Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves Monday signed a new law that allegedly prohibits critical race theory in public learning institutions throughout the state.
It calls for school districts, charter schools and community/junior colleges not to “compel students to affirm that any sex, race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin is inherently superior,” that individuals shouldn’t be treated poorly for those characteristics, and that no course of instruction should be taught “that affirms such principles.”
Bill language also requires that “no distinction or classification be made on account of race “other than the required collection or reporting of demographic information,” and that funds can not be spent in violation of the act.
Christopher F. Rufo of City Journal said in a tweet that Mississippi is the 14th state to pass anti-critical race theory legislation.
Although a description of the bill on the Mississippi legislature wesbite reads “Critical Race Theory; prohibit,” there is no mention of critical race theory in the actual law.
Critical Race Theory is defined as an “intellectual and social movement and loosely organized framework of legal analysis based on the premise that race is not a natural, biologically grounded feature of physically distinct subgroups of human beings but a socially constructed (culturally invented) category that is used to oppress and exploit people of [color].”
Scholars who study the theory apply it systemic racism found within U.S. institutions and it does not posit that any race is inherently superior to another.
“I’m going to have to teach all of my undergraduate and law students the main points of #CRT so that they understand what the bill is about and how what I teach them does not in fact run afoul of the bill,” said University of Mississippi School of Law Professor Yvette Butler in a tweet.
However, Reeves is still associating the bill and the theory.
“In too many schools around the US, CRT is running amok,” said Reeves in a tweet. “It threatens the integrity of education & aims only to humiliate and indoctrinate.”
Discussion of critical race theory heated up during the 2021 Virginia gubernatorial race and many conservatives have been vocally opposed to it.
By October of last year, the National School Boards Association reported that “boards have been confronted in recent months by members of the public and the press asking about critical race theory (CRT) and public schools.”
According to an NBC News report from July 2021, a survey found that K-12 schools do not require or push critical race theory. The theory is not taught in Mississippi’s K-12 schools, according to the Mississippi Free Press.
Criticalrace.org, an organization that tracks critical race theory instruction, said it has “researched and documented critical Race Training in close to 400 colleges and universities in the United States.”
“Why is SB 2113 such a big deal? The bill is broad, vague and allows the State to strip funding from schools for violating it,” said Butler, the UM Law School professor.
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