



































"Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here


Contested Curriculum & Pedagogy: California During the Rafferty Era 

 
Mark Groen 

California State University, San Bernardino 

 

"Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to 

go from here?‖ ―That depends a good deal on 

where you want to get to." 

- Lewis Carroll,  Alice in Wonderland 

 

Abstract 

Max Rafferty served as California‘s 

Superintendent of Public Instruction from 1963 to 

1971, through some of the most contentious and 

transformative years in California education. 

Rafferty sought to transform the educational 

system and vowed to kill Progressive Education in 

California. His efforts altered both pedagogy and 

curriculum in California schools.  

 

David Tyack, writing in 1974, offered ―the 

conjecture that historians a hundred years hence 

may consider the ferment of the 1960s and 1970s 

to be a major turning point in the history of 

American education‖ (Tyack 1974). The nation 

entered an era of vibrant social experimentation 

and rebellion in the 1960s. As historians have 

noted, ―Much attention was paid during the 1960s 

and after, to the powerful liberals who molded 

social policy … from the Left. But the dominance 

of liberalism was attacked just as loudly from the 

Right‖ during the 1960s. ―The Right established 

itself as a unified and potent political movement 

during the same decade‖ (Isserman 2000, 206). In 

California, Max Rafferty was a part of that 

process. In the early 1960s, while student radicals 

at U.C. Berkeley anticipated the dawning of the 

Age of Aquarius, scarcely noticed, just a few 

miles away in California‘s State Capitol, the first 

stirrings of the conservative revolution that would 

transform the nation in the 1980s were already 

evident. Indeed, the man who came to embody 

that transformation, and even lend his name to the 

Reagan Revolution, was inaugurated as Governor 

of California on January 2, 1967. But if one 

person were to epitomize the curriculum and 

pedagogical contests of that period it is Max 

Rafferty.  

Max Rafferty taught in rural high schools 

in Southern California in relative obscurity until 

he ran for the office of State Superintendent of 

Public Instruction in 1962. His often vociferous 

speeches excoriating ―life adjustment‖ and 

progressive education won him the backing of a 

coalition of conservatives and those on the 

political far-right. Rafferty began writing a 

nationally syndicated newspaper column on 

educational matters that brought him a national 

audience and made him the foremost advocate of 

―back-to-basics‖ education in the 1960s. Rafferty 

trod the path of the arch-conservative in 

pedagogical matters, but in matters of ethnic 

inclusiveness in textbooks he pushed tirelessly for 

improvement.   

Max Rafferty was elected to the non-

partisan office of Superintendent of Public 

Instruction of the State of California in 1962. He 

held this office for two terms, from 1963 to 1971, 

through some of the most contentious and 

transformative years in California‘s Education.  

Rafferty‘s educational philosophy was one of 

back to basics. He claimed that he ended 

progressive educational practices in California‘s 

classrooms and considered it one of his greatest 

achievements. Whether he actually did end 

progressive practices is highly debatable. To 

some Americans in the early 1960s, Max Rafferty 

appeared to be a reactionary conservative harking 

back to an educational past. The longer 

perspective of history may instead see Rafferty as 

a harbinger of the educational policies embodied 



100 

 

in No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Thus, Max 

Rafferty‘s notions of educational policy and 

practice deserve the attention of educational 

historians seeking to locate the origins of the 

educational agendas in place at the dawn of the 

twenty-first century. 

Two conflicting educational trends 

emerged under Rafferty‘s tenure. The back-to-

basics movement and ―Education in Depth,‖ 

championed by Rafferty‘s office, stressed phonics 

instruction over the ―look-see‖ method and a 

return to core subjects in lieu of so-called ―fuzzy‖ 

curriculum said to characterize Progressive 

Education. On the other hand, a rising awareness 

of the lack of minority representation in school 

textbooks and the curriculum generated calls for 

improved materials and greater diversity. The 

portrayal of minorities when they were mentioned 

in textbooks also came under increased scrutiny, 

particularly in history texts. The pedagogical 

transformation driven largely by political 

ideology and imposed from Sacramento changed 

instructional methodologies but was not 

successful in its intended goal of eliminating 

progressive educational practices from schools. 

