Next, OAH Kidnapped by Aliens?
Dear Sir:
Reference is made to the front page article on the OAH Newsletter dated February 2000, "Charges of Racism Jolt Annual Meeting."
I am terribly upset about the article for a number of reasons. First, it appears that you have tried, convicted, sentenced, tarred and feathered and lynched Adam's Mark based on what are nothing more than allegations. I don't trust the Clinton/Reno Justice Department to make any kind of unprejudiced/unbiased investigation. And I certainly don't trust anything that the NAACP does or says. Yet, based on what amounts to hearsay and gossip, you have seen fit to take a stand that the Adam's Mark is guilty; don't confuse me with facts. What ever happened to "...innocent until proven guilty...?"
Second, the article is one-sided and incomplete. It only presents the side of the NAACP, the Justice Dept., and that of the OAH. In a document representing historians, I would expect a more critical, balanced and complete explanation of who, what, where, when, how, and how many. Your article is more fitting to the trashy sensationalism of the tabloids. Next issue, why don't you publish an article about being kidnapped by aliens?
I agree that the meeting should address matters relating to prejudice, discrimination, civil rights and related matters. Don't forget that prejudice takes many forms and manifests itself in many ways. More importantly, don't forget that justice means more than taking sides on an issue. It means gathering the facts from as many viable sources as possible, analyzing those facts, coming to a logical conclusion, making a decision, then carrying through with that decision. Justice has not been helped by your article; rather it has been obfuscated.
Bamboozling the Elephant and Misinterpreting the Lion
In the May 1999 issue of the OAH Newsletter, John Myers wrote about the teaching of history in Canada. Along the way, he cited (and patronized) Professor Jack Granatstein. Granatstein is the author of Who Killed Canadian History?, a best seller as such books go, which Myers describes as a polemic. Myers states that "some of us" don't agree with Granatstein's opposition to the practical elimination of national political history, in favor of "stories" about women, aboriginal people and various minority groups at the K-12 level, and to labor, gender and immigration history at the university level. The opponents, for "progressives" such as Myers, are "those . . . nostalgic for the teaching of history from another age."
Who "some of us" represents, other than Myers, I don't know for sure, but I think I've encountered a few. For example, the academics who edited The Neglected Majority, a collection of essays about Canadian women in the nineteenth century. When it was pointed out that females were not a majority in Canada until 1961, the ladies were unrepentant. The senior editor suggested that history was a large pool, and that I should "jump in and join the fun." What fun? The denial of historical facts?
Granatstein, in his "polemic," cited a remarkable letter from a school teacher in British Columbia to the editor of the Toronto Globe and Mail. The woman did not see why a war veteran should appear in her classroom on 11 November--Armistice Day--and "bore us with his medals." I wrote to the school board in question to complain about gross abuse of the freedom of speech defended and preserved by the veterans and their fallen comrades. The response I received stated, in effect, that the letter to the Globe hadn't happened. Moreover, there had been a memorial ceremony, during which "the boy of Hiroshima" had been prominent. What this had to do with Canada or the memory of Canadian war dead was not revealed.
More recently, I watched a television debate between a retired professor of Canadian history (white, male, not the present author) and a thirty-something female school teacher who referred to herself as a historian. The retired professor wanted Canadian history taught in the public schools. The teacher noted that more than half the pupils in the school district were immigrants or the children of recent immigrants from non-white, non-English-speaking countries. She contended that these children did not see themselves in Canadian history, which was quite natural and undoubtedly true, but they could easily and properly have been included in the story of the nation by reference to the traditional and continuing multi-racial, multi-ethnic immigration to Canada.
The teacher, however, asserted that her job was to teach pupils the histories of the countries whence they came. The old professor's gentle comment that she would not then be teaching Canadian history was rebutted with a snide remark about "dead white males." Subsequent events indicate that the lady represents prevailing views: the province-wide Grade 12 history examination, which is said to "teach 20th century events from a Canadian perspective," does not include a single question about Canada.
So I concur in Professor Granatstein's thesis that so-called "progressive" educators have a lot to answer for. John Myers' apparent attitude toward "traditional" history is exemplified in "Does the Past Have A Future?" a somewhat different draft of his OAH Newsletter article posted at <http://www.historymatters.com/>. The website version includes the following footnote, reminiscent of the "Columbus didn't know where he was going and didn't know where he was when he got there" school of analysis:
When I say "British," I really mean English. In the textbooks and curriculum documents, the Welsh were almost never seen, the Scots appeared only when the English had enough of fighting the French or Spaniards and the Irish were there only to demonstrate why the English were Protestant.
The footnote actually implies that rather than too much, there was too little "British" history, but the style is in keeping with the second sentence of the Newsletter article: "If our official credo was 'Peace, Order and Good Government,' the unofficial English-Canadian version was 'Ready, Aye, Ready,' whenever the British Lion roared." That statement--palpably inaccurate--is typical Myers. Later, Myers declares that: "It was evolution and compromise that founded Canada, not revolution or war." That is to say, the defeat of France by Britain in the colonial wars--especially the Battle of the Plains of Abraham--ensuring that Canada would inherit British constitutional and legal systems and the English language, rather than French; the expulsion of the Acadians and their replacement by Americans in the 1750's; the successful armed resistance to American attempts during the American Revolution and the War of 1812 to attach Canada to the U.S.A., ensuring that parliamentary and monarchical traditions would be maintained; the establishment of what is now Ontario by American Loyalists moving north after the Revolution; the abortive armed uprisings of 1837-1838, which were the first steps toward responsible government and the Canadian confederation of 1867; the defeat of the Metis rebellions and the successful struggle to assert Canadian sovereignty north of the forty-ninth parallel on the plains, in the Columbia territory and in the Yukon; significant Canadian participation on the world stage in two world wars; the massive non-British immigration from war-torn Europe after 1945; and the significant immigration of American dissenters during the Vietnamese war did not have a fundamental influence on the development of a distinctive Canadian society. To which the most polite answer might be "poppycock." Of course, someone committed to the "new" history might not know the "old" history. It has been said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Mr. Myers undoubtedly means well. He is identified as a curriculum expert from the Toronto school board on loan to the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. He should stick to his last. In my view, his disregard for facts renders him ineligible to interpret Canadian history, especially for non-Canadian audiences that might not have recourse to reliable accounts.