Howard Zinn's Communist Book a People's History of the United States Is Used Widely in Schools and Colleges

Howard Zinn's Communist Book A People's History of the United States is Used Widely in Schools and Colleges

Frank de Varona

A People's History of the United States is a 1980 book written by Dr Howard Zinn, a U.S. historian and political scientist.

This is a controversial book since he presented United States history through the view point of the common people, radicals, socialists, and Marxists.

A People's History of the United States, or the free materials that accompany the book which can be easily downloaded for free from the internet, is being used in some middle and high schools in the Miami-Dade County Public School, the fourth largest school district in the United States, as well as in other middle schools and high schools and colleges and universities across the United States. It would be hard to know how many social studies teachers are using these free materials since many of them learned or were taught Zinn's Marxist propaganda book in colleges and universities by socialist professors.

The communist Howard Zinn also wrote A Young People’s History of the United States in order to begin the indoctrination of young students. Many social studies teachers in the United States learned a negative view of our country since this was what they were taught in colleges and universities by many social studies, history, and political science professors. It is widely known that the colleges and universities are filled with radicals, socialists and Marxist professors, particularly in the social sciences. I know this fact because I taught full-time as a visiting associate professor of social studies education at the College of Education of Florida International University (FIU) for seven and a half years.

When I arrived at FIU, a Cuban American who taught social studies classes recommended that I used Zinn’s book. When I read it, I was appalled that such a biased Marxist book was being used at FIU. Being an anti-communist, I would never use such a book but I found out that was used widely is schools and colleges. It is no surprise that in recent polls almost a majority of young adults prefer socialism over free market capitalism.

I was invited to visit Cuba free of charge in order to meet with the Marxist professors at the University of Havana by one of my Cuban American colleagues who were unaware that at the age of 17, I had invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in 1961 and was sentenced to 30 years at hard labor. Fortunately, I served only two horrible years in prison. FIU professors took students to Cuba frequently, especially Professor Carlos Alvarez.

This Cuban American professor pretended to be my friend at the College of Education at FIU. Dr. Carlos Alvarez, who taught for 30 years at FIU, is currently in jail for working for the intelligence services in Cuba.

Of course, the United States is not a perfect country and as a nation we have made and continue to make mistakes. But look around the world to find the perfect country. Is it Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea or China? I think not.

The United States never had a large empire made up of many colonies as Japan, Russia, Britain, France, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany. We fought and won World War I and World War II and the only territory that we took from countries that we defeated or countries that we liberated was a piece of land to bury our soldiers. The only colony that the United States had was the Philippines which was taken from Spain in 1898. Our soldiers, Marines, and those who served in the Navy fought very hard during World War II to liberate the Philippines from the Japanese. After World War II, America gave Philippines its independence and urged its European allies to do likewise with their colonies.

Howard Zinn died at age of 87. He taught at Spelman College and Boston University and said he was a communist and an anarchist.

There is more freedom of opportunity and upper mobility in our nation than in any other country of the world. Why is it that millions of people want to move to the United States? Immigrants want to come to the United States because of our freedom and market economy, which, unfortunately, is presently under attack by followers of Howard Zinn.

Zinn's book has been frequently revised, with the most recent edition covering events through 2005. Reviews have been mixed. Socialists have called it a brilliant tool for advancing the cause of social equality by emphasizing the history of the Socialist Labor Party and socialists/Marxists such as Emma Goldman and Eugene V. Debs. Others have called the book a revisionist history containing errors and presenting a distorted Marxist view of American history.

Zinn covered the history of the Communist Party which he believed helped the poor during the Depression. Zinn explained that the Spanish-American War of 1898 was a racist and imperialistic war, a view that is radically different from the standard American history textbooks. He explained that the United States entered World War I in order to expand its foreign markets and not to make the world safe for democracy, as is taught in almost all American history textbooks.

Zinn described United States entry in World War II as being manufactured through the institutions of American society. He stated that the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 were unnecessary since the United States knew Japan was ready to surrender. Again this view is a distortion of reality as the Japanese were ready to fight to the last soldier to defend their homeland as they did in the Japanese islands across the Pacific. A conventional attack upon the main islands of Japan would have killed approximately one million American soldiers as has been indicated by Pentagon's studies.

