Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
This comes as no surprise. The Houston Chronicle reports that several members of the Texas BOE, including the incomparably clueless Terri Leo, have sent an email to school boards and school administrators encouraging them to use the blatantly unconstitutional NCBCPS curriculum for their state-mandated Bible classes.
Several state Board of Education members are encouraging public school districts to use a particular Bible curriculum that some experts predict will land them in court if they do."It's absolutely jaw-dropping," said Mark Chancey, a professor of religious studies at Southern Methodist University, referring to the e-mail circulated by state Board of Education members Terri Leo, R-Spring, Barbara Cargill, R-The Woodlands, Cynthia Dunbar, R-Richmond, and Gail Lowe, R-Lampasas.
And you might notice that they leave out a key fact:
Local schools should decide which Bible curriculum to offer, they said in the e-mail to school administrators and school boards."We recognize, however, that the curriculum provided by the National Council On Bible Curriculum in Public Schools has been implemented successfully in numerous school districts within the state of Texas for years," the e-mail said.
It's been "implemented successfully." Never mind that it got the Ector County school district sued and they were forced to sign a consent decree agreeing not to use the curriculum anymore because it became quite clear that they were going to lose the case. And never mind that the same curriculum was declared unconstitutional by a federal judge in Florida 10 years ago.
Coincidentally, the same thing happened in the Florida case that happened in the Odessa (Ector County) case and is now happening with the Texas BOE. Both school boards ignored not only the recommendations of the committees they formed but also the legal advice they got from their own attorneys and went for the NCBCPS curriculum anyway. Both school boards - and the Texas BOE - were told in advance that doing so would result in costly litigation that they would almost certainly lose. From the Florida ruling:
On December 16, 1996, School Board Attorney Steven Butler advised the Committee that the Bible History I curriculum had the "potential for litigation" because 1) the title of the course was biased; 2) the course appears to teach the Bible "as an inerrant document," 3) the purpose of teaching the course appeared to be non-secular; and 4) the course teaches "a single Protestant perspective." Mr. Butler also warned the Committee that the minority report increased the likelihood of litigation.The School Board issued a directive to the Committee on December 17, 1996 to continue with its work. The School Board also authorized the hiring of an outside law firm to review the constitutionality of the proposed curriculum. The School Board requested a report by March, 1997, and postponed offering the class until Fall, 1997...
On May 7, 1997, the outside counsel of the School Board reported to Defendants on a review of the draft of the Bible History I. Melanie Gurley Keeney recommended extensive revision of the Bible History I curriculum, including the complete elimination of certain sections. Ms. Keeney warned that certain issues had the potential for overstepping permissible constitutional parameters....
The Committee continued to work on the Bible History II curriculum. Counsel for the School Board advised the deletion of certain topics and concepts, to which Committee members objected. The Committee voted to disband in light of the advice of counsel as to certain deletions in the Bible History II curriculum. Before disbanding, the Committee voted to recommend the complete adoption of the NCBCPS "New Testament" curriculum to the School Board.
In a letter of September 25, 1997, Ms. Keeney, outside counsel for the School Board, warned Defendant Whittaker that the NCBCPS curriculum contained segments which she concluded would be viewed as constitutionally impermissible.
Mr. Martin, counsel for the School Board, recommended the deletion of much of the NCBCPS "New Testament" curriculum from the Committee's draft...
Ms. Keeney, outside counsel for the School Board, cautioned the School Board against adopting the NCBCPS curriculum on October 20, 1997.
The School Board convened on October 21, 1997 to consider adoption of a New Testament curriculum. Many speakers addressed the School Board. Public opinion remained sharply divided as to the "New Testament" curriculum. Defendant Harter advised the adoption of the hybrid staff curriculum combining the Committee's unfinished work as revised by School Board attorneys and district staff. Defendant Gross also made a motion for the School Board to adopt the NCBCPS curriculum, which was seconded. At the conclusion of the meeting, the School Board voted 3 - 2 to adopt the NCBCPS "New Testament" curriculum, which does not include the modifications by the Board's counsel.
The Odessa school board did the same thing. The committee they formed to make recommendations on the Bible curriculum recommended that they use the Bible Literacy Project curriculum but the school board wanted the NCBCPS curriculum instead. And they also ignored legal advice and adopted it anyway. These people never learn.
Politics
Comments
I sure hope that if any of these school boards are sued they turn around and sue the Texas BOE.
