The Texas Senate has voted to pass a bill which removes the requirement to teach students in public schools that the Ku Klux Klan is “morally wrong.”
The majority Republican Senate passed around a dozen new requirements and rules for public school curriculums, and the KKK requirement was included in Senate Bill 3. It passed the Senate last Friday with an 18-4 Republican vote.
The Bill is set to become law in September and was made as a way to fix the state’s past requirements and education code which were signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
The House Bill consisted of a number of requirements and new methods of teaching about sensitive subjects such as the KKK in public schools. It requires that “historical documents related to the civic accomplishments of marginalized populations” must be taught to public school students. This includes the women’s suffrage movement and equal rights, civil rights and racism, and Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
It also was a requirement to teach about important civil rights leaders and those who have made an impact on discrimination in the nation, such as Cesar Chavez, Susan B. Anthony, and other Native American leaders.
The Bill also included that teachers must teach “the history of white supremacy” including slavery, the Ku Klux Klan, and ways in which the white supremacist hate group was “morally wrong.”
However, in the Senate, these parts promoting the instruction of equality and shedding light on the people and groups who have worked hard to achieve it in America were removed.
“What we’re doing with this bill, we’re saying that specific reading list doesn’t belong in statute,” the bill’s author, Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes.
The new Senate bill is yet to be passed due to the absence of many Democratic Texas lawmakers who travelled to DC to lobby against the many restrictive voting laws the Texas GOP are attempting to implement. The Bill will be sent to the House as soon as they return to be discussed and voted on again. The Democratic party has not stated anything about their decision yet.