Spanking: A Cruel Retrogressive Habit

A letter to Project NoSpank
from Louise Gordon

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I BELIEVE THAT peaceful relationships and harmonious ways of life will remain remote and idyllic fantasies as long as corporal punishment remains an acceptable part of child rearing. As dependents, children can be as much "prisoners of their parents as they are of schools."
— Thomas Szasz, M.D.

Are the imaginations of educators, parents and all other adults so impoverished that they cannot arrive at more humane practices than spanking children in order to counter misdeeds and misbehavior? Is it any wonder that children adopt defensive coping mechanisms when they can have their clothes yanked off and their naked buttocks beaten with household weapons such as paddles, belts and whatnot? And this, during a period when young children are being taught modesty and the importance of remaining clothed rather than running around stark naked after a bath or on a hot summer day.

A conflicted message children are given here, when they are also taught that parents can violate their modesty and bodily integrity and human dignity at will. With that violation comes emotional trauma and fear, even terror, over pain that an adult is inflicting while the child remains defenseless against the aggressive "pedagogical" or punitive assault.

Is it any wonder that when treated this way by their "nearest and dearest," that children, wholly dependent on parents not only for love but also survival, develop ambivalent and dysfunctional attitudes towards intimacy and close bonds, both desiring and fearing them? Is it any wonder that they may adopt a spate of maladaptive behaviors, from aggressiveness to timidity and withdrawal, from fear of and misdirected rebellion against "authority" to inordinate approval seeking and desire to please? And is any lesson learned about the behavior that precipitated a spanking?

Or has the child simply learned to avoid getting caught? It seems to me that penalties for wrongdoing are inherent in the misdeed and are thus unavoidable, and one learns through such experience. Piling punishment on top of penalty is a different matter. If it must exist as a means of teaching people to distinguish between good and evil, then can we not, as a society, insist that it be humane? The very combination of words sounds oxymoronic.

The British seem to have had a special cultural flair for caning, flogging and such. A glance at the work of Algernon Swinburne and Ian Gibson's book "The English Vice" gives a clue concerning the grotesque distortions, the "kinky," sado- masochistic or dysfunctional patterns of human sexuality that can result from such childhood abuse. This is an extreme and, one hopes, exceptional, but if spanking is normative, then dysfunction can also become the norm.

How many people cringe, as if to fend off a physical blow, when other people's voices are raised in anger? How many women and children are cowed, walking on egg shells at home, because a male "head of household" threatens violence while shaking a fist and demanding silence, even though that man never actually delivers a blow?

I seriously doubt that a more humane and educated world will be realized if, as a society, we perpetuate customary cruelty such as inflicting physical pain on children as part of our impoverished didactic repertoire, and as long as physical force remains the final arbiter of all human disputes.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, said Lord Acton. Who has more power to abuse other humans than large parents, upon whom small children are dependent?

Like the big taboos of sex and death, this subject can be shame inducing. It may cause cracks in the fragile self-esteem of spankers and spankees alike. Fortunately, Project No Spank is bringing truth to light on this topic, the effects of which are deeply ingrained in attitudes and ways of being and relating to one another. So often people's need to think well of themselves, to salvage fragile "self-esteem"--based on false competitive win-lose, power-over mindsets to start with--overrides the search for truth. Without seeking truth, there is no hope of aligning ourselves, our minds, and our actions more closely with it. When adults inflict pain on children as a means of punishment, coercion and behavior control, clearly, they are not approximating the embodiment of truth and love revealed to humanity through the wisest traditions in philosophy and the world's great spiritual disciplines.

The use of physical pain to control children is not only unloving, but also unreasonable. Children should be reasoned with through language and intellect, not coerced through physical pain and humiliation. Children who are unable to comprehend reasoning, two-year-olds, for example, need to be kept out of harm's way by adults, not punished with spankings if they make a mistake that could cause injury to themselves or others, a mistake that adults call "misbehavior."

The whipping post and slavery were abolished in the United States. It is time to recognize spanking as the cruel retrogressive habit that it is, left over from the era when Americans owned other humans and were free to treat them with less care than inanimate objects.