Zinn explained the Cold War differently from standard American history textbooks. He wrote that the United States government used the Cold War to increase control of the American people and to create a state of permanent war which permitted the creation of the military-industrial complex. The last part of Zinn´s explanation, of course, is true since we do have a military-industrial complex as described by President Dwight D Eisenhower. However, the Cold War was waged by the United States to keep the Soviet Union and China from implanting their tyrannical form of Communist regime in the world.

As a Marxist, Zinn was sympathetic to the Soviet Union, China and other communist countries such as Nicaragua, Cuba, and Venezuela. The United States defended freedom around the world during the Cold War to stop Soviet and Chinese aggression.

Zinn explained modern history by saying that the Democratic and Republican parties are essentially the same and that they are favorable to corporations rather than to the people. We now know that the once center-left Democratic Party has evolved into a socialist, pro-Islamic radical, pro-infanticide, and destructive party. Just look at the unfair impeachment inquiry against President Donald J. Trump. There are close to 100 Democrats who belong to the Marxist Congressional Progressive Caucus. Other Democrats in Congress who do not belong to this Marxist Caucus are just as extreme radicals as those who are members.

Zinn anti-business mentality does not account for the improvement in the standard of living in the United States by businesses and corporations. Zinn does not explain why millions of people from all over the world want to move to the United States legally and illegally since according to Zinn the Unites States is an evil country..

Zinn argued that there will be a radical movement of rebellion involving labor unions, black radicals, Native Americans, feminists, and members of the middle class that would use strikes, civil disobedience, marches, demonstrations in order to redistribute wealth and to change the political and economic structure of the United States. Sadly, Zinn’s prediction has come true. All of that is happening now in America.

Zinn supported President Obama's desire for higher taxes and the redistribution of wealth in the United States and across the world. Zinn would have loved the current Democratic Party communists and socialists who are running for president in 2020. Zinn wanted to establish a socialist or a Communist system in the nation.

Similar to President Obama's preacher Jeremiah Wright, Zinn explained that the al- Qaeda attack of 9/11 was not caused by hatred for the freedom and democratic institutions of the United States as President George W. Bush had indicated. Zinn believed that it was to due to the United States support of Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and American foreign policy such as stationing troops in Saudi Arabia and economic sanctions against Iraq. He discussed the war in Afghanistan but did not mention the Taliban government. This part of Zinn's history book is completely distorted and inaccurate.

Zinn would agree with Obama's preacher of 20 years, Jeremiah Wright's statement that it was our fault (the chickens are coming home to roast) that we were attacked on September 11, 2001. He would also agree with Jeremiah Wright's statement that the United States is an evil country. Wright believed in Black Liberation Theology which is an anti-capitalist and Marxist religion. Reverend Jeremiah Wright of the United Church of Christ in Chicago said again and again God damn America, instead of God bless America. This is, after all, the radical damaging progressive criticism of our nation.

Reviews of A People's History of the United States

While they were positive reviews written by socialists of Zinn's book, prominent historians have criticized Zinn's book. Wikipedia explained that Oscar Handlin, a professor of history at Harvard University for over 50 years who won a Pulitzer Prize for history, wrote a negative review of the book in the American Scholar.

Dr. Handlin stated the following: "Hence the deranged quality of this fairy tale, in which the incidents are made to fit the legend, no matter how intractable the evidence of American history. It may be unfair to expose to critical scrutiny a work patched together from secondary sources, many used uncritically (Jennings, Williams), others ravaged for material torn out of context (Young, Pike).

Any careful reader will perceive that Zinn is a stranger to evidence bearing upon the people about whom he purports to write. But only critics who know the sources will recognize the complex array of devices that pervert his pages... On the other hand, the book conveniently omits whatever does not fit its overriding thesis... It would be a mistake, however, to regard Zinn as merely Anti-American.

Brendan Bahan once observed that whoever hated America hated mankind, and hatred of mankind is the dominant tone of Zinn's book... He lavishes indiscriminate condemnation upon all the works of man — that is, upon civilization, a word he usually encloses in quotation marks."

