Teaching About White Christian Nationalism

Above: (Top) A man carrying a Bible in front of American and Trump flags during the January 6th Insurrection. (Bottom) Civil rights and religious groups have been raising warnings about the rise of white Christian nationalism, such as the Glendale United Methodist Church in Nashville.

What Is White Christian Nationalism?

In a recent article in The History Teacher, Kaylene Stevens and I argued, 

Not all movements were/are just. ... It is crucial that history teachers help students distinguish between movements for justice and movements against justice. Not all people working together to advance shared ideas are working toward goals of fairness or freedom. In fact, some are organized to do the exact opposite. (p 353)

White Christian nationalism is one of those unjust movements.

White Christian nationalism is an ideology that fuses white supremacy, conservative Christianity, and American nationalism/American exceptionalism. White Christian nationalists generally believe that the United States was founded as a white and Christian nation (which directly conflicts with the historical record) and that U.S. laws and institutions should be built on conservative Christian beliefs (which conflicts with the Constitution and Bill of Rights). White Christian nationalists often believe that the U.S. was created by God and is divinely favored. Some demand spiritual warfare (which explains its relationship to domestic terrorism) and believe that Donald Trump was chosen by God to be president and should be immediately returned to power (evident during the January 6th Insurrection). As such, they believe that the country must be "taken back from" non-Christians, people of color, immigrants, and queer people. At its core, it is a particular type of racist (xenophobic and queerphobic) and Christian supremacist thinking (although the mainstream adherents will usually deny that they hold racist beliefs, but surveys show differently) that essentially rejects the pluralism, justice, and democracy of the United States. "The Flag and the Cross: White Christian Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy" by Philip Gorski and Samuel L. Perry offers a good primer (and you can watch one of Philip Gorski's talks on the topic here), as well as Bradley Onishi's "Preparing for War: The Extremist History of White Christian Nationalism—and What Comes Next."

As a movement, white Christian nationalism has had increased support in recent years, has strongest support among white evangelical Protestants and in rural areas, and gained significant political power within the Republican Party, including its leadership, such as House Speaker Mike Johnson (although he does not use the term to describe himself). It has also found overlap with anti-democratic and far-right groups in recent years. In recent polls, 6 in 10 Americans believed the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation and 45% think it should be a Christian nation (at the same time, large percentages of African Americans, Asian Americans, and Latinos, are concerned about the rise of white Christian nationalism). It is also not purely a U.S. phenomenon, as similar movements exist in Canada and across Europe and have gained political power in Hungary, with Viktor Orbán collaborating with U.S. conservatives, and Poland, which involves a Catholic take on white Christian nationalism.

What Is the History of White Christian Nationalism?

 

Above: (Top) The John Gast painting "American Progress" personifying Manifest Destiny shows an angel-like figure of Columbia bring light to the West and forcing Indigenous people off their land for the advancement of white society. (Bottom) Insurrectionists carried many symbols of white supremacy and Christian nationalism on January 6th, including crosses and Confederate flags.

White Christian nationalism is not a new phenomenon. Instead, similar movements have emerged at various points in American history (and some trace it all the way back to Columbus and later the Doctrine of Discovery). In many ways, movements like these are conservative and reactionary, especially when there are demographic shifts and changing social attitudes. White Christian nationalism certainly was a guiding ideology of the Puritans in Massachusetts Bay Colony, who used settler-colonialism to create a theocracy based on their conservative Protestant teachings (see Cotton Mather specifically); they intentionally used the killing, displacement, and religious conversion of Native people to create their ethnonationalist religious colony. In fact, many modern white Christian nationalists use the Puritans (as well as the actual or imagined Christian practices of some of U.S. "founding fathers") as a model and to historically validate their movement. The Second Great Awakening is another area where white supremacy and Christian nationalism re-emerged in American politics and policy. White Christians' participation in Manifest Destiny in the U.S. and Canada and a growing belief that God had given them a continent to establish a government based on their religious teachings and that using violence on Native people was justified in making their Christian nations. White Christian nationalist thinking emerged again in the era after the Civil War, which helped justify American imperialism (what Philip Gorski has called "WASP nationalism") and a view that the United States was acting as "God's hand" to spread white and Christianity values and freedom to the rest of the world through empire. 

