The OLD Philosopher – John M. Miller
There are several related words in the dictionary that all begin with two letters: “c-i.” Among these words are city, citizenry, citizenship, civic, civics, civilian, civility, civilized, and civilization.
Linguistically, they all derive from the same Middle English or Old French root: ci, from which the English word “city” comes (cite’ in French). By definition, a city is a place where many people and many kinds of people live. The citizenry of a city or region or nation consists of all the people who live there. A civilization is created when all the citizens of a geographic entity together move from a primitive every-person-for-himself-or-herself existence into a more refined, communal, civilized lifestyle.
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In 1954, all ninth graders at West Junior High School in Madison, Wisconsin were required to take a year-long course in Civics. My Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (copyright 1975, which no longer makes it very new) gives just one brief definition of the word “civics.” It is “a social science dealing with the rights and duties of citizens.” Our civics teacher told us we should begin reading a daily newspaper in order to become informed citizens. And she insisted that we should read the first section of the paper before reading the sports or comic sections.
Seniors at Madison West High School could elect to take two one-semester courses, Economics and Problems of Democracy. Every class in school is valuable, but some are more valuable than others, and some are more valuable to some students, while others are more valuable to other students. There are different educational strokes for differently educated folks. Not all students are equally drawn to or moved by all courses they take.
I believe there were no more important classes that I took in my early secondary education than Civics, Economics, and Problems of Democracy, even though I personally was more captivated by my history and English classes. In Civics we learned about the formation of the United States of America, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the meaning and responsibilities of citizenship, especially as it relates to voting. In Economics we learned about how feudalism, mercantilism, early capitalism, socialism, communism, and twentieth century capitalism attempted to serve the needs of the citizens in various nations at various periods of history. In Problems of Democracy we learned how hard it is to keep democratically-organized governments running smoothly and efficiently.
To the degree that schools teach civics with excellence to teenagers, those youngsters are likely to grown into educated, civil citizens who contribute conscientiously to a civilized society. To the degree that civics is not well inculcated into students in our schools, our society will splinter and flounder.
For at least a generation, American education from the elementary level though the halls of higher education has shifted from an emphasis on liberal arts in general to STEM in particular: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. As we discovered in our twelfth grade economics class, all those things are important in building better mousetraps (as Thoreau said), and they can cause the globalized world to beat a path to corporate America’s doors. But as that has been happening, the American citizenry were becoming less communal, cohesive, and civic.
Certainly there are many factors which explain how the American educational system has been declining for at least two generations. (We now rank seventeenth in the world.) Greatly altered family structures have resulted in far fewer parents being involved in the oversight of their children’s schooling. PTAs are a thing of the past in many urban, rural, and even suburban schools. Behavioral discipline is very difficult for teachers, and there are many factors involved in that. Teachers’ unions sometimes keep ineffective teachers employed, and far too low salaries dissuade some of the best college graduates from considering teaching as a vocation. The list goes on, and people far more occupationally qualified than I have commented frequently on these matters.
However, one of the most serious consequences of the decline of American education is that we are experiencing a lower and lower percentage of informed and committed citizens. Exhibit A to corroborate that statement is the election of Donald J. Trump as the President of the United States. It should have been evident to everyone in the American electorate, with the exception of the hard-core Trump base, that Mr. Trump was a dangerous candidate, and that he would be a dangerous President. Too many people either didn’t take civics in school or did not incorporate its truths into their thinking when they voted for a man who was obviously seriously flawed in his personality, thinking, and in his political abilities. By now he has shown us that his presidential skills are minimal at best.
If civics had been taught to every American for the past fifty years, there would be relatively few racists, neo-Nazis, or white supremacists. Nevertheless, these people represent a significant portion of the most reliable political base for Donald Trump. He has been President less than nine months, but already he has concluded it is to his political benefit that he consciously appeals only to the most anti-social, anti-government, anti-education segment of American voters. After all, he forthrightly told us, “I love the poorly educated.” Therefore it is not astonishing that these folks turned out in droves to vote for him. Probably many of them had never voted before. When they heard his Make America Great Again, anti-immigrant, anti-black, and anti-Latino rhetoric, they cast their ballots with high enthusiasm for the first candidate in living memory openly to express such heretofore venomous views.
Education in every democratic nation-state should produce educated voters. Education should not tell people for whom to vote, but rather on what basis to vote. What factors should be considered when casting a ballot? The personalities of the candidates should be secondary or tertiary, but what are their views on political issues? Those are some of the most important questions raised by the study of civics.
Donald Krider, the West High School Economics teacher, would highly have approved of an emphasis on STEM education for all of us. Science, technology, engineering, and math all contribute to economic advancement in the modern world. Further, they strengthen capitalistic economic growth.
On the other hand, Mr. Krider the Problems of Democracy teacher would say that too much emphasis on STEM erodes effective democracy and efficient government. People may be able to develop splendid widgets, but if they do not know how to vote, or worse, if they do not vote at all, they contribute to the decline of the nation of which they are citizens.
There are millions of Americans between the ages of eighteen and sixty who have excellent technical educations. But the education of many of those people may have rendered them ignorant about how to cast an intelligent ballot in a municipal, state, or national election. Further, many of them do not feel it is at all imperative that they do it.