However, the grassroots drive for greater 

diversity, and more positive portrayals of ethnic 

minorities in textbooks, permanently changed the 

content of the curriculum in America‘s schools.  

  

Dueling With John Dewey 

Max Rafferty saw his election as a 

mandate for purging progressive educational 

practices from California‘s schools. Progressive 

educators seek to center the educative experience 

in the emotional, intellectual and social 

experiences of the child. Thus, a child‘s education 

is child-centered and individualized. These 

notions ran counter to essentialist educators, like 

Rafferty, who believed that schooling ought to 

impart a fixed body of knowledge in a variety of 

subjects at each grade level. The Progressive 

innovation most vilified by traditionalists was 

‗life adjustment.‘ Life adjustment eschewed 

academic content in favor of social adjustment of 

students to their surroundings. Indeed, critics, 

such as Arthur Bestor, had argued for years that, 

as Wayne Urban put it, ―schools needed to be 

rescued from progressive educators‖ (Urban 

2009, 332). While many theorists contributed to 

the theoretical and pedagogical practices that 

comprise what is known as Progressive education, 

Max Rafferty saw John Dewey as its primary 

proponent. In fact, Dewey had written a book 

titled Experience and Education in 1938, in 

which he condemned the anti-academic 

tendencies then coming to dominate the life-

adjustment curriculum, but that made little 

difference. In speeches, Rafferty tirelessly 

attacked educators who followed what he called 

―the gospel according to St. John Dewey‖ 

(Rafferty 1965a, 1966a, 1966b, 1969a).   

―The Progressive Educationists – the 

spreaders of the gospel according to St. John 

Dewey – have much to answer for,‖ he wrote in 

1969 (Rafferty 1969a).  He insisted they were 

―most dangerous when they are most dedicated, 

they war against your children in the firm belief 

that they are helping them‖ (Rafferty 1969a). 

Rafferty railed against ―the tired old dogma of 

Progressive Education,‖ with what he called, ―its 

bubble-headed jargon of ‗life-adjustment‘‖ 

(Rafferty 1969a). ―Since the mid-thirties,‖ 

Rafferty wrote, progressive education ―has clung 

to the body of American education like a barnacle 

to the bottom of a boat‖ (Rafferty 1969a).  

According to Rafferty, progressive educational 

practices would cause children ―to grow up 

cultural barbarians, popular illiterates, adrenal 

rather than cerebral, indoctrinated instead of 

educated‖ (Rafferty 1969a). 



101 

 

 In place of progressive practices, Rafferty 

spoke out for what he called ―Education in 

Depth.‖ Announcing his campaign for reelection 

in March 1966, he declared, ―Before Max 

Rafferty, California was the center and the 

fountainhead of ‗life adjustment,‘ Progressive 

Education in these United States. Today, 

Progressive Education as our official statewide 

philosophy is as dead as a doornail‖ (Rafferty 

1966b). In its place, he advocated ―Education in 

Depth.‖ Rafferty told constituents, ―It‘s teaching 

through phonics … It‘s history taught as history, 

geography taught as geography, civics taught as 

civics. It‘s an end to ‗social studies‘ and ‗social 

living‘‖ (Rafferty 1966b). In another speech, 

Rafferty insisted he stood ―foursquare for 

Education in depth, Americanism in our schools, 

and observance of the principles of law and order 

on the part of students and instructors‖ (Rafferty 

1969b). But, he warned, ―Too many local school 

districts still follow the mandates of outmoded 

Progressive Education – the Gospel according to 

St. John Dewey‖ (Rafferty 1966b). Nor did 

Rafferty intend to confine ―Education in Depth‖ 

to California. He told audiences, if ―we can 

maintain in this state the philosophy which this 

victory represent[s] … can [we] encourage its 

adoption in the other 49 states‖ (Rafferty 1965b). 

