Banning Books

BANNING BOOKS -- (House of Representatives - June 09, 2005)

(Mr. PITTS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, a 10-year-old Knoxville, Tennessee child, Luke Whitson, and some of his friends chose to read the Bible to each other during recesses instead of playing on the jungle gym or kickball. Luke's principal was not amused. She put a stop on this terrible practice at once and told the students not to bring their Bibles to school again.

Now, we expect principals to protect kids from bullying and ensure a healthy learning environment. We do not expect them to dictate issues of faith or, worse, mandate a faith-free environment. However, this principal is a ground soldier in a national campaign to remove faith, even voluntary expressions of it, from publicly funded programs and facilities.

School children, all people, should have the right to read freely in their own free time, whether it is during recess at school or in the break room during lunch at work.

Our government buys and provides copies of the Koran and prayer rugs to terrorist prisoners at Gitmo. We expect our soldiers to honor a terrorist's right to worship freely, but will we stand for the right of an American child to do so as well? Sounds like somebody is paranoid.

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