizens did.
       You can't become Japanese by moving to Japan and taking 
     some oath.
       A Turk with great difficulty might immigrate to Germany and 
     become a citizen, but he will find himself described as a 
     Turk living in Germany, not as a German.
       Because of their Pakistani roots, the family of the 
     recently arrested Al Qaeda leader, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, 
     could not become Kuwaiti when they moved to Kuwait.
       But if a Japanese, or a Turk or a Pakistani came to America 
     and wanted to be a citizen, they would have to take that oath 
     to become an American. And they do that based not on race, 
     creed or color but by taking an oath and pledging allegiance 
     to a common set of principles.


                  What Happened to Our Common Culture?

       What principles?
       Judge Trauger mentioned most of them.
       Until recently in our country, most people learned these 
     principles in school, in their churches, at home, from the 
     media, in patriotic celebrations that were a part of everyday 
     life.
       Thomas Jefferson spent his retirement evenings at 
     Monticello teaching overnight guests what he had in mind when 
     he helped create America.
       Other founders took extensive notes and wrote long letters 
     explaining what it means to be an American.
       At the Alamo, Col. William Barrett Travis appealed for help 
     simply ``in the name of the American Character.''
       Former American Federation of Teachers President Albert 
     Shanker, said that the public school ``was invented to teach 
     immigrant children the three Rs and what it means to be an 
     American with the hope they would then go home and teach 
     their parents.''
       Diane Ravitch reminds us that McGuffey's reader sold 120 
     million copies and helped to create a common culture of 
     literature, patriotic speeches and historical references.
       President Roosevelt made sure those who charged the beaches 
     of Normandy knew they were fighting for Four Freedoms.
       But then things changed, for a variety of reasons.
       One reason was that McCarthyism gave ``Americanism'' a sour 
     taste.
       The Vietnam War and other challenges to authority 
     questioned prevailing attitudes including our founding 
     principles.
       The end of the Cold War removed a preoccupation with who we 
     were not, making it less important to consider who we are.
       And our history textbooks, which had done a good job of 
     teaching some traditional history, left out a lot. The 
     contribution of Spanish explorers was undervalued. The 
     diseases those explorers brought with them that devastated 
     Native Americans was rarely mentioned.
       No Tennessee history book taught me about men like Kunta 
     Kinte, the seventh generation ancestor of Alex Haley, a 
     Tennessean who won a Pulitzer Prize for his family story, 
     Roots, the struggle for freedom and equality.
       There was very little mention of men like my ancestor John 
     Rankin, a conductor in the underground railway, and about the 
     slave-catchers from Kentucky who tried to assassinate him.
       And finally, the largest number of new Americans in our 
     country's history came to our shores--and in the last few 
     years, the prevailing notion became let's just celebrate all 
     those cultures, and we forgot to remind new Americans of the 
     principles that have always united our many, new cultures.


                 Osama Bin Laden and George Washington

       So, just at a time when there should have been an 
     acceleration in the teaching and learning of American history 
     and civics--it declined.
       In Dr. Ravitch's words, instead of incomplete history and 
     simplistic patriotism, we went to the other extreme--``Public 
     schools with an adversary culture that emphasized the 
     nation's warts and diminished its genuine accomplishments.''
       So imagine the plight of teachers. Assaulted by simplistic 
     patriotism on one side and multiculturalism on the other, 
     teachers dove for cover, textbooks became sanitized and 
     boring, and we've seen the embarrassing results.
       Christopher Hitchens, in a 1998 article in Harper's, 
     summarizes the evidence:
       59 percent of 4th graders do not know why Pilgrims and 
     Puritans first voyaged to America.
       68 percent of 4th graders can't name the first 13 colonies.
       90 percent of 8th graders can't recount anything about the 
     debates of the constitutional convention.
       Today, three quarters of 4th, 8th and 12th graders--this is 
     according to the National Assessment of Educational 
     Progress--are not proficient in civics knowledge and one 
     third of them do not have basic knowledge, making one third 
     of our students ``civic illiterates.''
       Children are not learning American history and civics 
     because they are not being taught it, or at least they are 
     not being taught it well. American history has been watered 
     down and civics is too often dropped entirely from the 
     curriculum.
       Today, more than half the states don't have a requirement 
     for students to take a course--even for one semester--in 
     American government.
       The results of this are evident everywhere in American 
     life.
       For example, some federal judges--who seem not to know that 
     the first Congress enacted both the first amendment and paid 
     the first senate chaplain--these judges are unable to 
     reconcile our religious traditions with the separation of 
     church and state--producing absurd decisions like the one 
     removing ``under God'' from the pledge of allegiance.
       A United States Congresswoman actually says that ``Osama 
     Bin Laden and these non-nation state fighters with religious 
     purposes are very similar to those kinds of atypical 
     revolutionaries that helped to cast off the British crown.''
       Schools remove the names of George Washington and Thomas 
     Jefferson because it is discovered they owned slaves, without 
     remembering they also created a country whose principles led 
     to the inevitable end of that horrible practice.
       And, according to the Princeton Review, our presidential 
     debates (and I participated in these) are now conducted at a 
     sixth or seventh grade vocabulary level as compared with the 
     Lincoln--Douglas debates in the 1850's which were conducted 
     at a level of vocabulary expected of high school seniors.