Some historians have argued that the modern white Christian nationalist movement was born in the 1920s as a reaction to Asian and southern and eastern European immigration, Black migration north, and the changing morality of the time (related, it was a period where the Ku Klux Klan had a re-insurgence with a strongly Christian identity). Later, anti-New Deal campaigns in the 1930s expanded the movement (and created an unusual partnership with corporate America), which was strengthened by anti-communist and segregationist campaigns of the 1950s, and rebranded by conservative television evangelists and others in the 1980s into what became referred to as the "religious right" and gained supporters through the anti-abortion movement (and a more fringe and violent iteration inspired the Oklahoma City Bombing and other vigilante militia groups, including the Christian Patriot Movement). Later, similar ideologies influenced members of the modern Tea Party Movement in the early 21st century. Today, it presents a major threat to American democracy, pluralism, and justice, which has been made clear through the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025.

Above: (Top) Many segregationists viewed themselves as both American patriots and devout Christians, including at this Ku Klux Klan rally at an Oregon Baptist Church in 1922. (Bottom) A homeowner in Louisiana makes clear their desire for public schools to be centered around religious beliefs (also notice the U.S. flags) in 2018. 

How Has White Christian Nationalism Found Its Way Into Schools?

In recent years, white Christian nationalism has found its way again (as this is not the first time) into public schools, especially through curriculum and book bans. White Christian nationalists have strategically focused on controlling the narratives that are told in public schools (often through political control of school boards and activism by astroturf groups like Moms for Liberty), which includes advocating and, in many cases, mandating that U.S. history be taught as a rooted in European and Christian thinking. They justify white settler-colonialism as part of a larger biblical plan and excuse any racial and religious violence as simply common aspects of their eras. The movement has also carefully crafted its language to not raise alarms about its white supremacist and Christian nationalist ideology. Rather, it often uses code words (especially when it comes to anything related to school curriculum). Instead, it will emphasize that a curriculum is teaching about "western civilization" or "classical education," or use terms such as "American exceptionalism" and "our European past." Moreover,  it often removes references to the American democracy in favor of exclusively using American republic and positions Europeans as delivering civilization to the rest of the world. Those have long been used as codes for "anti-multiculturalism," "white supremacy," and now "white Christian nationalist" curricula.

In recent years, there have been political pushes in several states, including Texas, Florida, North Dakota, and Virginia, to include Bible studies courses in public schools or increase Christian perspectives in curriculum standards starting at the elementary level through high school and incentivizing teacher professional development that has an emphasis on Christianity, conservatism, and western civilization. Some charter schools (independently run schools that receive public funds) have built their educational programming around white Christian nationalists curriculum. Several states education agencies have endorsed PragerU's (which is a rightwing media organization and not a university) videos and curricular materials, which involve anti-Black, anti-LGBTQ, and Christian nationalist propaganda. Conservative groups nationally (such as the rightwing Civic Alliance's American Birthright curriculum standards and the conservative Christian Hillsdale College 1776 history curriculum) have offered alternative curriculum standards and materials based on white Christian nationalist views. Yet, this is also occurring in more liberal states, albeit in more careful and nuanced ways, through conservative groups attempting to influence the writing of state social studies standards or using lawsuits to limit the teaching of certain subjects or affinity spaces for certain students.

 

Above: Adopted by numerous school districts and state education agencies, American Birthright and the Hillsdale 1776 Curriculum are essentially white Christian nationalist propaganda posing as school curriculum.

