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An Email Exchange with Jorge Amselle
Webmaster's note: Jorge Amselle is vice-president for education of the Center for Equal Opportunity, a Washington-based advocacy group that opposes affirmative action and multiculturalism. CEO is headed by Linda Chavez, neoconservative pundit and former president of U.S. English. Its advisory board includes Ron Unz and Christine Rossell. Mr. Amselle's messages are reprinted here verbatim, without editing even to correct typographical errors.
To: Jwcrawford@compuserve.com Dear Mr. Crawford, I recently had the opportunity to read a transcript of your June 26 speech in Miami to the National Association of Hispanic Journalists regarding the media coverage of the Proposition 227 campaign in California. I felt compelled to write to you regarding several inaccurate comments you made. You freely attacked Alice Callaghan and her motives and even accused her of threatening Hispanic parents. This is grossly irresponsible. Had you bothered to meet with Ms. Callaghan you would have realized that she does speak Spanish (contrary to your claims) and that she is completely committed to the Hispanic community. She has dedicated her life to working in this community and helping people and for you to attack her in such a way is truly vile. Your claim that no parents have complained to the California Department of Education about the inability to remove their children from bilingual programs is simply false. I have personally assisted several Hispanic parents to file official complaints against schools which do not notify parents that their children were placed in bilingual classrooms or allow them to opt out of bilingual education. Finally it is irresponsible of you to keep claiming that Prop. 227 "eliminat[es] parents' right to choose bilingual programs" when you know very well it specifically allows parents this right. I found it interesting that you felt qualified to criticize the media on their very fair coverage of this issue. I am glad to you decided to end your career as a journalist. You make a much better novelist. Jorge Amselle To: Center for Equal Opportunity <comment@ceousa.org> Dear Mr. Amselle, Although the Internet has done a lot to facilitate the exchange of insults among strangers, I see no point in responding to you in kind. Instead, I will try to answer your charges on their merits. You argue that it's "grossly irresponsible" and "truly vile" of me to question the motives of Alice Callaghan, a person who "has dedicated her life to working in [the Latino] community." Why should this be so? You fail to explain why such criticism should be off-limits. Whatever else Ms. Callaghan may be, she is a political activist who does not hesitate to get down and dirty with her opponents. She and Ron Unz have repeatedly condemned bilingual educators as motivated by greed, self-interest, and politics rather than a genuine concern for children. Indeed, so have you. While such charges were irrelevant to the pedagogical issues surrounding Prop. 227, they were effective in evoking stereotypes – for example, when bilingual education was dismissed as "a jobs and political patronage program" (your own words, Los Angeles Daily News, Feb. 24, 1998). Belittling language-minority educators may have seemed like a good way to win votes at the time. No doubt it appealed to an element of the electorate that resents and distrusts this group. But it's a strange way to show "dedication" to the Latino community. You say that if I "had bothered to meet with Ms. Callaghan," I would have recognized both her Spanish skills and her "commitment" to helping Latinos. My information on her language proficiency comes from sources who have observed her in action among children and describe her Spanish as extremely limited. Although she and I have never met face-to-face, we did speak by phone last spring. She struck me as someone who is supremely committed to her own opinions, even when it comes to a subject she knows little about. When I asked her to describe the program that Prop. 227 would mandate by law, she had trouble explaining "sheltered English immersion" except to say, "It's the way every other country in the world does it – like ESL pullout." Alice Callaghan may well be sincere in her ideas about what's best for Latinos. I have no way to judge. What troubles me is her determination to impose those ideas regardless of what Latinos themselves might choose. You criticize me for reporting that some parents felt pressured to participate in the Ninth Street School boycott, believing they would otherwise lose the free daycare. As I made clear, I have not confirmed that Ms. Callaghan made any explicit threat along these lines. Nevertheless, she had to understand that these immigrants might harbor such fears, given the power she exercises over their lives. Parents who depended on Ms. Callaghan's center were not reassured that they had any real choice in the matter when she urged them to participate in the boycott and to remove their children from bilingual education. Some told school staff that they did so against their better judgment, according to documentary evidence I was shown. You insist that it's "irresponsible" of me to describe Prop. 227 as an attack on parental choice "when you know very well it specifically allows parents this right." It is true that the initiative