Is literacy a civil right? Poor reading skills threaten democracy, individual progress| Opinion

Mirabeau B. Lamar, the second president of the Republic of Texas and remembered as the “Father of Texas Education,” told us that a “cultivated mind is the guardian genius of democracy.”

Kimberly Jenkins Robinson, a nationally recognized scholar on education and the Constitution, observed that “democracy is not a static institution; it is a living system that requires constant nourishment from its citizens.”

Lamar’s words are carved in stone above school doors across Texas, including a local middle school. Half of Texas school students who pass under that inscription cannot read at grade level. For Fort Worth children who attend schools operated by 12 different independent school districts within our city limits, that share is 57%.

According to the U.S. Department of Education’s “Nation’s Report Card,” only one-third of American students are proficient in reading. Millions of Texans and tens of millions of Americans cannot read proficiently, with millions more on that path.

What is the future of our democracy when our guardian’s genius fades, and the nourishment from its citizenry dissipates?

Since the Supreme Court’s historic Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954, the federal courts have wrestled with various versions of the question of whether literacy is a civil right protected by the Constitution.

The question we address is related but different. Regardless of its constitutional status, is illiteracy a threat to democracy? We believe it poses a two-front threat to democracy. It renders citizens incapable of effective participation in self-government and dashes their hopes of living the American dream for themselves or their children.

While stopping short of finding that literacy is a constitutional right, the Supreme Court has affirmed and reaffirmed the critical importance of public education in “maintaining our basic institutions,” with literacy essential and foundational. Drawing excerpts from its opinions, we learn that literacy is vital “for the preservation of a democratic system of government” and necessary “to preserve freedom and independence.”

Why vital? Literacy is essential to the concept of “ordered liberty” and is the “gateway that unlocks the basic exercise of fundamental rights” by our citizens on their behalf and for their children. Political participation is “predicated on literacy.” Second in importance only to the values and education imparted by their immediate family, literacy gives children the tools to participate as full members of American society and in our democracy.

Tyranny was an ever-present fear of our Founders. They warned that a poorly educated citizenry is easy prey for the demagogue and told us that an educated citizenry is the only effective bulwark against tyranny. True then and true now, and perhaps more so today, with the decline in local journalism and the reach and manipulative capabilities of social media and artificial intelligence.

While locking millions of our citizens out of the democratic process, illiteracy also locks millions of Americans into an economic underclass and lives of dependency. It destroys the possibility of the American dream for countless Americans, and for their children. It does not nourish a “living system”; rather, it nurtures cynicism, resentment, and alienation. Illiteracy kills hope, and without hope, the roots of democracy atrophy.

Illiteracy creates a wall separating the powerful from the powerless and the hopeful from the hopeless. The wall is not along our Southern border, but it has a razor’s edge and zigzags through families and communities all across our nation. Illiteracy is a threat to our democracy.

Attend this important event on literacy

Robinson is a distinguished constitutional scholar from the University of Virginia. She will be the keynote speaker at an event hosted by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s Crossroads Lab and other community partners exploring the question, “Is Reading a Civil Right?”

The event will be at 7 p.m. Oct. 8 in the lecture hall at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden. If you’d like to attend, please register for free at star-telegram.com/readingisaright, as seating is limited.

This story was originally published September 27, 2024 at 5:28 AM.