I don't know how many times I have said that our elected officials probably could not pass the type of Constitution or Civics test required of regular folks who graduate HS or local community colleges - now I have some data to back me up.
According to the following article written by Richard Brake for AOL News, the average elected official is less knowledgeable about the Constitution -- that many take an oath to uphold -- than the average citizen.
Accoridng to the article Mr. Brake is co-chairman of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute's National Civic Literacy Board.
Embedded in the article is a sample of the test questions. I scored 100%, which makes me smarter than the average politician, which is apparently not saying much.
Score one for the Tea Party, who pushed for the reading of the Constitution in the House earlier this week and who also brought in Supreme Court justices from both ends of the political spectrum (Scalia and Kennedy, I believe) to educate the representatives in Constitutional issues.
Some in Congress decried the moves as cheap political stunts. Apparently it was entirely necessary remedial work.
from AOL News:
Elected Officials Flunk Constitution Quiz
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/14/opinion-who-are-the-constitutional-illiterates/?a_dgi=aolshare_twitter#position1
For five years now, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute has been conducting a national survey to gauge the quality of civic education in the country. We've surveyed more than 30,000 Americans, most of them college students, but also a random sample of adults from all educational and demographic backgrounds.
Included in the adult sample was a small subset of Americans (165 in all) who, when asked, identified themselves as having been "successfully elected to government office at least once in their life" -- which can include federal, state or local offices.
The survey asks 33 basic civics questions, many taken from other nationally recognized instruments like the U.S. Citizenship Exam. It also asks 10 questions related to the U.S. Constitution.
Elected officials at many levels of government, not just the federal government, swear an oath to "uphold and protect" the U.S. Constitution.
But those elected officials who took the test scored an average 5 percentage points lower than the national average (49 percent vs. 54 percent), with ordinary citizens outscoring these elected officials on each constitutional question.
Examples:
Only 49 percent of elected officials could name all three branches of government, compared with 50 percent of the general public.
Only 46 percent knew that Congress, not the president, has the power to declare war -- 54 percent of the general public knows that.
Just 15 percent answered correctly that the phrase "wall of separation" appears in Thomas Jefferson's letters -- not in the U.S. Constitution -- compared with 19 percent of the general public.
And only 57 percent of those who've held elective office know what the Electoral College does, while 66 percent of the public got that answer right. (Of elected officials, 20 percent thought the Electoral College was a school for "training those aspiring for higher political office.")
Overall, our sample of elected officials averaged a failing 44 percent on the entire 33-question test, 5 percentage points lower than the national average of 49 percent.
The fact that our elected representatives know even less about America's history and institutions than the typical citizen (who doesn't know much either) is troubling indeed, but perhaps helps explain the lack of constitutional discipline often displayed by our political class at every level of our system.
Given this dismal performance, it would seem that last week's House reading of the Constitution shouldn't be described "presumptuous and self-righteous," but as a necessary national tutorial for all elected officials.
When elected officials take an oath "to protect and defend the Constitution," shouldn't they know what they are swearing to?
AMEN TO THAT, BROTHER. YOU'RE PREACHING TO THE CHOIR
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