Whether as part of toxic parenting or poisonous pedagogy, human beings no longer can afford to indulge in inflicting pain as an "efficient" means of modifying behavior. As Alice Miller says, "every smack is a humiliation." Some smacks prove fatal, while all are injurious to human dignity and diminish the human community in which we all must live. If children are human, they have rights that no adult should be able to violate with impunity.

© 2004 by Louise Gordon — May 4, 2004

Shall we bring back the teacher's paddle and the Klansman's noose?

THERE IS A great deal of clamoring in certain quarters lately for restoring corporal punishment as the primary means for classroom disci- pline. Proponents are demand- ing that it's time to "bring unruly kids back into line," that we must "teach them to follow rules and respect authority," that they must "learn to obey their elders or suffer the consequences." This theme is emerging as a new rallying cry heard at school board meetings, in state and local legislatures and, I fear before long, on street corners.
....One has to wonder, where might this yearning for good ol' fashioned discipline lead? Would the next logical step be a call for restoration of the lynch mob's rope? That's not as far-fetched as it might first sound. One has only to compare a list of the top ten paddling states to a list of the top ten lynching states, and the basis for my warning becomes clear — seven states show up on both lists.
....What's behind this mindset that fuels a drive for inflicting violent punishments on the defenseless? Well, it's been around for millennia, and never far out of sight. The treatment of slaves, prisoners, soldiers, the mentally ill and wives is testimony to this deep-rooted, cherished tradition. It's fresh in our collective memory. And for many children, it's here and now.
....Schools systems that allow corporal punishment (a deceptively benign-sounding, clinical-sounding term) act as magnets and safe havens for the dangerously unfit. Put a bully, sadist or sociopath in charge of children, close the classroom door, pull the shade, and it's party time. Pity those children.
....Throughout the modern, civilized world, the teaching profession has largely purged itself of this worst-of-all afflictions. Teachers are held to a standard befitting their training as professionals, and assault and battery of children clearly isn't part of the job description. Many leading organizations that deal with children's issues have stated unequivocally that hitting children is counterproductive and should be prohibited. The list includes:

..• The National Association of School Psychologists
..• The National PTA
..• The American Academy of Pediatrics
..• The American Medical Association
..• The American Psychological Association
..• The American Public Health Association
..• The Child Welfare League of America
..• The National Association of Social Workers
..• The National Committee for the Prevention of Child .....Abuse
..• The National Mental Health Association
..• The Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine
..• The American Bar Association
..• The American Civil Liberties Union
... . . and more.

....Society will always be burdened with bullies — hopefully in dwindling numbers — and bullies have an equal right to earn a living, but they should be directed into areas of employment which offer them no oppor- tunity to indulge their perverse habits.

— Jordan Riak, May 8, 2010

Parenting Expert Warns Against Physical Punishment

Corporal punishment of children has long been a topic of controversy in the United States. According to some studies, more than half of all U.S. parents condone spanking as a regular form of punishment for small children. Other studies have shown spanking to be harmful to children. So when children misbehave or act out, what should parents do? APA spoke with Alan E. Kazdin, PhD, John M. Musser professor of psychology at Yale University and director of Yale's Parenting Center and Child Conduct Clinic. He was APA’s 2008 president and is the author of many professional-audience books on child psychology and behavior.

APA: Some parents spank their child not only to punish him or her but to change their child’s behavior. Does spanking have that effect?

Dr. Kazdin: Spanking is not a very effective strategy. It does not teach children new behaviors or what to do in place of the problem behavior. It is also not useful in suppressing the problematic behavior beyond the moment. Research indicates the rate of misbehavior does not decline, in fact, the problem behavior returns, even if the parent escalates the punishment.

APA: What other types of physical punishment do some parents use?

Dr. Kazdin: The task is to help children change their behavior, and physical punishment is not needed to accomplish that. Developing positive opposite behaviors, i.e., the desired behaviors that the parent wants, is much more effective.

