Power and Control: The Battle for American Education

Graphic by Arola Oluwehinmi

PART I: INTRODUCTION

In the 2021 Virginia gubernatorial election, Republican Glenn Youngkin came to power on a promise to ban critical race theory and champion parental rights in education. One of his first acts in office was to set up a hotline for parents to report teachers who discuss “divisive subjects” in the classroom. Youngkin is just one among a wave of Republicans seeking to exert control over school curriculums. Since January of 2021, lawmakers in  forty-one states have introduced bills to restrict how teachers can talk about racism or sexism in the classroom, with many bills directly banning the teaching of critical race theory (CRT). Virginia is among fourteen states that have put these bills into law. This pattern is part of a concerted effort by Republican lawmakers to reshape the narrative of American history and the contours of American education.

PART II: BANNING CRITICAL RACE THEORY

In June of 2021, New Hampshire passed a bill into law that prohibited certain discussions of race or gender in classrooms. A new bill, to be introduced in the 2022 session, would ban teachers from advocating any theory which would give a negative account of U.S. history. Change is happening at the local level, too. In McMinn County Tennessee, the school board removed “Maus”—a graphic novel that tells the story of how the author’s parents survived the Nazi concentration camps—from its curriculum, allegedly because it contained profanity. This is not a new phenomenon: book banning has been an American pastime since 1650, when the Puritans banned a book that they deemed blasphemous. Toni Morrison’s Beloved—the heartbreaking story of a family of former slaves—has faced bans since 2006 and still does today. But this newfound zeal to control the content of curriculums has a unique character and a new scapegoat: critical race theory.

At its simplest, CRT is “an academic and legal framework that denotes that systemic racism is part of American society,” most often attributed to Kimberlé Crenshaw, a law professor at the University of California (UCLA) and Columbia University. CRT connects the social elements of race with the legal structures that shape life in the United States and shows how laws create and perpetuate race and racism. Take housing, as an example. Crenshaw and other critical race theorists question the economic discrepancies between Black neighborhoods and white suburbs, which still exist today. CRT traces this back to the practice of redlining during and after the Great Depression, when the federal government funded the construction of segregated neighborhoods in the suburbs. “Black neighborhoods,” according to Crenshaw, “were strategically produced by American policy.” Critical race theory is taught at graduate schools and law schools, like those at which Crenshaw teaches, and yet it is still the boogeyman that conservatives chose to fight over school curriculums. Right-wing figures like Tucker Carlson attack critical race theory ad nauseum, without a clear understanding of what it is or any evidence that it is taught in schools. Carlson—who admitted that he does not actually know what CRT is—called it “evil” for teaching that some races are “morally superior to others.” Others bafflingly associate critical race theory with Marxism and denounce it as anti-American for teaching that the United States is “fundamentally racist.”

PART III. POWER AND CONTROL

Critical race theory is not being taught at public schools, and it does not teach that any race is superior to another. But this argument misses the bigger picture. It does not matter what critical race theory is, or whether or not grade-schoolers are being exposed to this graduate level academic framework. Just as books like “Maus” are not being banned because of graphic content, bans on critical race theory are entirely detached from the ideas at play in that theory. The backlash against talking about racism in schools is about control and power, about responding to modern conversations and realizations that do not adhere to a conservative worldview. Governor Youngkin’s hotline spells that out perfectly: he does not seek to explicitly target critical race theory, but rather anything that could be considered “divisive.” Pretending that the United States is a colorblind meritocracy and sanitizing history are part of an effort to protect the inequities of the system. Banning discussions of race in classrooms and ignoring inconvenient parts of history serve to stymie this country’s racial reckoning and to preserve the status quo. It is, to borrow from the Fox News vocabulary, “indoctrination.”

Banning “Maus” does not help Tennessee’s eighth graders, nor does banning the discussion of racism, slavery, or privilege. Students are hindered by an incomplete understanding of history and identity, and that is the only possible outcome of these bans. Yes, it might be uncomfortable for students to talk about these subjects, but history is not supposed to be comfortable: it is supposed to teach. The children of those forty-one states trying to ban “critical race theory” are the future lawmakers, advocates, and activists of our country. They will be tasked with constructing equitable systems and institutions, with challenging the world’s genocides and human rights abuses. To hold them back in service of a “patriotic” narrative about this country that refuses to acknowledge its flaws is a great detriment to the nation which these lawmakers contend to love.

PART IV: POLICY SOLUTIONS

The debate over critical race theory and what children should learn in schools is a tricky one, largely because there is no way to actually win. No matter how many times Kimberlé Crenshaw and others like her explain what critical race theory is, it does little to challenge the misinformation that swirls around this topic. There is also little that politicians can do, at least at the national level. Education is a domain of the state, and the bans at issue are taking effect in states with Republican governors and legislators. However, I suggest two steps that the federal government should take before the 2022 midterms.

First, the U.S. Congress should pass legislation that protects teachers from persecution for following their professional code of ethics. This code of ethics requires teachers to allow their students access to varying viewpoints, and to not “deliberately suppress or distort subject matter relevant to the student's progress.” New laws like that in New Hampshire place teachers in the difficult position of balancing a commitment to ethical education and a fear of consequences for discussing race or gender. This new federal law should withhold U.S. education spending from schools that restrict teachers’ ability to objectively teach about history and topics like racism. Controlling Department of Education funding is a common tool of the federal government to uphold federal education standards. These standards should include freedom of speech protections for teachers and their students. Protecting teachers from discipline over teaching about racism will only benefit American students.

Second, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) should file legal challenges against any of these bans that place undue restrictions on the first amendment rights of teachers and students. Private organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union are already preparing for this legal battle, but the federal government must also be prepared to defend freedom of speech in the courts. The DOJ already devotes significant time and resources to defending first amendment rights across the country, from supporting free expression on college campuses to defending the right to public assembly during the pandemic. The government must go beyond friend of the court briefs, which it files to offer its expertise and insight in support of free speech cases. Instead, it must lead the effort to protect the rights of American teachers and children in the forty-one states where their rights are under fire.

These options are not perfect, and there are plenty of opportunities for failure. The government will not be able to challenge every CRT ban on the basis of free speech. Withholding funds from schools may be ineffective or even damaging to students. Either effort could fail at the Supreme Court, which currently hosts a conservative majority. Therefore, federal action must be supplemented by grassroots political mobilization. Americans do not want these bans, and reject efforts like book bans in large numbers. Even Glenn Youngkin, who won his election in large part due to a promise to ban CRT, is “underwater” with Virginia voters, 57% of whom oppose the CRT ban. This is an opportunity—at school board meetings, in classrooms, and at elections, Americans must make their voices heard and challenge the narrative put forth by those pushing to restrict speech in classrooms to protect their power.