Battleground: One Mother's Crusade, the Religious Right, and the Struggle for Control of Our Classrooms
In fundamentalist Hawkins County, Tennessee, the "Scopes II" textbook trial made national headlines as conservative parents, spearheaded by alarmed mother Vicki Frost, fought to ban reading materials which they deemed anti-Christian or harmful to their children. In this investigative report based on interviews with participants and on court records, Bates ( If No News, Send Rumors ) delivers a centrist analysis of the case which will irk liberals and supply ammunition across the political spectrum. "Scopes II" (named after the famous 1925 "monkey trial" over the teaching of Darwin's theory of evolution) climaxed in 1986 with a decision that parents could opt out of a public school reading program by teaching their children at home. But an appeals court reversed the ruling. Critical of the reversal, Bates suggests that schools, as part of a pluralistic society, should in certain situations accommodate parents' religious objections to the curriculum. Faulting Concerned Women for America, a fundamentalist pressure group that supported the parents, and its arch-rival, People for the American Way, Bates finds both outfits divisive and inflexible. Photos.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.