3/17/2025

Last week’s curation at RealClear’s American Civics portal starts with Shawn Healy's op-ed at The Hechinger Report that argues that civics education needs our support. Healy is the executive director of CivXNow, a coalition of more than 370 institutions across America (which includes RealClear American Civics). He says that this bipartisan coalition agrees on the need to make a “generational investment in teaching students how the government works.” “We agree on a solution that will ensure the Spirit of 1776 forever endures: dedicated instructional time in civics should be the norm for every student throughout grades K-12,” Healy writes. Since the federal government cannot mandate a national curriculum, the solution lies with the states. Illinois, Indiana, and other states have shown the way forward, “strengthening K-12 civics instruction and incentivizing students’ civic development.” Healy says that high schools should mandate a year-long course in civics, “recognize civic excellence by offering ‘civic seals’ to high school graduates,” “require that districts develop and publish K-12 civic learning plans for public scrutiny, and recognize the schools and districts that show exemplary commitments to civic learning.”

At Law & Liberty, Jace Lington reviews Justice Neil Gorsuch’s book, “Over Ruled.” He maintains that Gorsuch and his co-author, Janie Nitze, show unequivocally that “the system the Progressives erected is not equal to the challenges of modern government.” The book details the myriad ways that bureaucracy has triumphed over lawmaking – and, ultimately, the consent of the governed. Citing Hilldale College's Ronald J. Pestritto, Gorsuch and Nitze make the case that the administrative state, the name given to the vast bureaucratic complex that was initiated by word and then deed by Woodrow Wilson, is fundamentally at odds with the structure of government the Constitution lays out. As Gorsuch and Nitze argue, “Prussian bureaucracy does not fit the American character.” They conclude, “Whatever noble intentions might have motivated abandoning the original constitution, the authors’ critique eviscerates the idea that unleashing detached administrators is the best way to establish justice in America.”