This is not a new phenomenon. There has been a long history of centering white and Christian nationalist ideologies in the history curriculum. As Kaylene Stevens and I outline the long history of white supremacist influence on history curriculum in our book Teaching History for Justice:  

White supremacy was intentionally built into the original design of ancient history courses. These courses became standard components of North American and European education in the 18th and 19th centuries (Marino, 2010; Morris & Scheidel, 2016), at a time when those nations were engaging in colonialism and later in imperialism. Eurocentric ancient history was used to justify the emerging national boundaries and related nationalism (Hourdakis, 1996; Hourdakis, Calogiannakis, & Chiang, 2018), especially in Western Europe, the United States, and Canada; it was to show that these nations were the heirs to civilization started in Greece and Rome. Moreover, Eurocentric ancient history was used to justify White people’s global power and expansion, as well as assert European and American exceptionalism. For instance, the study of Greek and Roman history, as proof of European superiority, was advocated by Herbert Spencer, who was a lead developer of scientific racism in the late 1800s (Morris & Scheidel, 2016). In the 1980s and 1990s, Eurocentric ancient history again gained popularity and was advocated for by a group of, often politically conservative, scholars and politicians as a way to combat the emergence of multicultural education in the 1960s and 1970s (Dunn, 2008; Nash, Crabtree, & Dunn, 2000). They argued that, for national unity, it was essential that all Americans learn that the U.S. government, and more broadly civilization, was originally founded in Europe and built on a Western heritage and culture (Gagnon, 1998; Ravitch, 1990; Ravitch & Finn, 1987; Stotsky, 2004). (pp. 105-106)

These ideas directly overlap with a white Christian nationalist interpretation of U.S. history and have generally created educational alliances between conservative educational scholars and white conservative Christian political leaders.

Above: Herbert Spencer, a lead intellectual of scientific racism and who coined the term "survival of the fittest," was a white supremacist (although abandoned his Christian beliefs as a teenager) and a major advocate for the teaching of white supremacy in schools through curricula centered on European history.

How Do We Help Students Learn About White Christian Nationalism and the Role that It Has Had in the Past and Present Day?

It is crucial that social studies teachers teach the long history of white Christian nationalism in the United States and ask them to examine the role that it has had in the past and present day. Below are some resources on the history of white Christian nationalism in the United States. 

In examining these sources, teachers may pose the inquiry question: What is the history of white Christian nationalism in the United States? Does it present a major problem for American democracy in the present?

With this, it is very important to clarify that not that not all conservative Christians are white Christian nationalists. White Christian nationalism, as I defined earlier, is a very specific movement that draws on Christian and white supremacy and advocates for a Christian and white U.S. state. Many Christians hold conservative political views without a belief that the U.S. should be a Christian government and that whites are a superior racial group. Moreover, many Christian denominations have explicit teachings for racial justice and religious pluralism (not to mention a strong Christian tradition within the African American community that has long united Christian thinking with social justice). Granted, some white conservatives Christians are becoming increasingly influenced by or have found themselves unknowingly aligned with white Christian nationalism (raising concerns among many Christian groups, including the United Methodist Church, Episcopal Church, Roman Catholic Church, Baptist religious leaders, and the group Christians Against Christian Nationalism and others). [In full disclosure, I am Catholic and a Polish American, so have seen some of this white Christian nationalist thinking among people I grew up with and during visits to Poland.]

"The Roots of Christian Nationalism Go Back Further Than You Think" by Robert P. Jones (TIME Magazine)

"White Christian Nationalism: The Deep Story Behind the Capitol Insurrection" by Philip Gorski (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

"Tracing the Rise of Christian Nationalism, from Trump to the Ala. Supreme Court" by Terri Gross and Brad Onishi (National Public Radio)

"The Dispossessed? Lived History and White Christian Nationalism" by Lauren R. Kerby (Berkeley Center; Georgetown University)

"How I Became a Christian Nationalist" by Kenneth Woodward (The Washington Post)

"An ‘Imposter Christianity’ Is Threatening American Democracy" by John Blake (CNN)

"The Mundane History of White Christian Nationalism" by Neil J. Young (Religion & Politics)

"Preparing for War: The Extremist History of White Christian Nationalism and What Comes Next" by Melissa Harris-Perry (WNYC)

"White Christian Nationalists Want More Than Just Political Power And Washington, D.C., Looms Large in their Struggle" by Lauren R. Kerby (The Atlantic) 

"White Nationalism Remains Major Concern for Voters of Color" by Gabriel R. Sanchez, Keon L. Gilbert, and Carly Bennett (Brookings)

Teaching About the Land Back Movement

Above: Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, a women-led Bay Area collective working to return land to Indigenous peoples celebrates a recent City of Berkeley vote to return sacred land to the Lisjan Nation.