Wikipedia pointed out that Michael Kammen, a professor of American History, wrote the following in the Washington Post: "I wish that I could pronounce Zinn's book a great success, but it is not. It is a synthesis of the radical and revisionist historiography the past decade. . . Not only does the book read like a scissors and paste-pot job, but even less attractive, so much attention to historians, historiography and historical polemic leaves precious little space for the substance of history. . . We do deserve a people's history; but not a simpleminded history, too often of fools, knaves and Robin Hoods. We need a judicious people's history because the people are entitled to have their history whole; not just those parts that will anger or embarrass them. . . . If that is asking for the moon, then we will cheerfully settle for balanced history."

Georgetown University history professor Michael Kazin wrote in Dissent that Zinn is too focused on class conflict, and wrongly attributes sinister motives to the American political elite. He characterized the book as an overly simplistic narrative of elite villains and oppressed people, with no attempt to understand historical actors in the context of the time in which they lived.

Dr. Kazin wrote the following: "The ironic effect of such portraits of rulers is to rob 'the people' of cultural richness and variety, characteristics that might gain the respect and not just the sympathy of contemporary readers. For Zinn, ordinary Americans seem to live only to fight the rich and haughty and, inevitably, to be fooled by them."

Professor Kazin argued that A People's History fails to explain why the American political-economic model continues to attract millions of minorities, women, workers, and immigrants, or why the socialist and radical political movements Zinn favors have failed to gain widespread support among the American public.

A more recent criticism of A People's History of the United States was made by Dinesh D'Souza in his book, America, Imagine a World Without Her (2014). Many socialist progressives, such as Howard Zinn, believe that capitalism is a system of organized theft of what working people have produced.

D'Souza wrote that Howard Zinn concluded in his book by stating the following: "From the founding of the nation to the present day, the government has generally legislated on behalf of the wealthy; has done the bidding of corporations in dealing with working people, and has taken the nation to war in the interest of economic expansion and political ambition." Dinesh D'Souza pointed out in his book that Zinn has changed the existing pantheon of heroes in American history, such as the Founding Fathers, to be replaced by such figures as Seminole leader Osceola, who fought a guerrilla campaign against the United States, anarchist and socialist Emma Goldman, and Iraq war protester Cindy Sheehan.

Dinesh D'Souza wrote in America, Imagine a World Without Her (2014) that Zinn believed in global economic equality, as he put it in his book "a time when national boundaries are erased, when the riches of the world are used for everyone." The core of the radical progressive Marxist view of America, shared by Zinn, is a moral critique of capitalism.

This Marxist point of view of America explained that America's riches are due to theft, and as such, America is under the obligation to redistribute its wealth to the Third World nations. Similarly, America needs also redistribute the wealth among its citizens in the nation to end income inequality.

President Obama constantly talked about income inequality. He wanted to create more jobs and yet he is anti business, it simply will not work. President Obama instead of redistributing wealth, he expanded misery and poverty.

D'Souza wrote that Obama's agenda would bring economic stagnation, impoverishment, indebtedness, and decline. This is the progressive case for America's suicide. It is well to remember what Prime Minister of Great Britain Margaret Thatcher said of socialism, "socialism works well until they run out of other people's money."

Clearly, many socialist countries of Europe and Latin America have run out of others people's money and are close to being bankrupt with national debts that these nations can no longer sustain. In addition, many of these nations with socialist programs have increased poverty, high inflation, and high unemployment.

President Obama did not believe in American exceptionalism. Every other president has stated that the United States is an exceptionally good nation looking back at our Declaration of Independence and Constitution and the type of nation that was founded in 1776.

Obama, and all the Democrats running for president in 2020, looked with disdain to our Founding Fathers and our Judeo-Christian values and traditions, as did Howard Zinn. Marxist radicals, like Zinn, believed in American exceptionalism of the other kind. Zinn believed that America was exceptionally evil and that America is an evil empire.

Under President Barack Obama, the United States became a superpower in retreat. America was no longer respected by its allies or feared by its enemies. President Obama was a traitor who engaged in treason, dereliction of duty, and criminal negligence when he implemented his Presidential Study Directive 11 which directed the implementation of a policy to turn the Middle East to Iran and the North of Africa to al- Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Howard Zinn spoke at Mariboro College in February 2004.

Who was Howard Zinn?

