Debate heats up over God Reference in Textbooks

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- The state's largest teacher group is taking aim at an amended bill that would require references to God in public school science textbooks. <br><br>"I think it has more to do

Friday, April 7th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- The state's largest teacher group is taking aim at an amended bill that would require references to God in public school science textbooks.

"I think it has more to do with politics than it has to do with instruction or religion," Carolyn Crowder, president of the Oklahoma Education Association, said Thursday.

The language that textbooks "include acknowledgment that human life was created by one God of the universe" was tacked on toSenate Bill 1139 during House debate Wednesday at the urging of Rep. Jim Reese, R-Nardin.

The amended bill is bound for a House-Senate conference committee, where the teacher's group and others will likely work to remove the language.

Another amendment empowers the state textbook committee, which approves all public school texts, to add a one-page disclaimer, review or summary in science books.

The textbook committee attempted to require publishers to put a disclaimer in science textbooks that evolution is a "controversial theory," but state Attorney General Drew Edmondson ruled that the committee lacked authority.

The Oklahoma Education Association also opposes the second amendment.

"We are against using a clearly established policy that's both constitutional and statutory when it comes to the textbook committee," Crowder said.

Gov. Frank Keating supported the textbook committee's disclaimer mandate.

But the governor's press secretary, John Cox, said Keating hasn't decided how he feels about the House amendments. Instead, Keating will wait on a final version of the bill.

But the Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a self-described religious liberties watchdog, warned that the Oklahoma Legislature is inviting a lawsuit.

"This legislation is outrageous and unconstitutional," said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. "This is America not Iran. Our legislators are not supposed to be judges of religious truth."

The U.S. Supreme Court in 1984 struck down a Louisiana law requiring equal classroom devotion to creationism and evolution.

Although there has been a philosophical shift in the court in the past 16 years, justices would probably still take a dim view of a mandate that touches on religion in the classroom, said John Whitehead, president and founder of the Rutherford Institute.

"They are going to have a problem with that one," said Whitehead, whose organization defends religious liberties, including what Whitehead considers teachers' rights to at least talk about alternative beliefs to evolution.

The debate over evolution and creationism is an example of another political fight that could be avoided with school choice, said Darcy Olsen, director of education at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington.

"There's no reason a politician should be deciding whether somebody's son or daughter gets taught about creationism or doesn't," said Olsen, who favors a system using a universal tuition tax credit.

The credit would allow parents to choose schools like people are free to spend grants at the colleges of their choice.

However, other organizations, including the National Education Association, say using tax funds for school choice deprives public education of needed funding.