APA: What are some of the alternative methods for disciplining children that parents would be well-advised to employ? How do these alternative methods work? Why are they more effective? Where can parents find resources to learn these alternative methods?

Dr. Kazdin: Positive reinforcement for alternative behaviors is extremely effective. This is not just rewards or points but the use of antecedents (what comes before behavior), behavior (shaping and gradually developing, repeated practice), and consequences (e.g., specially delivered praise).There is a whole area of research (applied behavior analysis) devoted to this and some parenting books, too. See www.alankazdin.com

APA: What is the difference between physical punishment and child abuse?

Dr. Kazdin: Child abuse is defined individually by the states in the U.S. and the definitions vary—some focus on where on the body the child is hit; others focus on whether objects are used, and so on. The key issue is that moderate-to-severe physical punishment has all sorts of long-term negative consequences for the child including in the areas of academic performance and mental and physical health. One need not abuse a child to achieve those very unfortunate effects.

APA:. Are there social, environmental or economic stressors that may cause a parent or caregiver to be more likely to use physical punishment with children?

Dr. Kazdin: Yes, stressors can contribute to abuse; parent expectations for what the child can and ought to do can contribute, too. I have worked with parents who abused their infants because they would not stop crying. Another parent beat a 10-year-old boy because he forgot one item on a grocery list when he was sent to the store by himself. Both the crying and forgetting something have a technical name in psychology: They are called “normal.”

APA:. What are the effects on children who are disciplined with physical punishment? For instance, are they more likely to be aggressive with their siblings, peers or others?

Dr. Kazdin:. Research on very mild, infrequent spanking (e.g., one time/month) is inconclusive. When a parent moves beyond that to moderate or severe physical punishment, there are all sorts of untoward consequences—educational delays, psychological disorders and physical disorders, too.

APA: What do you say to the parent who says, “My parents spanked me, and I turned out OK?”

Dr. Kazdin: There are people who smoke cigarettes and live to be 100, but that does not refute the findings that smoking is likely to lead to early death. Exceptions are interesting (some people who contract HIV do not get AIDS) but they do not alter the finding and it would be foolhardy to think that one is an exception.

APA: What kinds of research would provide more conclusive evidence on the effects of physical punishment of children and provide insight into alternative forms of discipline?

Dr. Kazdin:. There is a good deal of research that has already been conducted that shows that anything beyond very mild physical punishment does not work in the long term and has negative consequences. While not all child development experts agree, my advice to parents is to avoid physical punishment altogether; there are simply more effective ways to teach and discipline your child.

The American Psychological Association, in Washington, D.C., is the largest scientific and professional organization representing psychology in the United States and is the world's largest association of psychologists. APA's membership includes more than 152,000 researchers, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. Through its divisions in 54 subfields of psychology and affiliations with 60 state, territorial and Canadian provincial associations, APA works to advance psychology as a science, as a profession and as a means of promoting health, education and human welfare.

Source: American Psychological Association (APA)
May 5, 2010, 11:00 AM EDT

223,190 Kids Legally Beaten in US Schools

For the first time in over 18 years, Congress has held hearings on the use of Corporal Punishment in U.S. Schools. In the coming weeks, Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (NY) will introduce a bill to institute a federal ban of corporal punishment in all US Schools. [source: US Congressional Hearing]