Rafferty‘s ‗Education in Depth‘ often 

involved more rhetorical flourish than substantive 

curriculum reform. In 1964, Rafferty ordered the 

―substitution of terms ‗History and Geography‘ 

and ‗Social Sciences‘ for ‗Social Studies‘‖ 

(Rafferty 1964a). He insisted that the 

―enchantment with ―social studies‖ and ―social 

living‖ instead of history has taken us a long way 

down the road to oblivion‖ (Rafferty 1965c).  

Five years later Rafferty was still assuring 

constituents that ―California on the state level no 

longer uses the terms Social Studies or Language 

Arts. We are calling subjects by their right 

names‖ (Rafferty 1969b).   

Although Rafferty savaged Progressive 

educational practices in speech and print, 

throughout his eight years in office, he had 

surprisingly little lasting impact in classrooms. 

Progressive pedagogy survived and even thrived 

in California schools in the 1970s and beyond. 

However, his efforts at curriculum reform fared 

much better. 

 

Textbooks and Curriculum Reform 

Max Rafferty may have sought to turn 

back the clock where subject titles and pedagogy 

were concerned, but he also recognized the 

dramatic changes in the world beyond the 

schoolroom, and sought to influence curriculum 

in positive ways. He tirelessly advocated early 

phonics instruction and made lasting changes in 

the reading curriculum. During his tenure, the 

content found in California textbooks, particularly 

history textbooks, changed in dramatic and 

substantive ways. The way California obtained 

textbooks changed as well.  

In 1884, State Senator George Perry of 

San Francisco introduced an amendment to 

California‘s State Constitution to allow the State 

Printing Office to publish a State Series of 

textbooks. The measure passed, and the 

Legislature ordered the State Board to adopt a 

State Series of textbooks to be printed and sold by 

the State Printing Office. Thereafter, California 

insisted that publishers lease their plates so that 

any textbooks adopted could be printed at the 

State Printing Plant in Sacramento. The first 

break with this tradition came in 1960 when the 

State adopted the reading books of Ginn and 

Company, despite the firm‘s refusal to lease the 

plates. By 1963, several non-leasing firms had 

secured adoptions, and the state began purchasing 



102 

 

fully manufactured textbooks directly from the 

publishers. 

Max Rafferty‘s most enduring curriculum 

reform restored phonics to a place of primacy in 

early reading instruction in California classrooms. 

Max Rafferty actively sought to embed phonics 

instruction in California‘s classrooms. He advised 

textbook publishers, ―My special interest lies … 

in the area of elementary school reading books 

and their treatment of phonics‖ (Rafferty 1963a). 

When Rafferty was elected, most California 

school districts taught pupils to read using a word 

recognition approach, the so-called ‗look-see‘ or 

‗look-say‘ method. The basal readers used text 

that mirrored the method, ―look, see Spot run.‖ 

Phonics was introduced later. Teachers, Rafferty 

argued, ―drag phonics in by the scruff of the neck 

months after the ‗look-say‘ damage has been 

done,‖ and this, he believed was a mistake 

(Rafferty 1969c). Rafferty noted that, ―under this 

system, the tests showed a steady decline in 

reading ability‖ (Rafferty 1969c). As a frequent 

contributor to major newspapers, he sought to 

utilize the press to apply political heat to advocate 

for curriculum change, believing that ―even the 

enemies of phonics will reluctantly use it to pull 

their chestnuts out of the fire if the fire finally 

gets hot enough‖ (Rafferty 1969c). Rafferty 

boasted of the example of the Los Angeles 

Unified School District. After implementing 

curriculum reforms (he endorsed) that introduced 

phonics from the very start of reading instruction, 

student test scores rose. Test results, he exulted, 

showed ―for the first time in umpteen years the 

reading scores are up‖ (Rafferty 1969c). The 

introduction of early phonics instruction is 

perhaps the most enduring educational reform of 

Max Rafferty‘s tenure as State Superintendent, 

but he also sought to impact educational policy 

and pedagogy.  

Rafferty led the effort to transform the 

content found in history and geography texts. 

Efforts to revise the textbooks, to be more 

ethnically inclusive and give previously 

unrecognized peoples a visible place in the 

American narrative, began early in Rafferty‘s first 

term. He wrote to textbook publishers explaining, 

―My interest lies in the possibility of exploring 

with you … problems that exist … in connection 

with … history and geography books and the 

treatment accorded minority groups in these 

textbooks‖ (Rafferty 1963a). 

