Texas Conservatives won.

Texas Conservatives Win Curriculum Change

AUSTIN, Tex. — After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light.

The vote was 10 to 5 along party lines, with all the Republicans on the board voting for it.

The board, whose members are elected, has influence beyond Texas because the state is one of the largest buyers of textbooks. In the digital age, however, that influence has diminished as technological advances have made it possible for publishers to tailor books to individual states.

In recent years, board members have been locked in an ideological battle between a bloc of conservatives who question Darwin’s theory of evolution and believe the Founding Fathers were guided by Christian principles, and a handful of Democrats and moderate Republicans who have fought to preserve the teaching of Darwinism and the separation of church and state.

And then the kids go to college, and are freaked out by the history they missed out on earlier while they were learning about the NRA, Phyllis Schlafly, the Moral Majority, the reason why Newt Gingrich is still on Sunday morning chat shows, and how Jesus wrote the Constitution while riding on the back of a dinosaur.


Although it's just one out of a number of disturbing things, the questioning of church/state separation pretty much irritates me. The quote from the story:

“I reject the notion by the left of a constitutional separation of church and state,” said David Bradley, a conservative from Beaumont who works in real estate. “I have $1,000 for the charity of your choice if you can find it in the Constitution.”

Fine. Those specific words aren't in the Constitution--probably because the founders didn't think they would have to spell it out like that. We usually just call it the "establishment clause" after what's actually in the First Amendment.

Also, the historical opinions of many of the Founding Fathers and other notable Americans can't be discounted. There is a really neat compendium of them here.

I hope the article is correct in stating that Texas' influence on textbooks used country-wide is on the wane.