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 ormer
Education Secretary and Drug Czar William J. Bennett is director,
with Jack Kemp, of Empower America.
Empower America has just released The Index of Leading Cultural
Indicators 2001, which can be read in full on the website www.empower.org.
Kathryn Jean Lopez: Why a new Index
now?
William J. Bennett: The Index
has always been one of the most popular projects I've done. We receive
about five to ten phone calls a week requesting a copy. I thought
it would be a good idea to post the Index on the Internet,
so that almost everyone could have immediate access to it. We last
released the Index in the fall of 1999, so it was worthwhile
to incorporate new data wherever possible in preparing the Internet
version.
Lopez: As you note in your introduction,
some of the most disturbing trends — regarding the breakdown
of the family — are just as bad now as they were in 1990. Sure,
there are limits to what politicians can address, as you say, but
any flunky student of Aristotle knows that the family unit is fundamental.
What does this say about us?
Bennett: That we've forgotten many
of the most important truths about the human condition and have
set off on a path into uncharted waters. But make no mistake: While
some people have actively worked to destroy the family unit as we
know it, there are many who are uncomfortable with a lot of the
changes that have occurred. Unfortunately, they are even more uncomfortable
taking steps to fight those changes. There's a soft relativism,
I think, about these matters. As one writer pointed out during the
impeachment scandal, sex has become a judgment-free zone. And unless
we are willing to make judgments about marriage and the family,
we will continue to see the sort of family breakdown that has occurred
in the past 40 years.
Lopez: How has Bush done so far on
these issues? Is his rhetoric up to snuff on the more civilization-altering
questions?
Bennett: President Bush, simply by
ending the Clinton-Gore years, is a step in the right direction.
He has a gifted speechwriting team, so it's not a question of rhetoric.
It's a question of whether he'll put the necessary emphasis on these
cultural problems. When he was governor, he showed a lot of attention
to these issues. My wife, for example, went and spoke at a conference
he held on abstinence education. The most important thing he could
do, as president, would be to give a speech about the importance
— public and private — of marriage and the family. To
remind us that, for example, children whose parents divorce are
two and a half times more likely to drop out of high school than
children whose parents remain married.
Lopez: Is John DiIulio's office a solution?
Bennett: The office in itself is not
a solution. But if they choose to sponsor the right kind of groups,
it could well be a step in the right direction. I believe that the
problems of our time stem from a moral and spiritual crisis. The
most important programs therefore address not only teenage pregnancy
or drug addiction, but their underlying causes. And to the extent
that the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives sponsors
such programs, it is an example of good government.
Lopez: Did anything surprise you while
working on this Index?
Bennett: Some of the numbers in the
"Computers and the Internet" section, which is a section we added
to this edition. They are omnipresent in our lives and have become
so in a very short period of time. They give us great opportunities;
I
| “While
some people have actively worked to destroy the family
unit as we know it, there are many who are uncomfortable
with a lot of the changes that have occurred.” |
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am the chairman of a company called K12, which is building a wide
array of Internet-based education programs. But on the other hand,
there are downfalls to the Internet, such as the ready availability
of pornography, which also surprised me. Almost 25 percent of Internet
users visit a pornographic website at least once a month. That's
more than go to the newsstand to buy it. The anonymity of the Internet
removes the shame of purchasing pornography.
Lopez: "There was a 14 percent decline
in the number of abortion providers between 1992 and 1996" —
how significant is this? Is this or any other indicator a guide
for pro-lifers?
Bennett: Despite the fact that there
are about 250,000 to 300,000 fewer abortions per year than there
were in the mid-1980s, we still see too many abortions. For instance:
About 25 percent of all pregnancies end in abortion. Here's a problem:
More than half of all abortions take place in the first eight weeks
of pregnancy. So any effort to curtail late-term abortions, while
laudable and noble, are really failing to address the problem. And
very few people in positions of power talk seriously about proposals
to stop early-term abortions. There's nothing wrong with approaching
abortion incrementally, but we need to recognize the reality of
the situation.
Lopez: "In 1995, 12.7 percent of students
knew someone who brought a gun to school." I mention this because
we hear so much about it. What should conservatives be doing in
addressing the topic of children and guns?
Bennett: The first thing to make clear
is that the stories of school violence we hear are the aberrations.
Most schools are safe places, and most kids are safe at school.
That said, any sort of violence at school is troubling. The tragedies
of the past few days really do tell us that something is amiss.
Part of it — but only part — is the access children have
to guns. That's not necessarily an argument for more gun control,
but it is an argument for more parental involvement in their children's
lives. More problematic is the "culture of death" about which Pope
John Paul II has written, a culture too often promoted by movies,
music, and television. It is confluence of factors, ranging from
the availability of guns, to the breakdown of the family, to a violent
popular culture.
Lopez: "Between 1992 and 1999, there
was a 16 percent increase in the percentage of Americans reporting
the use of any illegal drug within the past thirty days. Between
1979 and 1999, we have seen a 52 percent decrease in illegal drug
use." What does this say about the drug war? Does the decrease prove
that National Review continue to be wrong on drug legalization?
Bennett: There's a gospel of futility
about the drug war — that we have lost it, that we can never
win it. The problem is that the facts don't support that. Between
1980 and 1992 — the Reagan-Bush years — illegal drug use
in this country decreased 59 percent. During the 1990s, we saw a
27 percent decrease in the crime rate, a 28 percent decrease in
the violent crime rate, and an almost 50 percent decrease in the
percentage of people on welfare. These are all rightly hailed as
successes. Why isn't the war on drugs? The war on drugs has been
one of the most successful public-policy efforts of our time. If
we decreased illegitimacy, or teenage pregnancy, or divorce by that
amount, it would be cause for celebration, not surrender. And we
shouldn't surrender in the war on drugs.
Lopez: "Between 1990 and 1999, the
percentage of births that are out of wedlock increased 18 percent.
Between 1960 and 1999, the percentage increased 523 percent." Also,
single-parent families increased 13 percent between 1990 and 1998
and 248 percent between 1960 and 1998. Is it possible to reverse
these — given the death of shame, and the endless available
reproductive options that do not require a man and a women and matrimony?
Bennett: The availability of these
reproductive options — the pill, in vitro fertilization, etc.
— is a fact of life. The death of shame, however, is something
we do not have to accept and must not accept. We need to make anew
the case for marriage and the modern nuclear family. There is a
wealth of social science evidence about the benefits of marriage
for parents and children. We need to make that better known, as
Maggie
Gallagher and Linda Waite have done. But we need to make the
philosophical case for marriage as well. Marriage is a sacred institution,
ordained by God. What passes for relations between the sexes these
days seems like something ordained by the cast of Animal House.
This is something to which I am turning my own attention. My next
book will be about the disintegration of the family, as I think
it is the most critical issue facing America.
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