Preemptive Education: Lynne Cheney's America: A Patriotic Primer and the Ends of History

If children's picture books have received something of a surge of media attention in the past few years, this may be in part because celebrities have become especially eager to write them. Lately, bookstore display shelves have been as likely to exhibit the recent efforts of Jay Leno or Katie Couric as they have the works of Ian Falconer or David Wiesner, and pop-stars like Madonna top not only Billboard charts but the New York Times children's bestseller list as well. While a few celebrity-authored children's books such as Jamie Lee Curtis's Where Do Balloons Go? and John Lithgow's I'm a Manatee have received critical acclaim for their inventiveness and wit¹, most have gained public attention simply by virtue of their authors' status as easily recognizable public figures. Indeed, the cult of celebrity personality, as well as the apparent compulsion many luminaries feel to reinvent or otherwise massage their bankable images, no doubt has driven the hype behind Madonna's five contributions to children's literature—which, as reviewers were fond of mentioning, the pop diva published approximately a decade after having produced a book of photographs deemed so inappropriate for young eyes that it had to be wrapped in cellophane.² Moreover, the production of a children's picture book has become something of an alibi for public figures accused of behaving badly. For example, in 2004 attorneys representing John Gotti argued for the notorious mobster's release on bail by insisting that he "now prefers writing children's books to extortion and racketeering" (MacPherson para. 5).

While the long and steadily growing list of celebrity children's authors is mostly composed of Hollywood actors and singers (and the occasional racketeer), it also includes a number of former political figures, including former New York mayors Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch, Democratic strategist James Carville, and former president Jimmy Carter.³ Perhaps the most prolific of these politicians-turned-children's authors is Lynne Cheney. Cheney first became a household name in 1994, when she vigorously condemned a proposed set of educational history standards whose production she had earlier advocated during her term as chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities; these standards, she contested, demonstrated the hijacking of "traditional" modes of historical pedagogy by "politically correct" and partisan "special interests" ("The End of History" A22). Even after the much-publicized national history standards debate ended, Cheney carried on her strenuous campaign against multiculturalism, feminism, and postmodernism—discourses she believed were tearing at the very fiber of American culture—and her outspokenness swiftly earned her the reputation as a key player in the culture wars of the 1990s. While Cheney briefly disappeared from the public spotlight during her husband's bid for (and ultimate acquisition of) the vice presidency in 2000, she resumed her battle against the allegedly liberal agenda of American schools and universities shortly after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. In an oft-cited October 2001 speech given to the Dallas Institute of the Humanities and Culture, she urged American educators to suspend curricula favoring multiculturalism and "internationalism" in favor of nativist American historical pedagogical discourses ("Teaching Our Children" 2). Cheney's renewed plea for traditional historical pedagogy was lauded by conservative organizations such as the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, which cited her Dallas speech in its proposal for greater oversight of university liberal arts programs; likewise, it was equally condemned by scholars who perceived it as a bitter challenge to academic freedom.⁴

Shortly after having given her Dallas speech, Cheney turned to another project: the publication of a series of children's books on the topic of United States history. Curiously, the publication of her first children's book, a picture book entitled America: A Patriotic Primer (2000), won critical attention not so much for its content as for the evidence it provided for Cheney's ostensible abdication of her central role in the culture wars. Reviewers, perhaps jaded by the growing trend of celebrity-authored children's books, seemed all too...