Last week, the City of Berkeley voted to rematriate a portion of land to the Lisjan Nation (Ohlone peoples), which follows the lead of the City of Oakland. The West Berkeley Shellmound was likely the first Native settlement in the area and dates back 5,700 years. On the other side of the continent, people who are the descendants of the first settler-colonists in New England are raising funds to buy and return local land to the Nipmuc peoples and members of the Hassanamisco Band of the Nipmuc are advocating for the rematriation of the Lampson Brook Farm in Western Massachusetts.

Decolonization is not a metaphor; the Land Back Movement is "literally" working to return Native homelands and ensure that the U.S. and Canadian governments respect treaties and recognize when treaties were unjust with Indigenous nations. 

Above: No DAPL protests in 2016.

The Land Back Movement gained momentum during the Dakota Access pipeline protests/Water Protectors Movement with the term "Land Back" being coined in 2017 by Kainai tribal citizen Aaron Tailfeathers (the hashtag #LandBack has become popular on social media). Yet, the movement for Indigenous people to have their land returned to them is as old as the first taking of Native lands by settler-colonists. For instance, in 1659, Nipmuc leader Tantamous legally defended his land from white settlers in Massachusetts Bay Colony who attempted to take it.  

While the term repatriation is often used to described the returning of someone to their home country, Indigenous women activists have coined the term rematriation to describe the returning of the stolen sacred sites to the mother. As a result, a growing number of governments (mostly at the local level, such as the City of Boston returning the Mattapan Rhyolite Quarry to the Massachusett people) but also including some federal decisions) and private citizens are finding ways to return land to local Native nations and tribes (there is also a similar movement to return land to descendants of enslaved Black people and Black families that have had their land taken by the government). Yet, much of this work is being done by Native nations and tribal governments, who are buying back their own lands (including the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans here in Massachusetts). This post was created to help give social studies resources to teach about the past related to this present-day justice movement and consider potential ways that governments may start to right the wrongs.

Above: Native protesters outside Mt. Rushmore during Donald Trump's visit in 2020. 

Teaching About the Land Back Movement

In having students learn about the Land Back Movement, one potential inquiry question to ask is: "How should the government return stolen land to Indigenous peoples?" Students could read about the history of treaties and Native sovereignty in the U.S., research different options of rematriation, and design potential plans for the national, state, or local governments. 

Native lands have been rematriated in several different ways: land title purchases by nations and tribes, donations from private landowners, transfers from land conservancies, or local, state, or federal legislation/actions. For instance, students may argue that cities and towns should return municipal land to local nations and tribes. Other students may argue that the federal government should return land to local nations and tribes through expansion of the current Interior Department program. Yet, other students may argue that descendants of settler-colonists should return land to Native peoples and donate money to local nations and tribes, so they can buy back land. Still, some students may conceive new ways to seek land justice for local nation and tribes.

Below (and linked above) are some resources that students could examine to help answer that questions.

Resources on Native Sovereignty and Broken Treaties

Key Vocabulary: Teaching & Learning About Native Americans (National Museum of the American Indian)

Native Land Digital (Indigenous territories, treaties, and languages mapping tool)

Nation to Nations (National Museum of the American Indian)

Tribal Sovereignty: History and the Law (Native American Caucus: California State Legislature) 

Tribal Nations & the United States: An Introduction (National Congress of American Indians)

Histories of Indigenous Sovereignty in Action: What is it and Why Does it Matter? (Organization of American Historians)

Why Treaties Matter (Minnesota Humanities Center) 

Broken Treaties With Native American Tribes: Timeline (History Channel)

In 1868, Two Nations Made a Treaty, the U.S. Broke It and Plains Indian Tribes are Still Seeking Justice (Smithsonian Magazine)

Indigenous Peoples Day Comes Amid a Reckoning Over Colonialism and Calls for Return of Native Land (The Conversation)

Resources on Current Rematriation Efforts 

The Land Back Movement Unravels Manifest Destiny (Sierra Club)

Rematriation Resource Guide (Sogorea Te’ Land Trust)

Returning the Land (The Fix) 

Rematriation  Returning the Sacred to the Mother (Rematriation/Haudenosaunee)

Rematriation Through Sustainable Food And Economic Systems (Eastern Woodlands Rematriation) 

How Returning Lands to Native Tribes Is Helping Protect Nature (Yale Environment 360)

Interior Department Land Buy-Back Program (U.S. Department of the Interior)

Land Recovery (Indian Land Tenure Foundation) 

 

Want to know more? Consider watching this short documentary by NDN Collective on the work of Lakota and other Indigenous activists fighting to have land returned to the Oceti Sakowin Nation.

