An Arizona charter high school is under fire for using materials that detail the “benefits of slavery.”
The 5,000 Year Leap and The Making of America, both authored by Cleon Skousen, are reading requirements for 12th graders at Heritage Academy in Mesa, Arizona. Skousen is a conservative author who is best known for his faith based political theories.
Non-profit organization, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, filed a complaint to the state’s school board against Heritage Academy for using books that taught debunked “Christian nation” history. The complaint also described the required reading materials to have “sexist, racist and anti-Semitic messages.”
Garrett Epps, law professor at the University of Baltimore, spoke out against the use of Skousen’s books in the classroom. He described Skousen’s major textbook, ‘The Making of America,’ as a long description of slavery, claiming that the slavery was beneficial to African Americans and that Southern racism was caused by the ‘intrusion’ of northern abolitionists and advocates of equality for the freed slaves.
The schools principal and founder, Earl Taylor, doesn’t think there is anything wrong with using the books.
“Our purpose is not to convert students to different religious views,” Taylor told The Arizona Republic. “It is to show them that religion influenced what the Founders did.”