Every 20 seconds of the school day, a child is beaten by an educator. Every 4 minutes, an educator beats a child so severely that she seeks medical attention. According to conservative reporting to the U.S. Department of Education 223,190 students were the victims of institutionalized violence at least once in the 2006-2007 school year, of which over 20,000 sought medical attention. [source: Office for Civil Rights at the US Dept. of Education; Congressional Testimony]
....Pre-school age through high school, students are being beaten with boards, belts, paddles, and whips... in public schools... in the United States... and while corporal punishment has been repeatedly shown to be ineffective and has deleterious effects on students, the practice continues and is legal in 20 states.
....The iron age practice of "corporal punishment" is still legal in 20 states and there are no federal laws prohibiting it. The National Association of School Nurses defines corporal punishment as "the intentional infliction of physical pain as a method of changing behavior. It may include methods such as hitting, slapping, punching, kicking, pinching, shaking, use of various objects (paddles, belts, sticks, or others), or painful body postures."
....From infractions as dangerous as forgetting a pencil to prom dress code violations, students are being beaten across the country. All of this, of course is without any due process, court hearing, and often the parents have no say in the matter. Did I mention that corporal punishment is outlawed in the US legal system, and even felons convicted of rape or murder can sleep soundly knowing they will never be subject to the same kinds of beatings we routinely doll out to our children in public schools. Not to mention that 97 out of the 100 largest US School districts have banned corporal punishment. [source: Center for Effective Discipline]
....The United States stands alone in the developed world — Canada, Europe, the UK, Australia and 102 other countries have long since outlawed the practice. [source:] The United Nations, Parent Teacher Association, American Civil Liberties Union, American Association of Pediatrics and countless other organizations have strong positions against the use of corporal punishment. [source:Center for Effective Discipline]
....The American Psychological Association opposes the use of corporal punishment in schools and asserts that corporal punishment is violent and unnecessary, may lower self-esteem, is liable to instill hostility and rage without reducing the undesired behavior and is likely to train children to use physical violence.
....In fact, the majority of research suggests that corporal punishment has little to no positive long term effects, actually decreases the effectiveness of other forms of punishment, and introduces a whole mess of other complications including increased drop out rates. Why then do some schools insist on using an ineffective, outdated practice? Since 30 states currently outlaw corporal punishment, what is so different in the lagging 20? Are the students somehow worse behaved? Are the teachers less capable of non-violent classroom management?
....The United States must join the rest of the developed world and implement a federal ban on corporal punishment. Dodging the issue and leaving it up to the states is irresponsible and neglectful to the hundreds of thousands of kids physically abused by the education system every year. The "States Rights Gambit" didn't work for slavery or segregation, and it won't work for this either.
....As a nation we may be in violation of international law by our non-compliance with the United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights - which we signed and ratified in 1992. The UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child found that "corporal punishment and other cruel or degrading forms of punishment are forms of violence and States must take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to eliminate them" [source: A Violent Education: Corporal Punishment of Children in U.S. Public Schools]
....You can help spread awareness around this issue by sharing this article with friends, blogging about it yourself, and joining the Facebook Group.
....Additionally, contact your state representatives office, and let them know you support a Federal Ban on Corporal Punishment — this is a real chance to leave a human rights legacy you can be proud of.
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Appeared in THE HUFFINGTON POST by Anthony Adams
— Posted May 5, 2010 09:00 AM

This article is the first article in a series on Corporal Punishment in the United States by Anthony David Adams, Founder of DetentionSlip.org

Victims of Sociopathic or Sadistic Acts

IF YOU ARE capable of painfully striking your child in the absence of anger, remorse, or guilt, your behavior can be characterized as a sociopathic act ... to cause harm without conscience.

On the other hand, if you are capable of causing emotional or physical harm to another, in conjunction with feelings of pleasure, gratification, and/or sexual arousal, you have committed an act of sadism.

These forms of dysfunctional behavior when perpetrated against adult persons are generally accepted as accurate by definition. But, until children are also included as a viable segment of humanity, they will remain largely exempt from being considered victims of sociopathic and/or sadistic acts according to the double standard definitions as they apply to adults.

As we continue to evolve as a society, our cultural norms and values change, as do the words that define our behavior. In just a period of fifty years, we've seen the terms Spousal Abuse and Domestic Violence spring into our consciousness. A little over one hundred years ago, the term Child Abuse was not a part of the collective conscience in the U.S.

Given these changes reflecting a greater collective humanity, I fully expect to see an expansion of the parameters currently used to describe acts that are consistent with sociopathy and sadism. This will occur when we finally bring children into the fold of humanity by putting behind us our prejudicial and discriminatory attitudes toward our young.

— James C. Talbot (April 24, 2010)

Author of The Road To Positive Discipline: A Parent's Guide.