Posted by: Tulse | September 30, 2008 10:16 AM
Having never lived in Texas, but knowing it as home to some of the most brain-dead politicians ever to have sullied the national stage (Phil Gramm, Tom DeLay, Kay Hutchinson spring immediately to mind, to say nothing of that lunatic Sally Kern), I looked Terri Leo up on Google. Turns out she's got her very own Web page. In little, teeny weeny letters down at the bottom it says that the Web page is a political ad, but it is not that which attracted my attention. What attracted my attention is that absolutely nowhere on that page will you find a hint that this woman is a religious fanatic. Despite her effort to push a clearly biased and untrue agenda through the curriculum which is discussed in this blog, she claims that "I have resisted efforts to lower the academic expectations of high school students in Texas." I can only repeat what I have said many times -- I find no verse or chapter in the Bible which says "thou shalt be as stupid as thou possibly canst" -- which is exactly what would happen if this woman and her kind succeeded in forcing the aforementioned curriculum onto Texas' schools, and if Leo claims to support "academic expectations," then she is simply a lying and mendacious piece of work. or she is merely deranged. A look at her list of endorsers does show loony-tune "Christianity" at work, but the things she says about herself say nothing about that at all. Ashamed, Terri? Aware of the fact that even in Texas you might not get reelected to a cushy job if people knew what a total maniac you are? Honestly, what in the name of Einstein's beard is the matter with such people?
Posted by: eeuropean2000 | September 30, 2008 10:19 AM
I can't quite decide if these people are idiotic fanatics or fanatical idiots. This behavior just boggles the rational mind.
~David D.G.
Posted by: David D.G. | September 30, 2008 10:21 AM
Having never lived in Texas, but knowing it as home to some of the most brain-dead politicians ever to have sullied the national stage (Phil Gramm, Tom DeLay, Kay Hutchinson spring immediately to mind, to say nothing of that lunatic Sally Kern), I looked Terri Leo up on Google. Turns out she's got her very own Web page. In little, teeny weeny letters down at the bottom it says that the Web page is a political ad, but it is not that which attracted my attention. What attracted my attention is that absolutely nowhere on that page will you find a hint that this woman is a religious fanatic. Despite her effort to push a clearly biased and untrue agenda through the curriculum which is discussed in this blog, she claims that "I have resisted efforts to lower the academic expectations of high school students in Texas." I can only repeat what I have said many times -- I find no verse or chapter in the Bible which says "thou shalt be as stupid as thou possibly canst" -- which is exactly what would happen if this woman and her kind succeeded in forcing the aforementioned curriculum onto Texas' schools, and if Leo claims to support "academic expectations," then she is simply a lying and mendacious piece of work. or she is merely deranged. A look at her list of endorsers does show loony-tune "Christianity" at work, but the things she says about herself say nothing about that at all. Ashamed, Terri? Aware of the fact that even in Texas you might not get reelected to a cushy job if people knew what a total maniac you are? Honestly, what in the name of Einstein's beard is the matter with such people?
Posted by: eeuropean2000 | September 30, 2008 10:22 AM
Ed:
How ironic for a school board...
Posted by: Paul Lundgren | September 30, 2008 10:23 AM
I'm wondering if maybe they're trying to push this curriculum in the hopes that a lawsuit will happen and that it would be sent all the way to the Supreme Court. Maybe they're hoping by that time to get a conservative majority and be able to get it through that way?
Posted by: llDayo | September 30, 2008 10:33 AM
Tulse you beat me to it.
Why do they not make the various state BOEs accountable to the point that if the "advice" or direction they dispense out to local school boards results in legal action then the state BOE is held liable for all legal expenses?
It the current days of tight fiscal problems for most school districts it is amazing that this situation continues over and over again.
Posted by: DavidR | September 30, 2008 10:38 AM
The Texas GOP has one of the most radical right-wing platforms in the country. Fortunately, it's quite possible that the state House of Representatives is about to fall into Democratic hands again and the long term demographics are trending blue. That said, Texas will remain a haven for people like Leo for quite a while yet, unfortunately.
Posted by: tacitus | September 30, 2008 10:42 AM
I won't presume to know what (or if) the individual BOE members are thinking. But I do believe there's a deliberate strategy by creationists as a whole to force as many court challenges as possible. Even where they know they can't win, every loss just furthers the persecution complex they use to whip up their followers.
Posted by: WScott | September 30, 2008 10:51 AM
I used to blame incompetent, politically-connected hack lawyers selected to advise school boards for such nonsense. I was wrong. I apologize.
Posted by: CJColucci | September 30, 2008 11:15 AM
One small correction. Sally Kern is an Oklahoma legislator.
Posted by: Karl | September 30, 2008 11:19 AM
The other day I decided to check out the NCBCPS curriculum and went to their web site. They don't provide much information about the curriculum. Two files are available for download. One is an overall outline of the curriculum. The other is a single unit from the teacher's guide. Unfortunately, it is for unit 9, which deals with the Psalms. That isn't terribly informative because the Psalms raise neither the religious issues nor the historical issues that many other parts of the Bible do. Isn't it curious that they pick what is probably the least controversial part of the Bible to illustrate their curriculum? Funny that they wouldn't want us to see how they handle the Creation in Genesis or the prophecies of Isaiah or the historicity of the Gospels or of the portions dealing with the Davidic Kingdom.