Howard Zinn was born on August 24, 1922 and died on January 27, 2010. He was an American historian, author, playwright, and social activist who taught at Boston University for 24 years. Professor Zinn also taught at Spelman College for seven years but he was fired even though he was a tenured professor for his involvement in the civil rights movement. He wrote more than 20 books. Many of his books dealt with civil rights, antiwar movements and the labor history of the nation.

During World War II, Zinn served in the Air Force as a bombardier and dropped many bombs on the enemy. Zinn questioned the justifications for military operations that inflicted massive civilian casualties during the World War II, the Vietnam War, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also criticized the Gulf War.

Zinn believed that the point of view expressed in traditional history books was often limited and inaccurate. Biographer Martin Duberman stated that when he was asked directly if he was a Marxist, Zinn replied, "Yes, I'm something of a Marxist." He was a friend of other Marxists intellectuals, such as Noam Chomsky. He was opposed to the Vietnam War and visited Hanoi, North Vietnam in January 1968.

Howard Zinn's Socialist/Marxist ideology

Zinn described himself as "something of an anarchist, something of a socialist, and something of a Marxist." He suggested looking at socialism in its full historical context as a popular, positive idea that got a bad name from its association with Soviet Communism.

Wikipedia explained that in 2009 in Madison, Wisconsin, Zinn said the following: "Let's talk about socialism. I think it's very important to bring back the idea of socialism into the national discussion to where it was at the turn of the [last] century before the Soviet Union gave it a bad name. Socialism had a good name in this country. Socialism had Eugene Debs. It had Clarence Darrow. It had Mother Jones. It had Emma Goldman. It had several million people reading socialist newspapers around the country. Socialism basically said, hey, let's have a kinder, gentler society.

Let's share things. Let's have an economic system that produces things not because they're profitable for some corporation, but produces things that people need. People should not be retreating from the word socialism because you have to go beyond capitalism." Zinn wanted American history to be taught exclusively from his Marxist point of view in all schools, colleges and universities in the nation. Sadly, he was partly successful. In 2008, he established the Zinn Education Project as his perverse legacy to middle and high school teachers and their students. The nonprofit organization offers classroom teachers free and low-cost teaching activities based on A People's History and like- minded history texts.

The Zinn Education Project was launched to promote and support the use of A People's History of the United States (and other materials) for teaching in middle and high school classrooms across the United States. With funds from an anonymous donor who had been a student of Zinn, the project began by distributing 4,000 packets to teachers in all states and territories. The project now offers teaching guides and bibliographies that can be freely downloaded.

Political activist Jane Walker who spoke to the Miami-Dade School Board members on August 6, 2014, requesting Board members to read Zinn´s book, informed me that several years ago this book was used at Carver Middle School in Miami-Dade County and is currently used in other secondary schools in this district.

FBI files

Wikipedia reported that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) released a file with 423 pages of information on Howard Zinn’s life and activities. The FBI opened a domestic security investigation on Zinn (FBI File # 100-360217), based on Zinn’s activities in what the agency considered to be communist front groups and informant reports indicated that Zinn was an active member of the Communist Party of the United States.

Zinn denied ever being a member and said that he had participated in the activities of various organizations which might be considered Communist fronts but that his participation was motivated by his belief that in this country people had the right to believe, think, and act according to their own ideals.

Controversies

Marxist Sandinista priest Miguel d'Escoto was Nicaragua’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and later president of the United Nations General Assembly.

Wikipedia pointed out that in 2008, Howard Zinn was selected as a special senior advisor to the Nicaraguan priest and Marxist Sandinista Miguel d'Escoto who was president of the United Nations General Assembly. It explained that the Associated Press (AP) stated in July 2013 that former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels asked for assurance from his education advisors that Zinn's works were not taught in K-12 public schools in the state. Daniels also wanted a "cleanup" of K-12 professional development courses to eliminate "propaganda and highlight (if there is any) the more useful offerings."

Daniels expressed contempt for Zinn upon his death and said the following: "This terrible anti-American academic has finally passed away...The obits and commentaries mentioned his book, A People’s History of the United States, is the ‘textbook of choice in high schools and colleges around the country.’ It is a truly execrable, anti-factual piece of disinformation that misstates American history on every page. Can someone assure me that it is not in use anywhere in Indiana? If it is, how do we get rid of it before more young people are force-fed a totally false version of our history?" David J. Bobb supported Daniels' stand on Zinn by writing an opinion piece in the online Wall Street Journal, where he claimed that Zinn was not a real historian, but a Marxist- propagandist.