allows parents to seek "waivers" from English-only instruction. Yet it also erects one obstacle after another to frustrate parents who would choose bilingual education. Which explains why Ron Unz says his intent was to "eliminate" 97 or 98 percent of such programs. Now that some districts are testing the limits of Prop. 227 by granting large numbers of "special needs" waivers, Unz and his allies are threatening to sue. For the record, Alice Callaghan opposed any concession whatsoever to parents' rights: "To be honest, I didn't want a waiver process in there at all" (San Diego Union-Tribune, May 31, 1998). It amazes me that so many conservatives – including your boss, Linda Chavez – claim to support parental choice on the one hand and the elimination of bilingual education on the other. In effect, they advocate choice for everyone but the parents of limited-English-proficient students. Pardon me, but some people might see racism in that. Certainly it's disingenuous for your so-called Center for Equal Opportunity to pretend to represent Latinos' civil rights. I refer to your recent lawsuit against the Albuquerque Public Schools (in which a $10,000 payoff was promised to recruit parent-plaintiffs, suggesting how little grassroots support you have). CEO is not merely demanding English-only instruction – an option that's already available at parents' request. It is also seeking "an order requiring [Albuquerque schools] to cease from offering native language academic instruction." That is, your group is suing to outlaw choice. I am not making this up! It's right there in the legal brief posted on the CEO web site. You say it is "simply false" of me "to claim that no parents have complained to the California Department of Education about the inability to remove their children from bilingual programs," adding that you "have personally assisted several Hispanic parents" in initiating such actions. I checked back with Norm Gold, manager of the CDE's Language Proficiency and Academic Accountability Unit, which is charged with investigating such matters. He reiterated that his office has no record of "any written complaint coming to the CDE over the last ten years alleging that a school or district did not respect the right of parents to withdraw from bilingual instruction." (So I have to wonder what you are referring to. If you still insist that you were "personally" involved in filing such complaints with the CDE, I would be curious to see the names of complainants, dates, and school districts involved.) Not that it would surprise me if there were isolated instances where children were assigned to bilingual classrooms against their parents' wishes. Schools are hardly perfect institutions, after all. My point is that no one has shown this to be a major problem. And even if it were, there's no logical connection between a bureaucratic snafu and the merits of bilingual education. This merely serves as fodder for demagogues. Finally, I am gratified by at least one statement in your message. You praise the news media's "very fair coverage of this issue." Nothing could make me feel more vindicated in my own criticisms of the press. James Crawford To: James Crawford <JWCRAWFORD@compuserve.com> Do I really have to expalin that Alice Callaghan is a Godly woman who has dedicated herself to helping the most disadvantaged out of a deeply held religious beliefs and not politics? Are you really comparing her to bilingual teachers who earn more than other teachers and far more than the average parent of any of their students? Your own intergrity on this subject is highly suspect. You accused Alice of speaking "no Spanish" and by your own admission you knew this was a lie. I still feel that it was completely unethical to repeat a claim of arm twisting by Ms. Callaghan (which you did) despite a complete lack of evidence (other than your own biased speculation). If you have any morals left I hope that you will stop repeating this inuendo. Our disagreements of the validity or intent of the waivers of 227 is irrelevant and does not address my criticism of you. The fact remains that you deliberately failed to mention them in your speech, thus misleading the audience. Regarding our Albuquerque lawsuit. We are seeking to elimiate native-language academic instruction (and thus bilingual education) because these programs are by design segregated and illegal. I am sure many white parents in the south would have preferred to choose segregated classrooms for their children but that doesn't mean they should get them. Nothing in our lawsuit would prevent dual language bilingual programs as long as they are opt in rather than opt out. Many of the parents we represent also want "real bilingual education" meaning they want the schools to teach Spanish as a subject as an optional program for all children. Finally we did not offer anyone a $10,000 payoff. One of the community activists we were working with distributed a flier at one school without our knowledge. As soon as we bacame aware of this we informed her that it was inapropriate. We are representing 40 students and have turned down many others who have wanted to join the lawsuit because of time and resource considerations. We are representing more parents and children that are the intervenors. I am sure that you will continue spreading this false story but at least next time you repeat it you will know that