The other thing that struck me is that the outline shows the curriculum as dealing only with the Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, not with the remainder of the New Testament. What kind of Bible course is so incomplete?
Posted by: Bill Poser | September 30, 2008 11:52 AM
If we can trust the New Testament, Jesus told his contemporaries clearly that he would return on clouds of glory within their lifetimes. It didn't happen, and presumably for most people that was the end of it.
But not for others, who have been waiting for him ever since, thereby making the same basic mistake for nearly 2,000 years now. "These people never learn," indeed.
Posted by: Eveningsun | September 30, 2008 11:59 AM
Ed: "These people never learn."
That's because, on this issue, they have no intention of "learning" anything. For them it's a holy crusade to save the souls of American teenagers from the satanicly inspired Darwin. Their religious dogmas come before their brains do.
Posted by: Caliban | September 30, 2008 12:01 PM
tacitus wrote:
Tacitus, can you fill that in a bit more? I've never heard that, and would be very interested if it's true, as it would have stunning political implications.Posted by: James Hanley | September 30, 2008 12:37 PM
Transplanted Texan here. (I can't believe I have been here almost 20 years!) I had jury duty in Ft Worth yesterday. While waiting to go into the courtroom, I overheard another juror talking...about how Jesus was supposed to come back around Rosh Hashanah and wouldn't it be great if she got out of jury duty because Jesus came back?!?!?!
I can't wait for my kids to finish high school and then maybe we can move back to a rational part of the world. I have already told my husband he'll have to come bail me out in Austin if they try to pass any kind of creationism crap.
Posted by: Boudica | September 30, 2008 6:01 PM
Ed, it bugs the tar out of me when you beat me to these tasty nuggets of Texas news, as you regularly do.
Not that I begrudge it much -- you get much better readership than I do, and it's all good for a noble cause.
Texas trending blue? We hope so. Dallas County nearly switched 8 years ago, and four years ago. Two years ago we got enough straight ticket votes to boot out every Republican judge up for re-election, and win all the open slots. Plus we elected a Democrat to the DA's office for the first time since the Triassic (or sometime thereabouts), and since that the DA's office has spearheaded efforts to look at DNA in a bunch of cases, with a dozen people let out of jail for crimes they could not have committed, two off of death row as I recall.
Bill White and the Democrats have done a great job of organizing Houston.
With a switch of a few thousand votes in Dallas, Houston and San Antonio, the whole state might tip. 8 years ago I was the only person at my precinct convention, picking 23 delegates to the state convention. Four years ago my oldest son and I were two of three people at the precinct convention, and of course we both went to the state convention as delegates.
This year we had at least 2,000 people turn out at our precinct convention -- maybe 5,000, it's difficult to say - and 9,000 showed up for the senatorial district convention, compared to 400 four years ago. Most of the new attendees were Obama supporters, mad as hell and not going to take it any more.
Dallas County will stay blue. If Obama's organizing was anything similar in Houston and San Antonio, there may be big shifts that simply are not showing up in polls.
I still have hopes that John Cornyn will go out, in favor of Rick Noriega, in the U.S. Senate. I also have hopes that the polls have simply missed these shifts.
Coupled with a much larger Hispanic population, mostly the result of more babies and not immigration, and the demographics of Texas look bluer all the time.
Is that what Tacitus referred to?
Posted by: Ed Darrell | September 30, 2008 6:14 PM
There's a very good chance Houston will go blue this year. I know from speaking to a number of lawyers and judges that the Republican judges in Harris County are quite fearful for their jobs. Also, turnout for the Democratic primary this year was enormous, with lots of first-time voters.
Texas has never been as red as many might think, and there are large areas that are quite friendly to Democrats. The Bush family dominance in the state, combined with Tom DeLay's machine, has always made the GOP more successful here than it would otherwise naturally be. This, combined with demographic trends (Texas is now a majority-minority state), means Democrats are likely to have increased success this year and in the elections to come. The pendulum is definitely swinging back.
Posted by: Kenneth Fair | September 30, 2008 6:32 PM
I hate to sound like I'm out of the loop.. but could somebody show me a few examples out of this curriculum? Admittedly, I don't know much about it other than what's in this article.
Posted by: woodstein312 | September 30, 2008 8:31 PM
Woodstein - the Texas Freedom Network does a pretty good job keeping track of all these fine goings-on down here.
The link below takes you to a good review of what the NCBCPS has to offer:
http://www.tfn.org/site/PageServer?pagename=biblecurriculum
eeuropean - Ms Leo has been carefully coached, apparently by the Discovery Institute, to keep the religion under the radar. Way back in 2003 at the biology textbook hearings she was very good at parroting their talking points. Off topic, but Sarah Palin reminds me of Leo - both are perky, attractive, devious as hell, and effective at mobilizing the fundies. Scary.
Posted by: Coragyps | September 30, 2008 9:15 PM