[Note: If
the reader has taken up reading this blog with this posting, he/she is helped
by knowing that this posting is the next one in a series of postings. The series begins with the posting, “The Natural Rights’ View
of Morality” (February 25, 2020, https://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-natural-rights-view-of-morality.html).
He/she, in order to know the current aim of this blog, should look up
the posting, “The Magruder and Glencoe Case, Part VIII (June 9, 2020).]
This posting continues the review and evaluation of two popular
American government textbooks[1]
– textbooks usually used in high schools.
The blog has analyzed, to this point, five randomly selected paragraphs
from Magruder’s. This posting continues
this effort with the first two paragraphs selected from Glencoe
United States Government: Democracy in
Action.
But before
beginning the Glencoe analysis, the writer needs to admit he fudged with
the very first random paragraph. He
randomly selected page 3; that page turns out to be the very first page of the
book’s text material. He felt the choice
would not serve the purposes of his effort.
That is, the page is too introductory to get at the questions he is
addressing. It is basically a title page
for “Unit 1” and lists a set of very general suggestions the author shares with
students. For example, “Take notes on
how this government functions …”
Obviously, this type of suggestion is devoid of any substantive content.
So, to offset
this shortcoming, the writer randomly chose a page from that first section. He landed on page 11. And since it is the first chosen paragraph,
he further settled on the first paragraph of the page.
Titles:
Chapter 1, “People and Government,” Section 1, “Principles of
Government,” Page 11 –
Content:
Many
other government services promote public health and safety. For example, government inspectors enforce
housing codes, check meat, and oversee restaurant operations. State legislators pass laws that require
drivers to pass a driving test.[2]
Context:
This selection is part of an
introduction on the purposes of government.
The passage is the last paragraph of the subsection, “Providing Public
Services.” The subsection does contain a
federalist “flavor” by quoting Abraham Lincoln (a federalist style president),
but the quote is one of his lesser federalist opinions:
The
legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever
they need to have done, but cannot do, at all, or can not so well do, for
themselves – in their separate, and individual capacities. In all that people can individually do for
themselves, government ought not to interfere.[3]
Yes, the quote begins describing a communal
issue, but deteriorates into emphasizing the individual.
Evaluation:
The main concern here is not so much
what the selection says, but the tone it and this chapter set for the rest of
the textbook. Again, government is cast
as a service rendering institution. Of
course, government is that, but that is not its main function. Government, as set up by the US
Constitution, is the overarching protector of the grand partnership the Constitution
establishes. And it does that through
the mechanism of a compact – a sacred agreement among all the nation’s citizens
and among the states of the United States.
The
Lincoln quote is telling. It limits
governmental action to those conditions in which a people or an individual
cannot meet a need or desire independently from government. Yet the Constitution is more
proactive. Yes, it does honor the
choices individual people make, but it calls for “a more perfect union.” This does not occur by a government that sits
around for the type of requests to which the quote alludes.
To
be “perfect” calls on anyone or anything to fulfill a vast array of
functions. Instead, the quote harkens to
a more natural rights view – one that glorifies the “sovereign individual.” And that seems to be the tone the author is
striving to portray. Naturally, a la
federation theory, one would judge that tone to be wanting.
Titles:
Chapter 9, “Presidential Leadership,” Section 1, “Presidential
Powers,” Page 250 –
Content:
In
1952 President Harry S. Truman, believing a strike by steelworkers could
threaten national security, ordered his secretary of commerce to seize and
operate most of the nation’s steel mills.
The president reported all of this to Congress, but Congress failed to
take action. In earlier cases, Congress
had provided procedures for dealing with similar situations.[4]
Context:
This paragraph tells a part of the
story in which President Truman, without any approval of Congress and through
executive decree, attempted to take over the private property of the steel
producers of the nation. The paragraph
appears in the subsection entitled, “Youngstown Sheet and Tube v. Sawyer (1952).” Truman cited his executive responsibilities
in relation to a foreign military operation, the US’ role in the Korean
conflict.
Evaluation:
That
conflict was an undeclared war and, as such, posed various constitutional
issues. But in terms of the concerns
here, this case study simply helps the student understand a structural element
of the US government – a central concern of the natural rights approach. If this case is chosen, the author of the
textbook could have been more direct as to what it meant, from a federal theory
point of view, to be so engaged.
That
is, it could ask how un-federal it is for the government to commit the populous
of a nation to a war without following the procedural steps the Constitution
sets out. One should remember that a
meaningful portion of the service personal in that war were drafted (this
writer estimates about 50% of the 150,000 soldiers in the war were not
volunteers). In such cases,
constitutional protections become more important.
The
account does not go into such concerns but simply quotes Justice Black as he
expresses a constitutional concern in the resulting Supreme Court decision: “The Founders of this Nation entrusted the
lawmaking power to the Congress alone in both good and bad times.”[5] That decision undid what Truman attempted to
do with the steel mills.[6]
The
next posting will describe and evaluate two more Glencoe paragraphs.
[1] Daniel M. Shea, Magruder’s
American Government (Boston, MA: Prentice Hall/Pearson, 2019) AND Richard C. Remy, Glencoe United States
Government: Democracy in Action (New York,
NY: McGraw-Hill/Glencoe, 2010).
[3]
Richard C. Remy, Glencoe United
States Government: Democracy in Action, 10. A Lincoln quote
from 1854 – seven years before he became president.
[5] Ibid.
[6] This evaluation should not be read as a critique of
the attempted steel mill takeovers or of the Korean conflict, it is just an
evaluation of Glencoe’s treatment of the Supreme Court case cited.
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