[Vision2020] Slavery Booklet Used in NC School

[Nick Gier]

School defends slavery booklet
Critic says text is 'window dressing'

By T. KEUNG HUI, Staff Writer, NewsObserver, Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill

Students at one of the area's largest Christian schools are reading a 
controversial booklet that critics say whitewashes Southern slavery with 
its view that slaves lived "a life of plenty, of simple pleasures."
Leaders at Cary Christian School say they are not condoning slavery by 
using "Southern Slavery, As It Was," a booklet that attempts to provide a 
biblical justification for slavery and asserts that slaves weren't treated 
as badly as people think.
Principal Larry Stephenson said the school is only exposing students to 
different ideas, such as how the South justified slavery. He said the 
booklet is used because it is hard to find writings that are both 
sympathetic to the South and explore what the Bible says about slavery.
"You can have two different sides, a Northern perspective and a Southern 
perspective," he said.

The booklet isn't the only connection its two co-authors have with the school.
One of the authors, Douglas Wilson, a pastor in Moscow, Idaho, wrote a book 
on classical education upon which the school bases its philosophy. Wilson's 
Association of Classical and Christian Schools accredited Cary Christian, 
and he is scheduled to speak at the school's graduation in May.
Some school leaders, including Stephenson, founded Christ Church in Cary, 
which is affiliated with Wilson's Idaho church.
The booklet's other author, Steve Wilkins, is a member of the board of 
directors of the Alabama-based League of the South. That is classified as a 
"hate group" by the Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based civil 
rights group.
"Doug Wilson and Steve Wilkins have essentially constructed the ruling 
theology of the neo-Confederate movement," said Mark Potok, editor of the 
Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Report.
Potok said people who argue that the South should secede again have latched 
onto the writings of Wilson and Wilkins, which portray the Confederacy as 
the last true Christian civilization.
At a time when a number of Triangle Christian schools have lost enrollment 
and even closed, Cary Christian has seen rapid growth since it opened in 1996.
The school has 623 students in kindergarten through 12th grade. With a 
relatively low tuition -- up to $5,000 -- it has attracted families from 55 
churches. At least one parent must be a regular attendee of a church.
Classical education
Stephenson said the school's growth is based on parental desire for a 
classical education founded on the basics of phonics, grammar, logic and 
rhetoric. Students read many classics, such as the writings of Plato and 
Socrates.
"As a classical Christian school, we think it's important for our students 
to be able to think and not be slanted to a particular position," 
Stephenson said. "We want them to think for themselves."
Until two years ago, Stephenson said, middle school students also had read 
excerpts from "Southern Slavery." He said the booklet was a counterpoint to 
"Uncle Tom's Cabin," which he said portrayed all Southern whites as 
treating their slaves badly.
Once the Civil War was no longer taught in middle school, Stephenson said, 
Cary Christian stopped using the booklet in those grades.
But the 43-page booklet is still read in its entirety by ninth-graders when 
they study the Civil War. Stephenson said the booklet can help students 
formulate arguments when taking the pro-Southern side in debates.
"A student may be assigned an opinion they may not agree with, so they will 
understand both sides," Stephenson said.
Angela Kennedy, whose daughters have attended Cary Christian since 1996, 
said all the booklet does is help students learn about both sides so that 
they have a basis to form their own opinions. She pointed out that the 
students also read Abraham Lincoln's speeches.
"They really do get both sides of the story," Kennedy said. "In public 
schools, all they get is one side of the story. That's not education. 
That's indoctrination."
Stephenson said the booklet is discussed for two days. Even as they read 
the booklet, he said, students are told slavery was wrong.
"Slavery is wrong," Stephenson said. "That's not debatable about slavery. 
The South was wrong about the slave trade."
Parent's support
Marcus Ranch, who has three daughters at Cary Christian, said he has no 
problem with the school using the booklet. He said it offers an accurate 
portrayal that is overlooked of how many slaves were treated kindly by 
their owners.
"That book is fine," Ranch said. "It does a good job with that particular 
perspective."
But Potok questioned how the school can use a booklet that asserts that 
slavery "was a relationship based upon mutual affection and confidence."
"What these men have written is an apology for slavery," he said. "They're 
putting window dressing on an abhorrent institution."
Potok also blasted the booklet, which was published in 1996, for 
plagiarizing a previous work. The booklet has received criticism from a 
number of historians.
Wilson declined to comment and referred questions to his assistant, Mike 
Lawyer. Lawyer said the booklet has been pulled from publication because of 
faulty footnotes and citation errors.
Lawyer said he thinks few schools use the booklet, which is published by a 
company owned by Wilson's Idaho church.
But Lawyer said the authors stand by their central belief that the Civil 
War didn't have to happen and that slavery would have ended on its own.
"The Southern Poverty Law Center is just trying to make money out of this," 
Lawyer said. "The Southern Poverty Law Center is totally off base to think 
in any way that the book is neo-Confederate."
But the use of the booklet is leaving some area pastors concerned that it 
could promote intolerance.
"If there's any attempt to divide us, it's totally un-Christian," said 
Richard Dial, pastor of Cary Church of God.
Mike Woods, administrator of Wake Christian Academy, said he couldn't see 
his school using "Southern Slavery, As it Was," especially with younger 
students.
"It's so easy for some of them to take something they read and assume 
you're in favor of it," he said.

Staff writer T. Keung Hui can be reached at 829-4534 or khui at newsobserver.com.


"Modern physics has taught us that the nature of any system cannot be 
discovered by dividing it into its component parts and studying each part 
by itself. . . .We must keep our attention fixed on the whole and on the 
interconnection between the parts. The same is true of our intellectual 
life. It is impossible to make a clear cut between science, religion, and 
art. The whole is never equal simply to the sum of its various parts." 
--Max Planck

Nicholas F. Gier
Professor Emeritus, Department of Philosophy, University of Idaho
1037 Colt Rd., Moscow, ID 83843
http://users.moscow.com/ngier/home/index.htm
208-883-3360/882-9212/FAX 885-8950
President, Idaho Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO
www.class.uidaho.edu/ngier/ift/index.htm

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