Sunday, February 12, 2006
Taking (Dis)credit
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The Discovery Institute, no doubt recognizing, even before the Debacle in Dover, that it was problematic, to say the least, for ID to pass Constitutional muster if mandated by public school authorities, has seized on Justice Brennan’s words above suggesting that teachers must be free to "teach any and all facets" "about the origins of humankind" and now counsels that school boards "not [infringe] on the academic freedom of teachers to present appropriate information about intelligent design if they choose." Of course, Justice Brennan made clear that he was speaking of teaching "scientific theories," not discrediting them.
Given the record of dissembling from the ID Movement, it is fair to suspect that "not infringing" on teacher’s rights will devolve into some school boards refusing to hire science teachers unwilling to discuss ID and threatening, subtly or not, present teachers who resist.
Ultimately, it is hard to see how the Discovery Institute’s ploy can work, unless or until the Supreme Court makes major changes in its First Amendment jurisprudence that would then render the ploy unnecessary. Teachers, in their official role in the classroom, are government officials, just as bound by the strictures of the Constitution as the school board itself is. If sued over the actions of a teacher, the school district would be responsible for the legal fees of the plaintiffs under 42 U.S.C § 1988 if the teacher was found to have been violating the Establishment clause. And if the teacher had been ordered by the school district not to teach ID, he or she might be personally liable.
That leaves the ugly reality that the DI hopes that teachers will "defend the faith" by flaunting an utter disrespect for the law of the land before the children in their care and teach them that they should be prepared to commit any act of dishonesty in the name of God.
I previously addressed the report of a speech Phillip Johnson gave at Campbell University that included the following:
"We want to discredit Darwinism," Johnson said. "This theory has had an enormous impact on secularization because it eliminates the Creator. We thought that if the theory of evolution was cast into doubt, it would have a big cultural impact, just as it did when it was discovered."
Something about that rang a bell and I finally found this from the Opinion of the Court in the decision in Edwards v. Aguillard, ruling Louisiana’s "Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science in Public School Instruction" law was unconstitutional:
The [Court of Appeals] found that the Louisiana Legislature's actual intent was "to discredit evolution by counterbalancing its teaching at every turn with the teaching of creationism, a religious belief." Ibid. Because the Creationism Act was thus a law furthering a particular religious belief, the Court of Appeals held that the Act violated the Establishment Clause. ...
If the Louisiana Legislature's purpose was solely to maximize the comprehensiveness and effectiveness of science instruction, it would have encouraged the teaching of all scientific theories about the origins of humankind (9). But under the Act's requirements, teachers who were once free to teach any and all facets of this subject are now unable to do so. Moreover, the Act fails even to ensure that creation science will be taught, but instead requires the teaching of this theory only when the theory of evolution is taught. Thus we agree with the Court of Appeals' conclusion that the Act does not serve to protect academic freedom, but has the distinctly different purpose of discrediting "evolution by counterbalancing its teaching at every turn with the teaching of creationism. ..."
Johnson, as the "godfather" of Intelligent Design, is certainly in a position to know the motivations that fuel the "Intelligent Design Movement." Whatever superficial changes were made in "creation science" by ID advocates (as demonstrated by Barbara Forrest’s testimony about the history of the manuscript of Of Pandas and People in Kitzmiller v. Dover), the intent is still the same according to Johnson. It has nothing to do with science and everything to do with supporting a particular religious view by discrediting evolutionary theory, which is alleged to be incompatible with that religious belief.
The Discovery Institute, no doubt recognizing, even before the Debacle in Dover, that it was problematic, to say the least, for ID to pass Constitutional muster if mandated by public school authorities, has seized on Justice Brennan’s words above suggesting that teachers must be free to "teach any and all facets" "about the origins of humankind" and now counsels that school boards "not [infringe] on the academic freedom of teachers to present appropriate information about intelligent design if they choose." Of course, Justice Brennan made clear that he was speaking of teaching "scientific theories," not discrediting them.
Given the record of dissembling from the ID Movement, it is fair to suspect that "not infringing" on teacher’s rights will devolve into some school boards refusing to hire science teachers unwilling to discuss ID and threatening, subtly or not, present teachers who resist.
Ultimately, it is hard to see how the Discovery Institute’s ploy can work, unless or until the Supreme Court makes major changes in its First Amendment jurisprudence that would then render the ploy unnecessary. Teachers, in their official role in the classroom, are government officials, just as bound by the strictures of the Constitution as the school board itself is. If sued over the actions of a teacher, the school district would be responsible for the legal fees of the plaintiffs under 42 U.S.C § 1988 if the teacher was found to have been violating the Establishment clause. And if the teacher had been ordered by the school district not to teach ID, he or she might be personally liable.
That leaves the ugly reality that the DI hopes that teachers will "defend the faith" by flaunting an utter disrespect for the law of the land before the children in their care and teach them that they should be prepared to commit any act of dishonesty in the name of God.
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The real question is: why do these people imagine that what they are discrediting is evolution?
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