Somehow, Morrow escaped indoctrination

By: GAIL CHATFIELD | Friday, April 1, 2005 4:03 AM PST ∞

A recent Knight Foundation survey of more than 100,000 high school students found the majority of them assign little or no value to their First Amendment rights. And probably some of those had to be reminded that the First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech, of the press, of religion, of assembly and the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

More than a third of the students think that the First Amendment goes too far in the rights it guarantees.

"High school attitudes about the First Amendment are important because each generation of citizens helps define what freedom means in our society," the report reads.

Thankfully, upon entering college, protecting the First Amendment is very important ---- as demonstrated by students at Cal State San Marcos again and again.

State Sen. Bill Morrow (R-Oceanside) recently defended his academic "student bill of rights" at the campus. An idea first put forth by conservative activist David Horowitz, the proposal includes mandating that colleges hire more conservative professors (but "intellectual diversity" could also mean hiring more communist or socialist professors) and legislate what they could discuss in their classrooms.

There is a strange movement afoot. School boards in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin and Kansas are legislating the teaching of creationism, or "intelligent design." Conservative activists challenge school districts and libraries to ban books such as "The Grapes of Wrath," "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," "The Scarlet Letter" and Shakespeare's "Hamlet."

Maybe that is why Morrow's Senate Bill 5 doesn't explain who will be the judge of what constitutes unreasonable political or religious opinions by professors.

But you can guess where this is heading.

Morrow attended college during the Vietnam War and believes the bad grades he earned in a political science class were because of his conservative views. He has wanted to restrict professors' "political indoctrination" of impressionable students ever since.

According to Sen. Morrow's Web site bio, he was elected student body president of Mount San Antonio College and graduated from UCLA with honors. He received his Juris Doctorate from the Pepperdine School of Law and was recruited by the U.S. Marine Corps, serving with distinction as a commissioned officer and military judge. He entered the private sector as a small-business attorney and later was elected state senator.

Not too shabby for someone who received a bad grade in a poli-sci class about 30 years ago. In spite of what he felt was a liberal professor's attempts to influence, manipulate and indoctrinate him, Morrow was able to maintain his integrity and conservative viewpoints as outlined on his Web page.

However, he thinks today's students need protection.

Students are smarter than he thinks. One opinionated professor may not alter your life, but chiseling away at the First Amendment certainly will.

If Morrow truly wants to do something to help college students, he should make sure that California colleges are funded, safe and affordable for all wishing to attend.

Gail Chatfield is a freelance writer based in Carmel Valley.

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