Conclusion

George Orwell said that “The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.”

I have always told the truth when speaking on radio and television, giving conferences, and writing many articles and books. Socialists and communists, as well as Democrats and their complicit corrupt mainstream media, constantly lie and distort events with fake news. For that reason many good and well-meaning Americans have been deluded into thinking that socialism is better than a free-market capitalist economy.

Socialism is a totalitarian system completely at odds with individual liberty, freedom of opportunity, and free market capitalism. Socialism seeks to destroy the social and moral fabric of society and by its very nature is intolerant and hateful. Socialism brings misery, hunger, death, oppression, and greater inequality. Socialism undermines responsibility and encourages dependence. Once imposed, socialism is almost impossible to undo. Schools should be doing more to teach students America’s great heritage of liberty and to be proud to be an American. Many years ago, I taught a high school government and economics course that included a textbook called Democracy and Communism Theory and Action in the Miami-Dade County Public Schools in Florida.

Sadly, the teaching about socialism and communism was discarded in Florida. Thus many young people lack basic knowledge regarding the terrible command and control socialist economy. We need to teach about the superiority of the free market capitalist economy over the command and control socialist economy. And then hire teachers and college professors who are not socialists.

We are at war with radical socialists and communists in America who want to take God and our freedom and liberty away. They want to destroy our Constitution and free market economy. They want to divide and oppress us. They want to take our precious sovereignty and place America under a one-world government under the corrupt United Nations but controlled by globalists of the New World Order. If any of the Democratic presidential candidates win the White House, our greatest nation in the planet will cease to be what it is today.

More than 63 million of us voted for Donald J. Trump in 2016 because we rejected the socialist and globalist ideology of Hillary Clinton. We need to educate our children and our grandchildren, as well as their friends and our adult friends, on the terrible consequences of socialism. We need to better inform ourselves on the evil nature of socialism and communism by reading The New American magazine. We should read Rand Paul’s book The Case Against Socialism or similar books and encourage our friends to do it. All of us need to become teachers to save America.

As a former middle school and high school principal, region director and region superintendent, associate superintendent for curriculum, and interim deputy superintendent of schools of the Miami-Dade County Public Schools, I would not have liked a history book such as the one written by Howard Zinn to be used in our secondary schools. The anti-American book written by Zinn is biased and it offers a distorted view of American history, as was documented by noted historians from prominent universities. The minds of our students should not be poisoned by books such as Zinn's.

By his own admission, Howard Zinn considered himself as an anarchist, a socialist, and a somewhat Marxist. Zinn's FBI file revealed that he participated in various organizations that were considered Communist fronts.

The socialism/Marxism that Howard Zinn advocated had brought economic stagnation, high unemployment, and high inflation and near bankruptcy to the nations that have implemented this failed economic system. I do not believe that middle schools and high schools in the nation should use a toxic book written by a Marxist who advocated socialism/Marxism for our nation as well as to erase our national boundaries and redistribute the wealth of the United States around the world. This would be national suicide and the end of the United States and free world as we now know it.

A People's History of the United States is not a history book approved by the state of Florida or the Miami-Dade County Public Schools. However, I am aware that it is being used in some middle and high schools by teachers who are instructing social studies Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate students.

It is my belief that this book has no place in any middle school, high school, college or university in the United States. After all, we do not live in China, North Korea, Cuba or Venezuela!

A Gallup poll done shortly before July 4, 2019 indicated that the share of our citizens who felt “extremely proud” to be Americans was the lowest in the Gallup poll’s 18-year history. It was 47%, compared with 70 % in 2003. Another poll done by WSJ/NBC showed that the younger Americans are; the less likely to say that patriotism is a “very important value.” Schools should be doing more to teach students America’s great heritage of liberty and to be proud to be an American.

If you love the United States, we need to fight hard to preserve the greatest and most generous country in the face of the planet, the United States of America, with our religious liberty, Judeo Christian values, and our Constitutional Republic. We need to say this will not happen in our watch. And this is a war that we shall win with the help of Almighty God!