                        trust classroom teachers

       So, to help put the teaching of American history and civics 
     back in its rightful place in our schools, I have proposed 
     that we create Presidential Academies for Teachers of 
     American History and Civics and Congressional Academies for 
     Students of American History and Civics.
       These residential academies would operate in the summer for 
     two weeks for teachers and four weeks for students. Their 
     purpose would be to inspire better teaching and more learning 
     of these subjects.
       The idea for these academies is based primarily upon my 
     trust and respect for classroom teachers.
       I believe that if, for example, 200 Tennessee teachers come 
     together for two weeks in the summer to discuss how to do a 
     more complete, inspiring and effective job of teaching 
     American history and civics, they will light up their 
     classrooms with their enthusiasm during the next year.
       In the same way, good students who spend a month with such 
     teachers will go back to their classrooms not only inspired 
     themselves but serving as good examples for other students.
       I know this works because I have seen it happen before. 
     Tennessee's Governors' summer schools for teachers and 
     students were the best education spending, dollar for dollar, 
     our state has ever done. Teacher after teacher, student after 
     student told me these schools literally changed their lives. 
     There are more than 100 such Governor's schools in 28 states, 
     almost all with great experiences.
       Our pilot program would start with 12 Presidential 
     Academies for Teachers and 12 Congressional Academies for 
     students. We'd spend $25 million a year for four years and 
     see if it worked. The schools would be sponsored by 
     educational institutions. The grants would be awarded for two 
     years at a time by the National Endowment for the Humanities 
     after a peer review process. Each grant would be subject to 
     rigorous review after three years to see if the program is 
     worth continuing.
       This is not only something that will work; it is something 
     parents want. A Public Agenda survey showed that 84 percent 
     of parents with school age children said they believe that 
     the United States is a special country, and they want schools 
     to convey the belief to

[[Page S4159]]

     their children by teaching about its heroes and traditions.
       President Bush has taken leadership in this. He created a 
     ``We the People Program'' to develop curriculum and sponsor 
     lectures on American history and civics. He is also 
     sponsoring a White House forum on the subject soon.
       Last year the Senate authorized $100 million to schools for 
     the teaching of traditional American history and civics. A 
     dozen senators, including the Democratic Whip, Harry Reid of 
     Nevada, have joined in sponsoring our legislation. 
     Congressman Roger Wicker and colleagues in the House of 
     Representatives have introduced it there.
       I have one more thing I need to say.
       I want to read you one sentence from my so-called ``maiden 
     speech'' to the Senate last week, because it elicited what 
     one newspaper described as ``harsh criticism from the civil 
     rights community.''
       This is the sentence: ``Some of our national leaders have 
     celebrated multiculturalism and bilingualism and diversity at 
     a time when there should have been more emphasis on a common 
     culture and learning English and unity.''
       There are some real differences of opinion reflected in the 
     criticism I got for saying that.
       Some believe that America is just another country, and that 
     it is embarrassing for us to claim it is truly exceptional.
       Some believe it is old fashioned and wrong to try to define 
     the principles that unite us as Americans because in the past 
     it led us to excesses such as McCarthyism, because it can 
     seem exclusionary and that we would be better off just being 
     comfortable as descendants of wherever we came from.
       Most important, we have not been able to put behind us the 
     memory that the ancestors of some of us who didn't come for 
     the same reasons most did. Native Americans were already 
     here, and the ancestors of most African-Americans, like Kunta 
     Kinte, were captured in their villages, transported in the 
     stinking bellies of slave ships to this country and sold into 
     bondage. It is hard to put that out of one's memory.