 

Textbooks and Civil Rights 

With the Civil Rights movement gaining 

momentum and Freedom Summer underway in 

1964, Rafferty sought the opinions of noted 

historians, asking them to critique the portrayal of 

minorities in proposed history textbooks. One 

such critique, of the fourth grade text California 

and the West, by historian Winthrop Jordan 

concluded, ―if it is not intended that fourth 

graders be taught about social problems 

concerning minority groups, this book  is by no 

means a poor introduction to California‘s people 

and land, despite its rather boost-California tone. 

On the other hand,‖ Jordan continued, ―if it is 

hoped that a textbook of history and geography 

can convey to young students some knowledge 

and sense of the social problems engendered by 

the presence of minority groups in California, 

then this book fails completely by omission‖ 

(Jordan 1964). Historian Kenneth Stampp, 

commenting on several potential texts, including 

the one reviewed by Jordan, said:  

 

In their treatments of minority groups 

[the texts] suffer from the same 

shortcomings as the high school and 

junior high school texts … Once more 

the chief sins are sins of omission. The 

existence of minority groups in 



103 

 

California, the resulting social problems, 

and the contributions that members of 

minority groups have made, are largely 

underplayed, or overlooked altogether 

(Stampp 1964).   

That failure by omission proved unacceptable to 

the State Curriculum Commission, the State 

Board of Education, and concerned citizens; other 

history texts would soon face greater scrutiny.  

With Civil Rights at the forefront of the 

nation‘s agenda, new constituencies demanded 

important editorial changes. Rafferty 

commissioned a panel of six prominent historians, 

Kenneth Stampp, Winthrop Jordan, Lawrence 

Levine, Robert Middlekauff, Charles Sellers, and 

George Stocking Jr. to examine textbooks for 

their treatment of minorities—as that term was 

then understood. The resulting report titled ―The 

Negro in American History Textbooks‖ examined 

both the ideal of historical scholarship and how 

the portrayal of minorities in textbooks differed 

from the interpretations of contemporary 

historians. The report opened with the observation 

that, ―We are concerned first of all as historians 

that the history taught in our schools should 

accurately reflect the best findings of current 

scholarship.‖ They also cautioned, ―Professional 

scholars are aware that historical ‗truth‘ is an 

elusive quality.‖ That said, the historians noted: 

 

 Most of the textbooks we have 

examined reflect views on racial and 

sectional themes that have been rejected 

or drastically modified by the best of 

current historical scholarship. (Stampp 

et. al. 1964) 

 

The commission concluded, ―the greatest 

defect in the textbooks we have examined is the 

virtual omission of the Negro. … the Negro does 

not ‗exist‘ in the books‖ (Stampp et. al. 1964). In 

the sections covering the history of the 

antebellum and Civil War eras, these historians 

found that ―The ‗southern‘ view tended to prevail. 

The deference of textbook publishers to the 

special sensitivities of the southern market has 

caused it to continue by and large to prevail in 

textbooks to the present day.‖ The committee 

observed, ―Important aspects of Negro experience 

… differ from that of many other groups in 

America … no other group could be so readily 

indentified by its color, no other group was so 

systematically enslaved, and no other group has 

been subjected to as persistent and virulent 

discrimination.‖ Noting, ―there is a danger in 

assessing historical writing in terms of its social 

consequences,‖ the commission offered both 

cautions and recommendations to textbook 

publishers. The committee warned that the ―desire 

to combat racism‖ and ―to bolster self-respect 

among Negro students, might result in 

exaggerating Negro contributions and the heroic 

qualities of Negro figures.‖ They argued, ―this 

would be an equal distortion of historical truth, 

and in the long run would fail to have the 

desire[d] social effects.‖ The committee also 

pointed out that ―the seriousness of the problem 

of racism underscores the textbook author‘s 

responsibility to portray the Negro‘s role in 

American life fully, accurately, and without either 

sentimentality or condescension.‖ The historians 

on the committee concluded, ―[the] civil-rights 

revolution seems to us to be one of the major 

historical events of the mid-twentieth century and 

to demand full treatment in any American history 

textbook … Surely the state of California can no 

longer tolerate textbooks that fall short of this 

minimal standard‖ (Stampp et. al. 1964).  The 

committee then went on to offer specific critiques 

of the adopted history texts for grades five, eight, 

and high school. 