you are lying. The parents who complained were in Salinas California. I checked my files and although I remember filing the complaint with CDE I only have copies of the ones we filed with the district and OCR, so I could be mistaken. If you think these incidents are isolated I suggest the following exercise. Next time you speak with a teacher or administrator ask them what happens if a parents want out of BiEd. My experience is that most of the time teachers and principals talk (harass) parents out of this decision. About half the time parents are given the choice of placing their children in ESL classes instead and the other half the choice is bilingual ed or nothing. Even when removal does occur parents are often forced to wait to the end of the semester or school year. Is this what you consider choice? Jorge Amselle To: Center for Equal Opportunity <comment@ceousa.org> Well, this is starting to get interesting. You present yourself as (1) an advocate of choice when parents want English-only instruction for their children and (2) an opponent of choice when parents want bilingual education. Obviously there's a contradiction here that you find embarrassing. So you try to justify it by claiming that "these [bilingual] programs are by design segregated and illegal." And you impugn the motives of parents who prefer bilingual education as a way to meet their children's language needs, comparing them – in a truly amazing analogy – to white racists "in the south [who] would have preferred to choose segregated classrooms." Fortunately, no federal or state court has ever endorsed this view. That's why CEO is now suing the Albuquerque Public Schools. It is asking a judge to declare bilingual education illegal, to eliminate an option that language minorities now enjoy. In short, you hope to impose your own views by law. To me this suggests you are unable to recruit many parents to your cause through persuasion. So you must resort to coercion. Or bribery. Whether or not CEO directly sponsored the leaflet promising $10,000 to parents who signed up as plaintiffs, the fact remains: your lawsuit seeks huge monetary damages – $140,000 for the seven or eight families involved (again, I'm quoting from your web site). This strikes me as rather ironic from a group that accuses bilingual educators of acting out of narrow self-interest. If the Albuquerque case is truly about parents obtaining English-only instruction for their kids, why is the financial payoff necessary? Why not simply seek guarantees that their right to choose will be respected (if indeed it is being denied)? Why is it necessary to outlaw bilingual approaches for all, regardless of what other parents might prefer? Aren't you simply using the Hispanic-surnamed plaintiffs as window-dressing, to pretend that CEO represents the views of language minorities while pursuing your own political agenda? I have a different conception of the right to choose. I believe it means giving parents information and then allowing them to make their own decisions. Certainly, teachers and principals should not "harass" parents or resist their requests for English-only programs. But school officials also have an obligation to explain the educational alternatives and the rationales behind them. Otherwise parents may not be in a position to make an informed decision. They may be misled by activists spreading false claims. This is what happened at the Ninth Street School, where the "Godly" Alice Callaghan launched her jihad against bilingual education. (By the way, I disagree that membership in the clergy should immunize Ms. Callaghan from criticism for her political acts any more than it should immunize Jerry Falwell or the Ayatollah Khomeini.) Quite simply, she took advantage of a captive audience: a group of immigrant garment workers who depended on her center to provide daycare for their children.
I believe that, whether or not she made the explicit threats that some perceived, Ms. Callaghan exercised undue influence, acting as an ideological zealot rather than a servant of parents' interests. Her overriding goal seems to have been to generate bad press for bilingual education. In this she succeeded. Many journalists allowed themselves to be manipulated, failing to investigate and report the whole story of the Ninth Street boycott. The result was to perpetuate a myth that misled the public and contributed to passage of Prop. 227. I base these conclusions not on "speculation" or "innuendo" or some absence of "morals," as you suggest, but on firsthand sources that I find credible. I belabor the issue not out of any personal animus. Rather, I think it's important to publicize how Ms. Callaghan's tactics exploit and abuse and disrespect the constituency she claims to represent. Like you and your cohorts at CEO, she waves the banner of parental choice while assaulting the right to choose bilingual education. Just this week the Associated Press quotes her as threatening that "school districts like Los Angeles are going to have to be taken to court" unless they stop granting parental waivers of Prop. 227. Ms. Callaghan seems to agree with you that language-minority parents can't be trusted to decide for themselves what's best for their kids. Ultimately, I believe, the public will come to see the hypocrisy and arrogance of this position. James Crawford
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