Major Owens: “I rise in support of the Unsoeld amendment. I do not want to be redundant, but this is not an amendment about values…”

“I rise in support of the Unsoeld amendment. I do not want to be redundant, but this is not an amendment about values, this is an amendment about micromanaging and local control. Monstrous, monumental micromanagement would have to take place in order carry out the Doolittle amendment. The Doolittle amendment invades the prerogatives of the local school boards as very few other amendments have done. Throughout all of our debate on Goals 2000, where the Federal Government seeks to set certain standards in content and curricula and standards in performance, everything has been voluntary, everything has been in terms of, We will state certain models and the States, in the final analysis, will decide what they want to do. Local control in curriculum has not been violated in any of the legislation for education that we have pursued so far. If there are people who really want to have the Federal Government have a greater role in promoting values and preventing teenage pregnancies and providing more positive sex education, then there are many things the Federal Government can do. Madam Chairman, let us be brave enough to take on the media, be brave enough to use the power of the Federal Government through the Federal Communications Commission. The No. 1 problem in America with respect to the values of young people is the influence of the media, television, radio, and motion pictures.”