George Stocking found that The Story of 

American Freedom (McMillan 1961), a fifth 



104 

 

grade text, ―treads a very narrow course between 

a dominant traditional concern for Southern 

prejudices and a dawning consciousness of … 

Negro-liberal sensitivities.‖ Lawrence Levine 

examined The Growth of America (Prentice-Hall 

1959), an eighth grade text, and found ―the 

author‘s treatment of slavery can be called 

favorable.‖ The account of the events leading to 

the Civil War are described as ―generally brief 

and inadequate‖ and the account of origins of the 

Emancipation Proclamation as ―novel and 

fanciful.‖ Most fell between these two extremes. 

None of the textbooks gave a good account of 

minority contributions, and most clearly suffered 

from what Winthrop Jordan called ―an apparent 

subservience to Southern sensitivities‖ and Robert 

Middlekauff called ―shrink[ing] before the tender 

sensibilities of the South‖ (Stampp et. al. 1964).   

One of the first textbooks to provide a full 

account of African-American accomplishments 

appeared two years later. It faced intense 

opposition, not for its portrayal of minorities, 

which was far better than previous texts, but for 

its perceived ideological bias. The State Board of 

Education approved the 8
th

 grade history textbook 

Land of the Free on May 13, 1966. As partisan 

political opposition to the text quickly arose, the 

conservative Max Rafferty insisted that the book 

was approved by a board made up of persons 

appointed primarily by his democratic 

predecessor, Governor Edmund Brown. He 

declared, ―After their approval, I did the only 

thing I could do, and that was to ‗blow the 

whistle‘ on this book to the parents of California, 

a book that I saw as being inaccurate, biased, and 

prejudiced‖ (Rafferty 1967).  Rafferty requested a 

number of revisions to the text but his changes 

were primarily ideological in nature. He observed 

that following his suggestions, Presidents Taft 

and Hoover, and John D. Rockefeller were ―dealt 

with more fairly and completely than before.‖ 

Revisions toned down praise of the New Deal and 

added acknowledgment of some of its less 

successful aspects.  

Once again, a committee of prominent 

historians, Allen Nevins, Glenn Dumke, and 

Charles Sellers examined the book. Unlike 

Rafferty, the committee was ―impressed‖ by the 

―high quality of the book and the earnestness and 

merit of many of the critical judgments‖ (Nevins 

et. al. 1967). The committee lauded the text for its 

focus on ―civil liberties and social justice‖ and 

found it ―superior to the textbooks … used in the 

past,‖ but they also noted, ―it emphasizes national 

shortcomings and mistakes too heavily.‖ While 

gentler than Rafferty in their criticism, they too 

found that ―the text seems weighted against a 

conservative interpretation,‖ and ―more balance is 

clearly needed and would help the authors avoid 

an impression of distortion.‖ The committee 

agreed with Rafferty that while the successes of 

the WPA and TWA during the New Deal era 

were ―well treated the failure of the NRA [wa]s 

not.‖ In the end, however, the committee praised 

―the book‘s many good qualities‖ and concluded 

that Land of the Free was ―superior to many 

school textbooks‖ (Nevins et. al. 1967). 

By mid-1967, opposition to war in general 

and to the Vietnam War in particular was 

increasing, and the disaffection in the larger 

society filtered into the textbook debate. Max 

Rafferty demanded that certain editorial changes 

be made. He ordered the publishers to make clear 

―the fact that Communist revolutionaries began 

the Viet Nam war,‖ and insisted that The Atomic 

Energy Commission not be ―described as ‗the 

nuclear warfare agency‘‖ (Rafferty 1967). 

Rafferty wanted a textbook that presented a 

balanced portrayal of the conservative views he 

advocated and, at the height of the Cold War, a 

textbook that was sound on anti-communism. 