Teaching About Affirmative Action

Above: Supporters of Affirmative Action outside of the Supreme Court in October 2022.

Despite a majority of Americans supporting the use of race in university admissions (although asking the question differently effects the results), it is very likely in the coming days that the U.S. Supreme Court will rule that university affirmative action programs are unconstitutional (UPDATE: On June 29, 2023, the Supreme Court reversed decades of precedent and ruled that affirmative action in college admissions was unconstitutional; this also led many to question the long-standing practice of legacy admissions in U.S. universities). This follows a trend of the conservative-majority Supreme Court undoing decades of civil rights legal precedents, including abortion rights (Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization), voting rights (Shelby County v. Holder), as well as separation of church and state (Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission; Carson v. Makin, Kennedy v. Bremerton School District; Shurtleff v. Boston) in the United States. 

This post is meant to help teach students about the history of affirmative action, the current debate over affirmative action, and help students contemplate the inquiry question: How should we address the racial disadvantages embedded in our educational systems? 

This issue is not only incredibly important to discuss with students, and especially high schools students who are often preparing to apply to college, but since educational access is a major determinant of life outcomes, it is an important issue for equity more broadly in American society.

Racial Segregation and the Civil Rights Acts 

Above: Black students attend a de jure racially segregated school in Summerton, S.C. (1954).

The United States was established as an independent nation in 1783 with a legalized race-based slave system and with people of color and women not having equal citizenship rights to white men, which caused widespread racial and gender inequality. After the Civil War and Reconstruction, racial and gender discrimination persisted and the social and economic gaps between white men and people of color and women continued to widen. While there were some eras of expanding racial and gender equality, including some civil rights cases in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (such as Tape v. Hurley and Méndez v. Westminster), women's suffrage, and during the New Deal (including anti-discrimination executive orders), it was not until Brown v. Board of Education that the government had a constitutional obligation to prevent racial discrimination. Soon laws, such as the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act would follow and extend these protections based on gender, national origin, and other social identities. 

History of Discrimination and Racial Segregation Before Brown v. Board of Education (Library of Congress)

Tape v. Hurley

Méndez v. Westminister

Brown v. Board of Education (PBS American Experience)

After Brown v. Board of Education (Organization of American Historians)

1957 Civil Rights Acts

Civil Rights Act of 1964

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Great Society and Racial Equality

History of Affirmative Action and Re-Segregation of the United States

"Affirmative action" was a term first used in Executive Order 10925 signed by John F. Kennedy in regard to preventing racial discrimination in the hiring of government contractors. Under the presidency of Lyndon Baines Johnson, the program became one of his signature civil rights initiatives. In the 1960s and 70s, affirmative action programs expanded in employment and education for both people of color and women (white women have been the largest beneficiary of affirmative action). While primarily government programs, private employers and academic institutions have also adopted affirmative action policies. Yet, since the 1990s, racial segregation in U.S. schools, workforce, and housing has increased. 

Affirmative Action Timeline (The American Association for Access, Equity, and Diversity)

History of Affirmative Action (Smithsonian Magazine)

History of Affirmative Action (Clinton White House Archive) 

The Return of School Segregation (PBS Frontline)

The Re-Segregation of the United States (NBC News)

Court Challenges to Affirmative Action

Above: Demonstrators in Washington, D.C. in 1977 protest the potential decision against affirmative action in the Bakke case.

Starting in the 1970s, there were a series of conservative legal challenges to affirmative action programs. They have made claims that race should not be a consideration in employment and especially not a consideration in school and college admissions (and labeling it as a form of "reverse discrimination," where there is evidence it instead "leveled the playing field."). Simultaneously, affirmative action programs increased social and economic opportunities for people of color and women. Meanwhile, many groups have defended the practice as a means to ensuring fairness in educational and employment opportunities.

