At last: parental authority challenges government intruders
By Wes Vernon | May 28, 2012 | Renew America
It has been a century since Woodrow Wilson reportedly opined that young boys should grow up to be as unlike their fathers as possible. Whether he worded it exactly that way, our 28th president surely pursued the goal, both as educator and as politician.
Not that his era was the first to witness a challenge to parents’ prerogative. However, the early 20th century “progressive movement” (of which Wilson was a part) did offer up the most open manifestation of that attitude in American official circles up to that moment in history.
Different versions, same crusade
In our own time, Hillary Clinton has channeled such Wilsonianism into the high-sounding It Takes a Village, which a few years ago became a bestselling book viewed by many as suggesting the “village” (not the parent) as best arbiter of what is best for one’s children.