                       why unity trumps diversity

       Here is what I believe.
       I believe that America's variety and diversity is a 
     magnificent strength. I have always sought that in my own 
     life and for my children.
       But diversity is not our greatest strength.
       Jerusalem is diverse.
       The Balkans are diverse.
       The greatest challenge we face in Iraq is not winning a war 
     but turning diversity into unity after the war.
       The greatest accomplishment of the United States of 
     America, after establishing freedom and democracy, is that 
     we've found a way to take all our magnificent variety and 
     diversity and unite as one country.
       I preside a great deal as a freshman senator. Engraved 
     above the Senate president's chair, for every C-SPAN viewer 
     to see, are the three Latin words that form the original 
     motto of our country, E Pluribus Unum--Out of many, one.
       It is NOT many, out of one.
       As Samuel Huntington has observed, if it were many out of 
     one, we would be the United Nations, not the United States of 
     America.


                         ``pledge plus three''

       Now, since 9/11, there has been a different tone in our 
     country. The terrorists focused their cross hairs on the 
     ideas that unite us--forcing us to remind ourselves of those 
     principles, to examine and define them, and to celebrate 
     them.
       President Bush has been the lead teacher, literally taking 
     us back to school on television about what it means to be an 
     American.
       We should join our President in this National discussion.
       One way would be for each school to start each day the way 
     the Senate does--with the Pledge of Allegiance, followed by a 
     teacher or student saying in his or her own words for three 
     minutes ``what it means to be an American.'' It would be a 
     daily lesson in American history and civics for the whole 
     school.
       When I decided to run for the Senate a year ago, I was a 
     member of the faculty at Harvard's school of government, 
     teaching a course in ``The American Character and America's 
     Government.''
       The students and I were trying to figure out if there is 
     ``an American way'' to solve tough public policy problems.
       It was easy for us to define the principles that unite us, 
     such as: liberty, equal opportunity, rule of law, laissez 
     faire, individualism, e pluribus unum, the separation of 
     church and state.
       But applying those principles to real problems turned out 
     to be hard work. The Senate was reminded of this yesterday 
     when we debated partial birth abortion: it was the liberty of 
     a woman versus the life of a baby.
       We see these conflicts of principle when we discuss 
     President Bush's faith-based charity proposal because on the 
     one hand, ``In God We Trust,'' but on the other hand, we 
     don't trust government with God.
       I want the federal government to pay for scholarships that 
     would follow children to any accredited school--public, 
     private or religious. To me that is equal opportunity. To the 
     National Education Association it is the violation of 
     separation of church and state and of the principle of e 
     pluribus unum.
       As Samuel Huntington has written, most of our politics is 
     about conflicts among principles that unite us--and about 
     disappointments that occur when we try to live up to our 
     greatest dreams.'' ``All men are created equal,'' we say, but 
     there is still racism in America. ``We will pay any price, 
     bear any burden to defend freedom,'' President Kennedy said, 
     but we didn't go to Rwanda, and there is a great debate about 
     going to Iraq.
       If the conflicts among these principles and our 
     disappointment in not reaching them is what most of our 
     politics and government are about--then we had better get 
     busy teaching them again.
       My best student in my last class at Harvard was Natalia 
     Kubay. She had grown up in Ukraine, married a Peace Corps 
     worker and moved to Boston. She was waiting for her 
     citizenship. Her enthusiasm for her new country was so great 
     that it infected all of us who were privileged to be in the 
     classroom with her. She hopes one day, after she is a 
     citizen, to run for office and serve in government.
       Natalia is proud of her family and her native country. When 
     she takes the oath of a naturalized citizen in the federal 
     courthouse in Boston, as you did today, she will be living in 
     this nation of immigrants, proud of where she came from, but 
     prouder to be able to say, ``We are all Americans.''
       Thank you.
  Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I would like to take this opportunity to 
commemorate the 47th anniversary of Tunisia's independence.
  Since the establishment of the Republic of Tunisia, it has made 
significant progress in the areas of social and economic development, 
transparency of the electoral process, respect for human rights, and 
the promotion of women's rights.
  As the Bush administration recently stated, Tunisia has become a 
force for tolerance and moderation in the region.
  It has been a vital partner with the United States in our efforts to 
facilitate dialogue in the Arab world. This role has become 
increasingly important in this turbulent time.
  I would also like to express my appreciation for Tunisia's continued 
support and cooperation in the fight against terrorism.
  By working together against this common enemy, we will eliminate the 
threat of terrorism and ensure international peace and security.
  Our shared commitments towards this end will only serve to strengthen 
our relations in the future.
  I hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating the government 
and people of Tunisia on the occasion of their 47th anniversary of 
independence.

                          ____________________