University of California v. Bakke

Wessmann v. Boston School Committee

Grutter v. Bollinger/Gratz v. Bollinger

Fisher v. The University of Texas

Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina/Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College

Supreme Court's Hostility to Affirmative Action (National Public Radio) 

Meet the Man Trying to End Affirmative Action (Christian Science Monitor)

Commentaries and Fact Sheets on Affirmative Action

Above: College Enrollment by Race (PEW Research Center).

Below are a series of affirmative action fact sheets and commentaries presenting different perspectives on the topic.

ACLU Affirmative Action Fact Sheet 

Asian Americans Advancing Justice Fact Sheet 

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights Fact Sheet

The Changing Meaning of Affirmative Action - The New Yorker

5 Reasons to Keep Affirmative Action - Center for American Progress 

A Monumental Threat to Racial Equality: The Supreme Court Affirmative Action Cases - Alliance for Justice 

Argument Against Affirmative Action - Stanford Magazine

Edward Blum Interview - Time Magazine

Teaching Book Bans in the Past and Present

Above: A list of book bans by state (PEN America). There are bans in 138 school districts in 32 states that represent 5,049 schools with nearly 4 million students.

What is going on with all these states and schools banning books? 

How can teachers use this as a "teachable moment" and educate students about the long history of censorship inside and outside schools?

There is a long history of humans banning or destroying books that they find objectionable. Of course, one of the most infamous acts of book burning included those of the Nazis during their rise to power in the 1930s. Similarly, segregationists during the modern Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and 60s attempted to ban books from local libraries and schools. 

Sadly, we again face attempts to censor what people, and especially students, read. A number of conservative states in the U.S. have passed laws that curtail what books can be included in schools and many school boards have banned books from their school libraries. These laws have largely targeted books related to race, sexual orientation, and transgender people (and are part of a concerted effort by conservatives to control the content taught in schools). In response, educators and community members have been challenging these laws. 

This blog post is to help social studies teachers contextualize these book bans through lessons for their students on the history of book bans.

Above: Book burning depicted in the 1493 Nuremberg Chronicles. Below: (Left) The 1817 Wartburg Festival in Germany, where anti-nationalist writings were burned. (Right) Segregationists in the 20th century often supported bans and burnings related to books about racial justice or written by authors of color. 

Book Bans Spread from Europe to the Americas

As long as there have been books, there have been attempts by people to ban or destroy them. There were incidences of book burnings in ancient Rome, Egypt, and China. There were at least 200 book burnings during the Medieval period in Europe. Traditionally, book burnings have been mostly symbolic acts to further the cause of banning books. With the invention of the printing press and books being more readily available, book bans increased. For example, during the Reformation, Pope Paul IV banned books by authors guilty of heresy against the Catholic Church, including Martin Luther, John Calvin, Henry VIII, and others. The first book banning in what became the United States was likely in 1637 at Manet (now Quincy) in Massachusetts Bay Colony and continued through much of the 17th and 18th centuries.

Book Bans to Prevent Increasing Justice and Freedom

Above: Anti-slavery book Uncle Tom's Cabin was banned and even burned in many places before the Civil War. 

In the 19th and 20th centuries, as more people facing oppression demanded their rights, book bans increased in the United States. Anti-slavery books were banned in many locations throughout the United States in the 19th century, and especially in slave states. For instance, Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe was publicly burned by slaveholders. Free Black minister Sam Greenwas was sentenced to 10 years in a Maryland penitentiary for owning a copy of the book. 

 

After the Civil War, with the passage of the Comstock Act (1873), possession or mailing of "obscene" or "immoral" texts became illegal; these laws often targeted queer people and women, as they included articles about sexuality and birth control. In Boston (where I live), the New England Watch and Ward Society was created in 1879 to push for the banning of books throughout in the area (it helped give the rise to the phrase "banned in Boston"); to their dismay, some publishers specifically chose to publish their books in the city in the hopes that it would get banned and raise publicity. During the anti-communism hysteria of the early 1950s, communities banned numerous books including Huckleberry Finn, The Catcher in the Rye, and To Kill a Mockingbird. 