See www.positivedisciplining.com/author.htm

Alice Miller's Gift to Humanity

THE CONTRIBUTION OF her writing to her readers, as well as to the cause of children and of humanity, is unparalleled.

....The lives of all who have read her books, from The Drama of the Gifted Child to Free from Lies, have been deeply transformed. To read Alice Miller is to be brought back to your own center, to the child you once were. No matter what invalidation or mutilation you have suffered, you regain contact with this child. You are able to sweep away the judgments that have been leveled against children — about their “foolishness,” their “original sin,” their innate “bestiality,” and their “drives — that the culture of contempt for children has stuck onto them. You can dare to declare that as children we were totally innocent. No one before Alice Miller had been so radical. Starting from the certainty that her books communicate to readers, a true resurrection becomes possible, simply because each reader is able to reconnect with the child one was, with the source of life within oneself.

....Alice Miller contributed infinitely to the cause of childhood. She showed, without minimizing as others often tend to do, all the forms of violence to which children are subjected: lack of tenderness, neglect, absence of care, sexual abuse, and, above all, ordinary educational violence, which is the most widespread and is everywhere considered normal and pedagogical. For many people, the profound effect of her work is surely seen in the adoption by 25 countries of legislation prohibiting all forms of corporal punishment and humiliation. Thanks to her and to her studies of the major mass criminals of the 20th century, we have been able to understand how what had happened in the intimacy of the family microcosm led to extremely grave consequences in the macrocosm of the social and political life of adolescents and adults.

....We must hope that in the future all that Alice Miller contributed to the cause of humanity will be understood. In showing that the life of adults — their familial, social, and political life, all their history — revolves around childhood and children, Alice Miller, like her fellow countryman Copernicus four centuries earlier, put the world right-side-up again. Freud had failed to do it. By inventing the theory of drives, after his father’s death and so as not to accuse him, he thereby returned to the old accusation against children as being the agents of the worst drives. Alice Miller, through empathetically listening to her patients, understood that this theory was false and had the courage to denounce it. And courage was certainly needed because she found herself immediately rejected by a number of her former colleagues. However, in shining light on the principal origin of human violence, Alice Miller’s work gives us hope for reducing, in its many forms, this violence stemming from ravaged childhoods.

....Alice Miller is no longer with us, but her books remain for us. Likewise, we still have her website that I hope Brigitte Oriol will continue to take care of. Would it not be possible for Alice Miller’s readers, with the agreement of Brigitte Oriol, to undertake the translation of the articles on this site into the maximum number of languages so that Alice Miller’s thinking becomes accessible to all and is spread even more widely than when she was still here?

— Olivier Maurel

[Translated from the original French
by Mitch Hall, April 24, 2010]

Alice Miller died on April 14, 2010 at the age of 87.

Child Abuse in U.S. Public and Private Schools

On March 6, 2010, the following was emailed to Congressman Jim Himes and Senators Joe Lieberman and Chris Dodd of Connecticut.

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I am writing to you at this time because I am deeply concerned about the mistreatment of schoolchildren in 20 of our United States. Although Connecticut is not one of the 20 states, this issue should concern every American.

I am trying to encourage federal legislation that would make it illegal for schoolchildren in both public and private school settings to be assaulted and battered as part of routine discipline.

Having lived in the Northeast all my life, I remember my first trip to the South to begin my freshman year at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa in 1963. I spent my first night in a segregated motel in Athens, Georgia. After dinner at a segregated restaurant, I witnessed a street demonstration by the Ku Klux Klan protesting the hiring of a Black woman at the Singer Sewing Center. That was the year Vivian Malone, a Black student, enrolled at the University of Alabama in spite of the lunatic protestations of Governor George Wallace, and the National Guard had to be stationed on campus to keep the peace. Those were troubled times, and Tuscaloosa was a troubled place. It was an eye-opening experience for a Yankee!

It took America almost 100 years after the ratification of the Declaration of Independence to abolish slavery with the Thirteenth Amendment to our Constitution. And, as I discovered in my student days in the 1960s, it was impossible to disentangle racial violence from its source. Clearly, bad habits die hard.

