At Home, But Hardly Alone; J. Christie

In the minds of most, it didn't matter that the championship title was forfeited. That coach, and that team, were still champions, and in more ways than one. We should ask ourselves, "Could I have mustered the courage to do the same?" I suppose some of you might be thinking, "Okay, so he's telling us to be good. So did Mother. What else is new?" What I'm saying is, keep your youthful AT HOME, BUT HARDLY ALONE 415 zeal for doing good and for changing the world. Some may call you idealistic, but progress is never made without ideals, and those who champion them are the examples we most admire and remember. Resolve that you will indeed make your mark and shape society for the better, but understand that it is not enough to preach to others, no matter how good it might make you feel inside. It is not enough, indeed it's almost always counterproductive, to try to shape the world by the use of force or political decree. You have it within your power to wield great influence. Just recog nize that how great that influence will be, is in direct proportion to your ability as a shining example to attract others to your cause.

Graduates-with the degrees you've worked long and hard to achieve, you have a head start on success in life. Now it's up to you to rise to the duty of becoming the very best examples you can possibly be in every aspect of all that you do. D At Home, But Hardly Alone by Jim Christie A ny time the leaders and followers of certain causes-like, say, civil rights, gay rights, and abortion rights-descend on Washington, D.C., flexing their political muscle, those who may be opposed, indif ferent, and just plain uninterested are lec tured on the grandeur of direct democracy. But when, let's say, a movement that is little known and completely uncovered by the media, like the homeschooling move ment, does something similar-in this case with a recent massive telephone campaign Jim Christie is an Oakland, California, writer. His review of Reclaiming the American Right appeared in the June issue of The Freeman.

to Capitol Hill-the press sounds all sorts of alarms that a clear and present danger is at hand. After all, many homeschoolers are Chris tian activists. The telephone campaign was orchestrated by one Michael Farris, presi dent of the Home School Legal Defense Association and a Christian conservative who unsuccessfully ran last fall for lieuten ant governor of Virginia. Liberals in the press can be mean enough to Christians. (Remember the flap last year after a Washington Post reporter in a story essentially called Christians a bunch of trailer trash?) But the coldest cuts are often 416 THE FREEMAN • AUGUST 1994 the sectarian ones, like that delivered by a San Francisco columnist who most often writes from a conservative perspective. In a column on Farris and the home schoolers' telephone campaign, for in stance, this right-of-center journalist called the homeschoolers "lemmings." That's just plain mendacious and misses the point completely. There are many solid reasons why the homeschooling "lem mings" united to exercise direct democ racy, albeit at the behest of a Christian activist, a member of the officialstrawman class for the 1990s.

In all too many public schools, reading, writing and arithmetic, are taking a backseat to backseat-of-the-car subjects. Some par ents have come to the conclusion that there is an unstated effort in the public schools to promote promiscuity even though not much good has come from years and years of sex-ed as the country's teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease rates soar. And let's face it, public schools are also on the skids academically. Certainly, bleak SAT scores and dropout rates prove this. Just ask any employer or college-level in structor, and you willhear that young adults are not only lacking in basic skills but in basic manners. Then there's the politically volatile issue of cultural curricula in politicized public schools. Now, for instance, instead of learn ing the broad themes of assimilation and cosmopolitan tolerance, children are sub ject to politicized multicultural sloganeer ing-while being used all too many times as cannon fodder in the continuous power grab of teachers unions.

To .borrow from the title of·one of the more celebrated special-interest text~, Heather may have two mommies, but can kindergartners appreciate lesbian studies? And must we subject smallchildren to allthe shrill self-esteem-based racial and ethnic cheerleading (and its distortions and fre quent outright lies) in many new textbooks even as many American classics, like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, are de nounced by the oversensitive? Besides, children in public schools just aren't going to have enough time to bolster egos, sink into guilt trips, and absorb every "ism" if Ms. Marple is keeping them busy in class with letter-writing campaigns to governors and legislators any time educa tion budget cuts or school reforms are in the news. For example, throughout California public schools last year, much class time was devoted to badmouthing the concept of school vouchers. Andlet's not forget some basic and shock ing truths about our public schools, like the fact that parent input into educational mat ters is kept to a minimum, by bureaucrats.

Why else does busing still persist when in practically every public school district, whether white, black or other, parents want their children close to their own neighbor hoods-and want funds for their neighbor hood schools to be made top-notch instead of being used to subsidize social engineer ing? Then there are purely selfish reasons for a family not to send their children to·some public schools. Simply put, some public schools are no better and no safer than prisons, often featuring police-state de tails-metal detectors, drug-sniffing dogs, armed guards, barbwire-that leave the im pression that education, when it's there, and even indoctrination, is of secondary con cern to coercive efforts to maintain order. Instead of depicting homeschoolers as tools of a nefarious Christian right plot, the media ought to look into why as many as 350,000families want to keep government from getting its hands on truly private edu cation.

The findings may not mesh with the wel fare state advocacy of liberals within the press, nor sit well with conservative jour nalists who consider anyone on the right and outside the country club gates to be part of the dangerous rabble, but they would hold the hard truth of life in the public schools up for view. Then it would become clear why a grow ing number of Americans aren't keeping their children from getting an education, but simply keeping them out of school. D THEFREEMAN IDEASON LIBERTY The Natural Disaster ProtectionAct: A Disaster Waiting to Happen by Gary Wolfram T he Natural Disaster Protection Act! provides an example of what the nine teenth-century French political economist Frederic Bastiat called "the seen and the unseen. ,,2 While it would appear to reduce the federal government bailout of those who have natural disasters befall them, it would instead create a substantial liability for the federal government, increase exposure to natural disaster, add to the regulatory bur den of the economy, and increase the size and scope of government. Its actual effect would be to reduce our individual freedom and move us further down what F.A. Hayek termed "the road to serfdom.,,3 The legislation would amend the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act4 in order to, among other things: (1) require "disaster-prone" states to adopt a model building code and enforce this code on new construction, either di rectly or through their local governments and submit to the Federal Emergency Man agement Agency (FEMA) a disaster mitiga tion plan; (2) require any new federal build ing or building which has been assisted by federal funds to meet the new building code standards; (3) create two new federal insurGary Wolfram is George Munson Professor of Political Economy at Hillsdale College in Mich igan.