 

In the 1950s and 60s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the anti-war movement, and the sexual revolution, schools became the front link for book bans. The United Daughters of the Confederacy waged successful campaigns to ban textbooks that were not sympathetic to the Confederacy (here is an excellent story from The Root showing how many current congressmen used those textbooks). Those opposed to the Civil Rights Movement banned books about racial justice and written from Black perspectives (something that started decades earlier, including the banning of Carter G. Woodson's work). They also burned books, including the plea for racial equality "We Sing for America" by Marion Cuthbert. Meanwhile, segregationists also prevented Black people from borrowing books from public libraries.

Above: (Right) A comic book and magazine burning in 1949 at St. Mary's High School in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. (Left) Elementary teachers cover bookshelves in 2023 after Manatee County School District officials direct them to remove all books that have not been approved by a specialist to ensure they do not violate a new Florida state law that censors the content of school books. 

 

Schools (and school-aged children) have often been the target of book bans and burnings. Due to their perceived innocence, book bans that are framed as "protecting children" often face less resistance from communities. Yet, these book bans have often targeted books that are actually uplifting to students of color and queer students, or help students understand issues related to race, sexual orientation, or gender.

 

During this period, there were also several important federal and Supreme Court cases that prohibited school officials from removing books from school libraries (Minarcini v. Strongsville City School District and Island Trees School District v. Pico) or preventing student journalists from reporting on controversial topics (Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier). Much of these rulings we based on a 1933 Supreme Court ruling that struck down bans of the James Joyce book "Ulysses." Yet, there have continued to be so many contested books in school libraries that librarians have established the annual "Banned Book Week."

Above: A book burning in 2022 held by a conservative Christian pastor in Tennessee. 

Book Bans Today 

Book bans and burnings are not unique to the United States, but they have made a comeback in recent years. The nonprofit organization PEN America found that 1,586 book bans targeting 1,145 unique books had occurred in 2022. So-called "divisive concept" or anti-Critical Race Theory laws have give new tools to conservative politicians to remove books related to racial justice or queer peoples' experiences.

 

Moms for Liberty, a dark money funded astroturf group, has been one of the groups leading the charge to ban books at the district and state levels (while also strategically placing conservative political propaganda in some of those same school libraries and generally lobbying against public education). A similar campaign is under way from other conservative political organizations to influence history and civics curriculum around conservative political ideologies.

 

An important aspect to book bans or burnings is that they usually do not work (yet, they do sometimes have a silencing effect in the short term-and there should be a concern that these bans may be different). Ultimately, they may encourage more people to read a banned or burned book, especially in the digital age, where it is much easier to get access to reading materials. For example, an Arkansas lawmaker tried to ban Howard Zinn's A Peoples History of the United States, and it likely led to more students reading the book. After some school districts attempted to ban "Stamped" by Ibram Kendi and Jason Reynolds, book sales skyrocketed.

 

Below are several editorials and campaigns against book bans. Have students read these various perspectives as they consider the potential harm caused by book bans.

"The Real Reason North Dakota Is Going After Books and Librarians" by Taylor Brorby (New York Times) https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/24/opinion/libraries-sex-books-north-dakota.html 

"How to Beat a Book Ban: Students, Parents and Librarians Fight Back" by Adam Gabbatt (The Guardian)  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/sep/20/us-book-bans-fight-school-librar

"How To Fight Book Bans and Challenges: An Anti-Censorship Tool Kit" by Kelly Jensen (Book Riot) https://bookriot.com/how-to-fight-book-bans-and-challenges/

"Unite Against Book Bans Campaign" by the American Library Association https://uniteagainstbookbans.org/

 

Inquiry Questions to Consider Asking Students:

Finally, here are a set of inquiry questions that teachers might ask students about book bans (and burnings) in the past and present. To help students answer these questions, teachers can use the above linked sources from the post:

• How should we remember the history of book bans and burnings? 
  
• Using examples from history, what are some effective ways that students and parents organized to stop book bans?
• Are current book bans in states like Florida or Texas constitutional? Do they cause harm to students?