Why Should the Rising Generation Be Taught Correct National History?

            Families, communities, and nations are stronger when the rising generation is taught the true history of their country. Every nation has good people who contribute much to the people of the world, and every country has skeletons in their closets, things that are true but not good. There are people in the United States who claim that America was based on evil actions and has evil intentions now. These same people are trying to teach these wrong ideas to the rising generation to create distain in them for their motherland. This is wrong in numerous ways.

            President Donald Trump is attempting to counter this counter-productive movement. On November 2, 2020, Trump announced that he would form the President’s Advisory 1776 Commission. In the past six weeks, he has called upon 18 conservative leaders to serve on the commission. The desired goal of the commission is to ensure that we teach “the next generation the truth about America’s Founding Fathers and the principles contained in the Constitution.”

            On Friday, President Trump named the members of the Commission. His executive order establishing the Commission says it will “better enable a rising generation to understand the history and principles of the founding of the United States in 1776 and to strive to form a more perfect Union.” 

            Larry Arnn (Arkansas), president of Hillsdale College, will serve as the chairman of the commission, and Carol M. Swain (Tennessee), a retired political science professor and author will act as the vice chair of the commission. The other members of the commission are Brooke L. Rollins (Texas), Vincent M. Haley (Virginia), Victor Davis Hanson (California), Phil Bryant (Mississippi), Mike Gonzalez (Maryland), John Gibbs (Michigan), Scott McNealy (Nevada), Gay Hart Gaines (Florida), Ned Ryun (Virginia), Charles Kirk (Illinois), Peter N. Kirsanow (Ohio), Charles R. Kesler (California), Thomas K. Lindsay (Texas), Jerry C. Davis (Missouri), Michael Farris (Virginia), and Bob McEwen (Ohio).

            The executive order states that the New York Time’s 1619 Project curriculum as well as the flawed narrative perpetuated by progressive leaders are teaching students to “hat their own country, and to believe that the men and women who built it were not heroes, but rather villains.” I think that we should all agree on the importance of teaching the history, both the good parts and the difficult parts. Most Americans are ashamed of some parts of our history – such as slavery, the way we treated the Japanese Americans during World War II, and the Native Americans. However, America and Americans have done many great and incredible things. Mike Gonzalez, a member of the commission and a fellow at The Heritage Foundation, said the following:

I look forward to rendering this service. Teaching the young to hate their country and its history is a recipe for national suicide, and a quick one at that….

America has had its trials and tribulations, and they should not be swept under the rug by history. But, all of America’s accomplishments have been achieved by those who inspired their countrymen to live up to the ideals contained in the founding documents. From James Madison and Thomas Jefferson to Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr., our leaders have aspired to improve the republic by forcing it to live up to its promise, not to teach it down and build something new.

            President Trump’s executive order gave the commission one year to determine how schools across the nation are teaching the founding of America. The commission is tasked to complete a report that conveys “the core principles of the American founding and how these principles may be understood to further enjoyment of ‘the blessings of liberty’ and to promote our striving ‘to form a more perfect Union.’”

            Kay C. James, president of The Heritage Foundation, is not a member of the commission, but she made the following statement about it.

At this divisive time in our nation’s history, it is more important than ever that all Americans, especially our youngest generations, come to know and love America for who she is – a nation unlike any other in record history. America is a nation that has been divinely used to not only safeguard the freedom of its own citizens, but also to unleash unprecedented freedom and flourishing on the rest of the world.

            I am grateful that President Trump formed the Commission to determine what is currently being taught in the schools. If students are being taught to hate America and our Founding Fathers, they are not being prepared to take their places in the nation as knowledgeable and responsible American citizens. We need every American – child, teen, or adult – to know the basic history of our nation and to hold proper respect for those who have gone before us to build this great nation and to protect and to preserve the American way of life. I know that teaching correct history of America can strengthen our families, communities, and nation.