THE good news is that more Texans are paying attention to social-studies lessons than ever before. The bad news is that they suddenly have cause. On March 12th, the state board of education voted for a series of changes to the state's history and social-sciences curricula. The changes look small enough—a word here and there, a new name included, maybe a different way of phrasing an issue. But the overall effect, if the changes are approved in May, will to be to yank public education to the right.
The board alluded to the controversial amendments in a polite press release: "All those who died at the Alamo will be discussed in seventh grade Texas history classes. Hip hop will not be part of the official curriculum standards." The most dramatic change is that Thomas Jefferson has gotten the boot. The conservatives on the board deemed him to be a su iously secular figure. The new guidelines would pay more fond attention to their favoured presidents, Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon. Phyllis Schlafly and the National Rifle Association are in. So are the Black Panthers.
Some of the oddest changes concern economics. Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek will join Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, and Karl Marx. And the board decided that references to "capitalism" and the "free market" should be changed to say "free enterprise", because capitalism has a bad reputation at the moment. That decision is almost inexplicable. Capitalism has been through a rough patch, but surely the term itself is no more inflammatory than free enterprise.
For critics, this is a blatant attempt to indoctrinate children. At the New York Times, an economics blogger concluded that based on his number of scholarly citations, Hayek was the beneficiary of an "ideological subsidy". The board's conservatives counter that their work is merely a corrective to academia's liberal bent. At the national level, some are concerned about the impact on other states. Texas is such a big textbook market that publishers typically accommodate it.
It is quite clear how this happened. There are 15 people on the board, ten Republicans and five Democrats. But more important is that among the ten Republicans are seven fierce conservatives, along with three who are merely staunch. This is no coincidence. Over the years Republicans have worked to stack the deck with social conservatives. The school board seats are, for the most part, small-money races. A candidate could win with just a few thousand dollars. Yet the board has some power, as last week's vote showed, and a determinedly ideological bloc can organise accordingly. To the victor go the spoils, in other words. It is a clever bit of political strategy, and Democrats could do it too if they put their mind to it.
In the meantime, even Texas Republicans are growing weary of the board's antics. Before the social-studies fracas, there was a separate and even more pitched debate over whether creationism should be taught alongside evolution in science classes. The ringleader of that effort was the board's chairman, Don McLeroy. On March 2nd he was defeated in a Republican primary. His opponent, Tom Ratliff, is conservative too. But on his campaign website Mr Ratliff parsed some differences between himself and Mr McLeroy: "I believe God created the Heavens and the Earth millions and millions of years ago. I do not believe, as my opponent does, that the Earth is a mere few thousand years old, nor do I believe, as my opponent does, that dinosaurs and mankind lived at the same time." The Texas board may be evolving itself.
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