We’ve been hearing a lot lately about how stupendously ignorant most Americans are about science: one in five Americans thinks the sun revolves around the Earth, for example, and almost half of us believe the Earth itself is less than 10,000 years old. But utter benightedness about basic science isn’t nearly enough, as it turns out — we are Americans, after all, and it won’t do simply to be massively ignorant about one or two subjects. As in everything else, we are determined to lead the world in empty-headedness too, it seems, and where better to start than by knowing absolutely nothing at all about America itself?
Recently the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs commisioned a survey to see how much the state’s high-school students knew about elementary civics. They sampled 1,000 students, and asked them 10 questions chosen at random from the test given to applicants for U.S. citizenship.
Here are the questions, with correct answers in parentheses:
1. What is the supreme law of the land? (The Constitution.)
2. What do we call the first ten amendments to the Constitution? (The Bill of Rights.)
3. What are the two parts of the U.S. Congress? (The Senate and the House of Representatives.)
4. How many Justices are on the Supreme Court? (Nine.)
5. Who wrote the Declaration of Independence? (Thomas Jefferson.)
6. What ocean is on the east coast of the United States? (The Atlantic.)
7. What are the two major political parties in the United States? (Democratic and Republican.)
8. We elect a U.S. Senator for how many years? (Six.)
9. Who was the first President of the United States? (George Washington.)
10. Who is in charge of the Executive Branch? (The President.)
To pass the U.S. citizenship test, an applicant must get six out of ten right. 92.4 percent of applicants pass on the first try. So how many Oklahoma high-school students got six or more right?
Are you sitting down?
2.8 percent. As the OCPA report said when it named this staggeringly, knee-bucklingly dismal figure, “this is not a misprint.” 2.2 percent got six right, and 0.6 percent got seven. Nobody got eight, or nine, or ten.
These, friends, are the next generation of American voters, heirs to the visionary greatness of Athens and the genius of the Founding Fathers — the ones who, as they take their rightful place as full participants in our glorious Western democratic experiment, will go on to shape the future of U.S. policy foreign and domestic.
The obvious conclusion: we are doomed. You can read all about it here.
8 Comments
But haven’t American citizens always performed poorly on the citizenship test? I thought that was a running gag.
Granted, 2.8 percent is a bit harsh, but still… it doesn’t surprise me all that much.
It appears the Republican Party should do mighty well in Oklahoma.
Should do well in my state too.
Probably the best argument I’ve heard for allowing lots of immigrants to live here.
Sure, Pete. In fact, why don’t we all just drop dead, and leave ’em the keys?
Yikes!?!
– M
I beg to differ: the more mystical a regard Americans have for their system (e.g., the less they understand it), the more powerful it grows. The religion of America is America. We’re not unlike the Romans in that respect.
And lest these results concern you too much, Malcolm, let me reassure you that however OK the kids in Oklahoma aren’t, the kids in at least 2 Asian countries I know of are even less so. Sure, an elite slice of them score very well on science and math tests. But I can assure you they are even less proficient when it comes to thinking on their own.
Thanks, Court. In other words: “Ignorance is Strength”.
Cheered me right up.
Hey, I do what I can.