Time For A Rewrite No Matter What The U.S. Senate Says, America’s History Books Need To Recognize Everyone’s Contributions

The recent denunciation of the National History Standards by the U.S. Senate by a vote of 99 to 1 brings up some interesting questions.

First of all, what is the Senate doing getting involved in national education? The new Republicans have said time and again that the interfering ways of Congress into state’s rights was too much for too long and should be brought to a halt. Even the laws passed by Congress that order the states to comply with federal mandates without financial support, are being seriously challenged.

It was always my belief that state governments had the final say as to what is taught in their schools; not Congress. But let’s take a further look at this.

The accusations by Congress that the National History Standards are “bunk” paints everyone involved in making these changes with the same brush. It is the brush known as extreme liberalism, a nasty word in this day and age.

Albert Shanker of the American Federation of Teachers says: “No other nation in the world teaches a national history that leaves its children feeling negative about their own country; this would be the first.”

Oh really! Then, Mr. Shanker, please tell me who oversaw the publications of the history books published in the 1940s and 1950s that made everything about white America beyond reproach and relegated this nation’s minorities to slurs and footnotes?

These books were published when African Americans, Hispanic Americans and American Indians had absolutely no input into what went into the history books. Did that make those books one-sided? You bet it did.

The books sent to educate us on the Indian reservations were hand-medowns that were even more outdated than those used in the rest of America. In these books, Indians were depicted as howling savages, heathens, red devils, murderers, torturers and worse. We sat in class and read these books knowing full well they were portraying us and our ancestors in a bad way.

These history books showed African Americans in the same bad light. Slavery was downplayed and the economic contributions made to this nation’s growth by the Black American slaves was never written about as anything positive.

In an article by John Leo in U.S. News and World Report earlier this month, historians Gary Nash and Charlotte Crabtree are castigated by Mr. Leo for suggesting that America is not a “Westernbased nation but the result of three cultures (Indian, Black and European) converging.” Writes Mr. Leo, “This subliminally put the Founding Fathers, and whites in general, in their place as mere founders of a third of a nation.”

So what’s so terrible about that? After all, there were many nations and cultures living in the Western Hemisphere before the white European. They were planting and growing corn, tomatoes, potatoes, chili peppers, squash, sweet potatoes, and countless more fruits and vegetables that nearly revolutionized agriculture the world over. Even the Indian-grown potato became known as the “Irish potato.”

How many history books published in the 1940s, ‘50s, or even the ‘60s mentioned these historical facts? I never saw it mentioned in any of the books used at Holy Rosary Indian Mission, where I got my elementary and high school education.

Granted, there are those long-winded liberals who go much too far in trying to correct certain wrongs. I do not agree with some of the changes they are trying to make in the history books because there is such a thing as swinging the pendulum too far to the left.

But what is wrong with trying to change the things that are clearly wrong and adding the things that have been left out? Isn’t the true history of this planet always in a state of flux?

I consider myself to be a student of history, but I don’t recall reading in the books used at my school about Blacks being lynched by the Ku Klux Klan or of the contributions made to this nation’s economy by the Hispanic Americans.

Put yourself in our shoes, or as it is said, walk a while in my moccasins, and look at these books through the eyes of American Indians, African Americans and Hispanic Americans and see if you don’t see things a bit more clearly.

All of the good things that happened in America were accomplished by whites. Even the words “Founding Fathers” leaves a bad taste in the mouth of most minorities because “fathers” connotes parenthood and all of us knew we could not possibly be the offspring of a white father. The American Indian was here long before the so-called “Founding Fathers.” Why were we not a part of this “founding?”

Perhaps there was slavery in Indian America to a small degree and perhaps some forms of slavery were carried out by Muslims and black slave traders centuries ago, but slavery was never refined and capitalized upon as it was by the white slave traders. There would be few if any African Americans on this continent if they were not brought here in slave ships.

If the American Indian were not slaughtered like so many animals, there would be many more Indians than there are now. All of these things happened. Slavery happened. Genocide of the American Indian happened. This is not trying to make white people ashamed of a portion of their history. It is trying to add to the history books that which has been conveniently hidden away.

First of all, the U.S. Congress should keep its nose out of the publication of history books, and second of all, those who would “bastardize and standardize” everything about Western history should back off, and historians situated somewhere between the two extremes should be allowed to rewrite history books to truly reflect the growth of America, the good, the bad and the ugly. What do we have to hide?

MEMO: Tim Giago is editor-in-chief and publisher of Indian Country Today, a national weekly newspaper on American Indian issues. His Lakota name, Nanwica Kciji, means “Stands Up for Them.”