This brings me to another legacy of slavery: the violent punishment of schoolchildren by teachers and school administrators, better known as "paddling."

When I tell people that 20 states legally sanction physical punishment of schoolchildren, they look at me in disbelief. When I tell them approximately 1/4 million beatings of American schoolchildren occur annually, and that children are often bruised and sometimes injured, shock sets in.

Anyone who doubts that this practice is a direct hand-me-down from plantation days should see www.nospank.net/slavish2.pdf. Notice that the paddle in the illustration is prototypical of ones used in paddling schools today. Furthermore, it should come as no surprise to anyone that a map of the top ten paddling states and a map of the top ten lynching states are a close match. Seven states appear on both maps. See maps at www.nospank.net/classrm.htm#2maps.

The 20 states that still legally permit corporal punishment in schools are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming.

According to Human Rights Watch/ACLU, the 10 states that paddled the most students during the 2006-07 school year were:
.1. Texas . . . . . . 49,197 paddlings
.2. Mississippi . . . 38,131 paddlings
.3. Alabama . . . . 33,716 paddlings
.4. Arkansas . . . . 22,314 paddlings
.5. Georgia . . . . . 18,249 paddlings
.6. Tennessee . . . 14,868 paddlings
.7. Oklahoma . . . 14,828 paddlings
.8. Louisiana . . . 11,080 paddlings
.9. Florida . . . . . . 7,185 paddlings
10. Missouri . . . . . 5,129 paddlings

The first state to abolish corporal punishment in public schools was New Jersey in 1867 — 143 years ago! California became the 9th paddle-free state in 1987. And most recently, on October 15th 2009, Ohio became the 30th state to protect schoolchildren.

The following countries prohibit corporal punishment in schools: Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, China, Congo, Republic of, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, DR Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Estonia, Ethiopia, Falkland Islands, Fiji, Finland, Gabon, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Guernsey, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Malta, Marshall Islands, Mauritius, Micronesia, Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Namibia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Oman, Philippines, Pitcairn Island, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russian Federation, Saint Helena, San Marino, Sao Tome & Principe, Senegal, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Spitzbergen, Suriname, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, TFYR Macedonia, Thailand, Tonga, Turkey, Turkmenistan, UK, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Yemen and Zambia.

If I haven't convinced you that now is the time for the United States to join the rest of the civilized world by protecting schoolchildren, I urge you to become more fully informed about this issue by visiting www.nospank.net (Parents and Teachers Against Violence in Education), www.stophitting.com (Center for Effective Discipline) and www.thehittingstopshere.com (The Hitting Stops Here!). And please read Plain Talk about Spanking at www.nospank.net/pt2009.htm or email me at goldfield@nospank.net for a printed copy. I will send you the booklet via First-Class mail.

To further familiarize yourself with this issue, I strongly recommend Report on Physical Punishment in the US: What Research Tells Us About Its Effects on Children [May 2009] by Elizabeth T. Gershoff, Ph.D. This report was published and developed in conjunction with:
Phoenix Children's Hospital
Child Abuse Prevention
1919 East Thomas Road, Suite 2211C
Phoenix, AZ 85016
(602) 546-3356.

You can find a PDF for this 57 page scientific document at: ww.phoenixchildrens.com/PDFs/principles_and_practices-of_effective_discipline.pdf.

Dr. Gershoff is an Associate Professor of Social Work at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In her current research, she focuses on the impact of violence by parents and teachers on children's mental health and academic achievement. A hard copy of the Report can be obtained by contacting:
Center for Effective Discipline
155 W. Main St. #1603
Columbus, Ohio 43215

I encourage you to examine punitive child rearing traditions with the same critical eye that one might use to consider the practice of stoning adulterers or cutting off the hands of thieves. This is the 21st century. The 20 states that still use corporal punishment as discipline in schools need to disarm and start treating children with kindness and respect. Please make this issue a priority and initiate legislation to make corporal punishment of schoolchildren a federal crime.

I look forward to hearing your comments and position on this most critical issue in America.

Michael Goldfield