Today, the National Coalition Against Censorship expressed outrage at the Executive Order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” The order targets the programming of the Smithsonian Institution, which includes 21 libraries, 14 education and research centers, a zoo, and historical and architectural landmarks, and directs it to comply with the presidential administration’s sense of what constitutes “American Greatness.” The order also directs the Department of the Interior to review and eliminate any changes to National Park Service monuments, memorials, and materials, which were made after 2020 and that contribute to a “false reconstruction of American history.”
The order aims to establish a federally-sanctioned American history that is uncritical, nationalist, and pro-State, and constitutes a blatant instruction to censor nuanced and critical views of the nation’s past. In the face of these efforts to render the Smithsonian Institution and the National Park Service mere platforms for nationalist propaganda, NCAC calls upon the Smithsonian Institution’s governing Board of Regents—perhaps the only entity with power to resist this Order—to uphold the core American value of free expression. Freedom of expression, which includes the freedom to criticize the government, is a fundamental component of American democracy.
Read NCAC’s Full Statement here:
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