by Brian Thevenot
January 15, 2010
... After a controversy much earlier this year, board members had earlier made clear labor leader Cesar Chavez would be included in the standards. Yet Wednesday night, the board booted Dolores Huerta, the woman who, with Chavez, co-founded the United Farm Workers. The reason?
“She’s a member of the Democratic Socialist Party of America,” said board member Geraldine Miller. “I don’t think she should be in a list of people exemplifying good citizenship, like Helen Keller and Clara Barton." (Miller apparently did not realize Helen Keller was a socialist.) ...
Some figures drew unexpected ire. Board member Barbara Cargill sought to add Thomas Paine — Founding Father and author of Common Sense, the landmark pamphlet advocating American independence — but Paine didn't pass muster with Hardy.
“I don’t want to cut the guy down in front of everybody,” she said, apparently not wanting to speak ill of the long-dead, though she the proceeded to do so: “You need to look a little deeper. Thomas Paine was a good writer … but after that he did nothing for the Revolution. He died penniless. He left America — skipped town, if you catch my drift" ...
http://www.texastribune.org/stories/2010/jan/15/civil-civics/
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