A modest proposal: Teach American exceptionalism again

As North Carolina students return to school for the fall semester of 2026, the General Assembly faces a constitutional duty it can no longer ignore.

North Carolina’s Constitution is clear and demanding. Article IX, Section 2 places the duty on the General Assembly: it “shall provide by taxation and otherwise for a general and uniform system of free public schools.” No other institution — not local school boards, not the Department of Public Instruction, not the federal Department of Education — bears that ultimate constitutional responsibility. Education in this state rests on the shoulders of the legislature.

We hear legitimate complaints about the system: Public education consumes a disproportionate share of the state budget, yet too much of that money flows into administrative layers rather than classrooms and teacher pay.

Parents and legislators ask how we can improve early reading for North Carolina students. These concerns matter.

As the debate over education rages, a recent billboard campaign declared: if you want better schools, “pay the daggum teachers.”

And to the billboard’s point, many hardworking teachers are underpaid and underappreciated, and that must change.

But this begs a larger question: Even if teachers became our highest-paid professionals, if the system tolerated an educational environment that directly or subtly promotes anti-Americanism or glorifies systems and ideas at war with traditional American values and American exceptionalism, then what have we accomplished? If our teaching and philosophies make kids think it’s cool to elect socialists, or that communism is an economic theory with egalitarian aims for all, then what difference does teacher salary make?

All this underscores a deeper problem that the General Assembly alone has the power — and the duty — to confront.

Over the last two to three generations, and since the creation of the federal Department of Education, the philosophy taught in American schools has drifted in the wrong direction. Curricula, public and private, have often replaced the transmission of a shared national inheritance with subtle or open anti-American conditioning, globalist pluralism, and moral relativism. We no longer teach that some systems of government are good and others are evil. We no longer insist that communism and Nazism are evil, that socialism leads to tyranny, or that radical theocratic systems demanding submission or death are dangerous and reprehensible. The result: a generation unable to distinguish light from darkness.

The General Assembly has the authority to reverse this. It can, and should, mandate a core curriculum that restores clarity.

The General Assembly has already begun this work. State law now requires a full-credit high school course — Founding Principles of the United States of America and North Carolina: Civic Literacy — as a condition of graduation. Recent legislation also barred public schools from promoting so-called DEI and divisive concepts and directed instruction toward merit and American exceptionalism rather than equity and grievance. Those steps matter. They do not finish the job.

Florida has already taken a step forward. Under Gov. Ron DeSantis, the Florida Legislature required statewide civics instruction grounded in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Federalist Papers; and required a comparative teaching of ideologies that conflict with America’s founding principles, including communism and totalitarianism. In 2024, DeSantis signed a further law directing public schools to teach the history of communism and the atrocities committed under communist regimes. The State Board of Education approved those standards in 2025; they are headed to Florida classrooms in the 2026–27 school year.

Now is the time for North Carolina to take that same step — and go even further.

First, students must understand that the United States is a constitutional republic, not a pure democracy, and the stark difference must be underscored. From elementary school through high school, every North Carolina student should achieve real mastery of the United States Constitution and the Federalist Papers. They must understand that our system rests upon limited, enumerated powers and maximum individual freedom. The Constitution alongside the Federalist Papers, with a mandated focus on original intent interpretation, should be taught every year from K through 12, with a mastery of original-intent constitutional understanding a prerequisite to high school graduation.

Second, we must teach American exceptionalism without apology. The American experiment has been the greatest governmental achievement in human history. Throughout human history, there has never been a close second to the United States of America. That is not imperial chauvinism, but rather a historical fact. 

Third, the Judeo-Christian foundations of the nation should be taught as historical reality. On the evening of D-Day, June 6, 1944, Franklin Roosevelt prayed over our forces that were embarking upon “a mighty endeavor… to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization.” Those three words were not empty words in describing who we are: (1) A Constitutional Republic, (2) built upon a Judeo-Christian foundation,  and (3) a defender of Western civilization. FDR’s words described the civilizational stakes resting at the time upon the soldiers of the United States military.  Now, that same battle has moved into the battlefield of academia, and it is a battle that we must win.

Fourth, regarding economics, students must be taught that free-market capitalism is the supreme economic system for widespread economic prosperity. Honest historians cannot dispute the record of prosperity, innovation, and rising living standards under free-market systems. “Free to Choose,” by Milton and Rose Friedman, must become mandated reading and mastery. Teach students that millions flee communism and rush to America — and it’s not the other way around.

Finally, the General Assembly should require that students be taught the moral difference between good and evil systems of government. Communism, socialism, Nazism, and radical Shariaism are not merely “different.” They epitomize evil. They have produced rivers of blood and mountains of corpses. Our children deserve to know the truth without naive euphemism.

Ronald Reagan spoke of America as “a shining city on a hill.” North Carolina can become that city again, and by doing so can light the way for other states. The General Assembly, through our schools, can put North Carolina front-and-center in the lead in restoring American greatness. They already holds the constitutional power to let North Carolina’s future generations shine. The sole question is whether it will use it.

The North Carolina General Assembly has the power to restore a love for freedom and American exceptionalism to our public schools.

The time to act is now.

Don Brown is a former Navy Judge Advocate who served at the Pentagon, best-selling author, former special assistant United States attorney and ran as a Republican candidate for the United States Senate from North Carolina.