O P I N I O N
THE SOAPBOX
Stand up. Speak up. It’s your turn.
Much ink has already been spilled about House Bill 544, the so-called “divisive concepts” bill that would penalize educators teaching concepts associated with what has become known as “critical race theory.”
As a longtime public school English teacher, I have a vested interest in whether this bill becomes a law. As someone trained in the law, I have profound reservations about its constitutionality. And as an active citizen in my community, I fear the bill will be used for nefarious partisan purposes that will have a significant chilling effect on the open exchange of ideas that is so critical to cultivating the next generation of active citizens, an outcome that I suspect is actually an objective of the bill’s sponsors.
So, I will not apologize about spilling a little more ink in this space.
The constitution is always open to interpretation. Indeed, we would not need a court system if that were not the case. However, certain articles of faith have emerged to form a constitutional consensus over the centuries. The most salient understanding about First Amendment protections to arise from that consensus goes something like this: No governmental entity, even one as representative as New Hampshire’s Great and General Court, can officially disadvantage a particular point of view — no matter how unpopular or discredited. (While critical race theory may be unpopular, it has not been discredited.)
Thus, even the Flat Earth Society (and it really still exists) is left to prosper or languish because the government has no business telling even the most misguided among us how to think. The Klan is allowed to march through the streets of a Chicago suburb that was home to more Holocaust survivors than any other American community because the government cannot undermine the expression of even the most hateful speech. Voters may elect notorious rascals and reprobates of all political persuasions because no government official can supplant the wisdom of the masses with his or her own allegedly more learned opinions.
While the Republican majority of the New Hampshire legislature — and the governor if he signs the bill — may not like the fact (and, yes, it is a fact) that systemic racism played a dominant role in this country’s founding and throughout its history, they have no business gagging those who believe otherwise and who can support that belief with ample evidence — especially not teachers, whose credibility rests on taking their students to where the facts lead.
Proponents of the legislation, including New Hampshire Commissioner of Education Frank Edelblut, have asserted that “our basic values” are at risk if teachers claim that racism played a critical role in American history. The commissioner’s use of the term “our values” underscores his misunderstanding of constitutional restrictions that do not allow government officials to define a particular set of values to be favored over those embraced by the commissioner of education, the governor, or even a majority of the legislature. That’s just not the American way.
Justice Robert Jackson in the 1943 Supreme Court case of West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, the decision that recognized the rights of students to refuse to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, articulated a constitutional precedent when he wrote: “If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.” HB 544 seeks to do all that and more.
Finally, there is also a political component to my objections to the passage of HB 544. The bill would empower Commissioner Edelblut, an active partisan who has already run for governor, regularly appears at partisan events, and is predicted to seek the corner office again, to use the law as a cudgel against teachers who run afoul of his political viewpoints and as a rallying cry for a base of voters he will need to win the governorship. Edelblut has been known to use his office to elevate supporters and to attack opponents. He cannot be trusted with the power that HB 544 would give him.
That’s enough ink devoted to this topic for now. Gotta save some for writing the inevitable court challenge that passage of HB 544 will certainly prompt.
Beg to differ? Agree to disagree? Thoughtful prose on topics of general interest are always welcome. Send submissions to publisher@manchesterinklink.com, subject line: The Sopbox.
David Scannell, a former Manchester School Board member and state representative, teaches English at Milford High School.