105 

 

While Max Rafferty supported 

commissions to revise and enhance minority 

representation in textbooks, he strenuously 

opposed so-called ‗forced busing‘ to achieve 

desegregation of schools. Nineteen-seventy was 

an election year. Rafferty lost both his bid for a 

seat in the United States Senate and his State 

Superintendency. The voters who embraced 

Rafferty and his back-to-basics reforms in the 

early 1960s abandoned him in 1970, but his 

legacy remained evident in California classrooms 

for many years afterward. While he had little 

impact on pedagogy, and progressive practices 

survived, the phonics instruction that Rafferty 

fought stridently for remains a mainstay of the 

primary reading curriculum.  

The debate over the content and 

interpretations presented in the history curriculum 

and textbooks reemerged in the 1990s as the so-

called social studies wars. Many of the debates 

during Rafferty‘s tenure, including the focus on 

basic subject-matter content versus progressive 

pedagogy, also re-emerged in the 1990s with No 

Child Left Behind (NCLB) and continues to 

animate American education today. This, perhaps, 

confirms David Tyack‘s ―conjecture that 

historians a hundred years hence may consider the 

ferment of the 1960s and 1970s to be a major 

turning point in the history of American 

education‖ (Tyack 1974). Max Rafferty stood at 

the center of the political stage, creating a fair 

amount of that ferment. He also contributed to the 

ideological foundation for the resurgent 

conservative educational paradigms that arose 

with the so-called ‗social studies wars‘ and the 

back-to-basics movement embodied in No Child 

Left Behind in the 1990s. 

 

References 

 

Isserman, Maurice, Michael Kazin. 2000. 

American divided: The civil war of the 1960s, 

New York: Oxford Press 

Jordan, Winthrop. 1964b. Re: California and the 

west, John W Reith, ed. (Fielder Co. 1963). 

Max Rafferty Papers, Textbooks F3752:840, 

California State Archives.        

Nevins, Allan, Glenn Dumke, Charles Sellers. 

1967. Report to the state board of education 

on the eighth grade text in American history. 

Max Rafferty Papers, Textbooks F3752:843, 

California State Archives. 

Rafferty, Max. 1963a. Letter June 26. Max 

Rafferty Papers, Textbooks F3752:840, 

California State Archives.        

Rafferty, Max. 1964a. memo, Max Rafferty 

Papers, Textbooks F3752:840, California 

State Archives.        

Rafferty, Max. 1965a. ―Education‘s 12 Herculean 

labors‖  Max Rafferty Papers, Weekly 

Syndicated Columns F3752:846, California 

State Archives.        

Rafferty, Max 1965b. ―Education and the big lie,‖ 

Max Rafferty Papers, General 

Correspondence, 3752:855, California State 

Archives. 

Rafferty, Max. 1965c. ―The teaching of 

patriotism‖ The Sacramento Union, December 

9, Max Rafferty Papers, Weekly Syndicated 

Columns F3752:846, California State 

Archives. 

Rafferty, Max. 1966a. ―The American high 

school: Undertaker or regenerator?‖ February 

12.  Max Rafferty Papers, General 

Correspondence, F3752:855, California State 

Archives. 

Rafferty, Max. 1966b. ―Announcement of 

candidacy,‖ March 22.  Max Rafferty Papers, 

Speeches F3752:855, California State 

Archives.       



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Rafferty, Max. 1967. undated letters, Max 

Rafferty Papers, Textbooks F3752:843, 

California State Archives.        

Rafferty, Max. 1969a. ―The war against your 

children‖  Max Rafferty Papers, Weekly 

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Rafferty, Max. 1969b. Rafferty to Abrahamson 

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Correspondence, F3752:744 Box 29, 

California State Archives.        

Rafferty, Max. 1969c. ―Surprise! surprise! 

Phonics works in L.A.‖ Max Rafferty papers, 

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Stampp, Kenneth. 1964. Stampp to Clowes June 

10. Max Rafferty Papers, Textbooks 

F3752:840, California State Archives.        

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Levine, Robert Middlekauff, Charles Sellers, 

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