Texas district may rename schools named for Franklin, Jefferson over Confederacy ties – By Douglas Ernst (The Washington Times)/Sept 18 2017
Ben Franklin’s face graces U.S. currency and was a Founding-era abolitionist, but some officials in Texas may soon remove his name from one middle school over a “connection to Confederacy.”
Dallas Independent School District is conducting an investigation into numerous schools in the wake of a national debate over monuments and historical figures associated with slavery. The move, which may also affect Thomas Jefferson High School, comes one month after a monument protest in Charlottesville, Viriginia, ended in the death of 32-year-old Heather Heyer.
“This was just a very quick review of looking at the biographies of the individuals,” DISD chief of school leadership Stephanie Elizalde recently told trustees, The Dallas Morning News reported Sunday. “And if there was any association with Confederacy — not making a judgment for or against — just if we saw Confederacy named in it, we then highlighted it. We are now in the process of doing a second [look].”
Trustee Dustin Marshall objected to the idea that a school named after Franklin — a key Founding Father who signed the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution — somehow warrants concern.
“I will not support a name change for Franklin since Benjamin Franklin clearly had many accomplishments that form the basis for why the school was named after him,” Mr. Marshall said Saturday on Facebook, the newspaper reported. “I don’t believe this school was named after Franklin to send a signal of oppression and control.”
Franklin died in 1790 and Jefferson in 1826, both decades before the South seceded.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/sep/18/texas-school-district-may-rename-schools-honoring-/
PB/TK – Some genius in Texas decided they needed to check to see if there’s a link between Thomas Jefferson or Ben Franklin to the Confederacy even though they are decades apart…. Well that explains why Texas is ranks 42 out of 50 in the Most Educated States reviews