We have spawned two generations of Americans who are political libertarians by default. They have concluded that everyone has to carve out a life for themselves and their families as best they can. They believe they cannot and should not count on government for any leadership in their quest to establish a better life for themselves.
The reason they think that is because they have been led to believe that government is the enemy. And government IS the enemy if it fails successfully to address the needs of all the people in our democracy. Government certainly cannot solve all our problems, but government must at least address our problems and suggest alternative solutions if it is incapable of overcoming those problems.
There are always problems of democracy in every kind of democratic nation-state. Government’s responsibility is to study those issues, and to decide whether it or other institutions in society should work on them to achieve the best results. Governments which try to do too much will succeed only in angering their citizens. Governments which intentionally try to do little will inevitably fail the citizens they are meant to serve.
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In the 9/6/17 edition of USA Today, there was an article entitled “White Christians decline in USA but dominate GOP.” It is the kind of story which automatically catches the eye of a codger white Christian pastor. The headline impacted this codger-pastor more for its first part than for its second part. White American Christians now represent less than half of the American populace, but that did not surprise me.
Public Religion Research Institute is a public policy research firm. In 2016 it polled 100,000 Americans regarding their religious affiliation. They learned that 24% of our citizens have no religious affiliation at all. That number is up from 10% in 1995. That is a huge increase of people unaffiliated with any religious institution in little more than twenty years. It is a 140 per cent increase, to be exact. Of Americans ages 18-29, 40% are unaffiliated. People in my vocation should be greatly alarmed by those numbers.
From the standpoint of civics, however, what was most enlightening -- and disturbing – in the article is that only half of religiously unaffiliated Americans vote. About half of eligible American voters vote. I would have guessed the percentage of those unaffiliated Americans without any religion would be more interested in the political process, if only because they are disinterested in the religious process. But apparently they are not. They are as apathetic as the rest of the non-voting American public.
I was further enlightened and dismayed to read that the Republican Party is 73% white Christian. It also is 80% evangelical, and that figure probably means 90+ per cent white evangelical. Nevertheless, according to PRRI, only 17% of the American populace are white evangelical Christians.
In more than half a century as a pastor, I would estimate that at least two-thirds of the parishioners I have known have been white Republican Mainline Protestant (as opposed to evangelical) voters. Most of those folks were well educated, thoughtful, civil, civic, civilized, city-dwelling citizens. They studied the issues, and they voted on the basis of what they thought was best for the country as well as for themselves.
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Now I shall make an admittedly very incendiary statement. It is not possible that nearly all of the 90+ per cent of the white evangelical Christians, who comprise a high percentage of the traditional Republican base and who vote Republican, are thoughtful, well educated, civil, civic, civilized, city-dwelling citizens.
For one thing, a large number of white evangelicals live in rural America, which represents a large geographic part of red-state America. Rural Americans are less likely to consider the welfare of all Americans, since they do not encounter large numbers of other kinds of Americans where they live. In addition, they gain more of their sense of identity from one another than do most other Americans. Most rural people are similar to most other rural people. City people tend to be far more diverse, and diversity is not a positive identity factor to many rural dwellers.
Another issue is that evangelical Protestants have tended to have less formal education than Mainline Protestants or Roman Catholics. Another, and probably a more important factor, is that evangelicals are more likely to cast votes because of social issues than political issues per se. They tend to favor candidates who express opposition to LGBT concerns (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender). They oppose any federal funding for Planned Parenthood. They disapprove of gays, lesbians, and transgender people in the military. Many oppose abortion and gay marriage. And most evangelicals support political candidates who publicly support what evangelicals support.
Donald Trump has taken positions as President that very intentionally coincide with evangelical social issues. In the 2016 election, therefore, it is obvious why 80% of evangelicals voted for Donald Trump. Never mind that many of his other statements and decisions are anathema to centuries-old Christian values. If he favors what evangelicals favor in their very small galaxy of sexual concerns, he receives their votes. And they do vote, because they are encouraged to do so by their clergy and other leaders.
Millions of non-evangelical Christians believe that many aspects of the evangelical position on sexuality are unchristian. But it must also be noted that their attitude is uncivil. They have no hesitation to try to eradicate the civil rights of certain other American citizens because of a perverted theological ideology.
Christians need to do battle with one another on Christian grounds over this issue. But citizens need to do battle with citizens on civics grounds over this issue. All citizens need to be aware of the incivility of depriving any citizens of their rights because of their sexuality, just as all citizens should resist the President trying to deprive DACA Americans of their rights because of who their parents were when the DACA Americans were born in America. Everyone needs to be educated about political rights in order to get America right.
If civics was more widely studied and practiced in America, American citizens would be much more civic, civil, and civilized in their behavior. Until that happens, abortion clinics will continue to be bombed, and Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City, and Charlottesville will increase as examples of a people who have somehow lost their civility. Whoever would have guessed that what used to be taught in ninth grade was so important?
September 8, 2017
John Miller is a writer, author, lecturer, and preacher-for-over-fifty-years who is pastor of The Chapel Without Walls on Hilton Head Island, SC.