By
Pastor Roger Anghis
September 16, 2012
NewsWithViews.com
There was a time early in our history when America led the world in education. The reason for that was our Founders believed that the beginning of wisdom was the reverential fear of God, Proverbs 1:7, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” Our Founders began their education with a book called the New England Primer. This book taught spelling, math, grammar, character and everything else using the Bible as its source. Our Founders believed that most of the world’s problems were because the people were not educated in the Word of God and that the powers to be in the nations were doing things that were contrary to the Word of God. They wanted the people of America to be educated in the Word of God so that they could determine if the governors, city council members and all in authority attempted to do something that was contrary to God’s teaching that they would rise up and stop them.
The first laws providing public education for all children were passed in 1642 in Massachusetts and in 1647 in Connecticut and it was called the “Old Deluder Satan Law”. These colonists believed that the proper protection from civil abuses could only be achieved by eliminating Bible illiteracy.
“It being one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of Scriptures, as in former time. . . . It is therefore ordered . . [that] after the Lord hath increased [the settlement] to the number of fifty householders, [they] shall then forthwith appoint one within their town, to teach all such children as shall resort to him, to write and read. . . . And it is further ordered, that where any town shall increase to the number of one hundred families or householders, they shall set up a grammar school . . . to instruct youths, so far as they may be fitted for the university.”[1]
Note that they put a premium on the ability to understand the Word of God. Many American literacy laws were directed at the necessity of understanding the Bible. A Connecticut law in 1690 read:
“This legislature observing that . . . there are many persons unable to read the English tongue and thereby incapable to read the holy Word of God or the good laws of this colony . . . it is ordered that all parents and masters shall cause their respective children and servants, as they are capable, to be taught to read distinctly the English tongue.”[2]
It was considered imperative for the people to be able to read and understand the Word of God. In the early 1800’s our education system was the best in the world. We were putting some kids into Princeton, Harvard, and Yale at 14 years of age and graduating them at 17 years old. We were the envy of the world.
In the 1600’s the churches were in charge of education. Most of our colleges and universities were established to raise up ministers capable of teaching all disciplines. By 1884 America had 370 universities and 83% were under the direction of a denomination. With the education system that we had America rose above all other nations and it is obvious that it was not a secular education system that achieved that level of academia. It was an education system that incorporated God’s Word and God’s principles into the lives of the students.[3]
Is America getting what we are paying for concerning the Department of Education? Absolutely not! The DoE is a complete incompetent failure.
In the 1860s, federal education had a budget of $15,000 and 4 employees to handle education fact-finding. By 1965, the Office of Education employed 2,113 employees and had a budget of $1.5 billion. In 1995, the DOE administered about $33 billion.[4] By 2011 the discretionary budget was $69.9 billion. We are spending $69.9 billion to have one of the worst education systems in the world! Why. If that is the best they can do, they should be fired and the education system should be put back in the hands of the American people where it belongs. When the people controlled the system we were the best in the world. It is time we took it back.
By the time our children hit the 4th grade we only rank 12th of the top 26 in math. By the 8th grade we are 28th of 41 and by 12th grade we are 19th of 21.
In science we rank 3rd by the 4th grade. By the 8thgrade we are 17th and by the 12th grade we are 16th.
In advanced math at 12th grade level we are 15th of 16 and in advanced science we are16th of 16.[5] What are we paying for? How can we expect our kids to compete in the world when we are in some cases last in industrial nations in critical areas such as math and sciences.
Today’s so-called education secretary is Arne Duncan. He supports the teaching, actually the indoctrination, of the homosexual lifestyle in all of today’s schools. The depths of depravity that has infiltrated our so-called education system only worsens the situation. Our Founders believed that to be successful one had to learn to live a moral and righteous lifestyle and that was what was taught in our schools. Today morality is almost forbidden. Sex outside of marriage is actually encouraged in college and promoted heavily in grades 6-12. Homosexuality is promoted as a ‘viable lifestyle’ when it has been proven that it is a very dangerous lifestyle.
Can America continue down this path and remain a super power. No! It cannot. The attempt to level America with the rest of the world will destroy the American experiment. Our Christian principles created the greatest nation the world has ever seen. We are not an arrogant nation. We are a prosperous nation, a giving nation and a powerful nation. We do not colonize, but we do help other nations reach for the freedoms we enjoy. We remove despots and dictators. But the present administration supports despots and dictators.
This election will determine if America survives. Another 4 years of Obama and we will become a third world nation. He will economically destroy America. Why has he been able to do this? We no longer teach the true history of America. We no longer practice the principles that made us great. Our places of ‘higher education’ have become bastions of liberal ideology that is anti-American and blame America for all of the worlds problems.
According to our Constitution, that document that our federal government ignores more than it observes, states this: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited to by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. – Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. There is no power delegated to the federal government to control education.
In a study done by the CATO institute it is recommended that the Department of Education should be abolished and return education to the states and the people as provided by the Constitution.
Without question, the Framers intended that most aspects of American life would be outside the purview of the federal government. They never envisioned that Congress or the president would become involved in funding schools or mandating policy for classrooms. As constitutional scholar Roger Pilon has said: ‘‘From beginning to end the [Constitution] never mentioned the word ‘education.’ The people, in 1787 or since, have never given the federal government any power over the subject—despite a concern for education that surely predates the Constitution.’’
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Chester Finn, who served as assistant secretary of education from 1985 until 1988, made the following observation about why education spending increased faster once we had a Department of Education: “. . . Make no mistake about it, the principal reason the NEA and the administration wanted to elevate the Office of Education to a full-fledged department was to give it the political power and prestige to seek bigger budget increases for federal education programs.”[6]
As the statement from Chester Finn clarifies the reason for the unconstitutional takeover of America’s education system was for ‘political power and prestige’ not for the betterment of our children. Deplorable at best. But a typical political move from a party that wants to control every aspect of our lives. We need to take back the control of our education to return it to the best in the world.
Until we begin to teach the truth about our education system and then return to that foundation of truth, we will not have what we need to stop the spiral we are in. November is critical for America. Don’t take it lightly. Our future depends on it.
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