Bill OReilly - Kids Are Americans Too

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Kids Are Americans Too

Bill OReilly and Charles Flowers

This book is for Madeline and Spencer,
who hopefully will develop into great
Americans and improve their country.
Your Dad Loves You.

B.OR.

For Sharon Canup , whose dry wit and
good heart are missed, but essential to
these pages.

C.F.

CONTENTS

Could not have been done without ace
agent Eric Simonoff, purveyor of
calm Makeda Wubneh, excellent editor
Hope Innelli, and keeper of the domestic
flame Maureen OReilly.

B.OR.

Long ago, Brainerd Junior High School
teacher Lassie Munsey labored tirelessly
against great odds to teach a raucous
all-boy class about our rights. Hope this
book gets it right, Miss Munsey.

C.F.

Welcome to the real world.

Thats rightThe real deal: life in the United States of America, where you are a citizen. Millions all over the world would like to be in your sneakersSo together lets begin looking at the countless reasons why.

A QUICK BITE OF REALITY TV

SETTING: Friday Harbor, a quiet village on an island off the coast of Washington State. Boats, gulls, waves, breezesyou know the kind of thing.

SCENE: The modest home of single mother Carmen Dixon and her daughter Lacy, fourteen. Moms home alone. The phone rings.

Mrs. Dixon: Hello?

Sheriff: Mrs. Dixon, this is Sheriff Cumming.

Mrs. Dixon: Is Lacy all right?

Sheriff: Shes fine, maam, so far as I know. But shes got a boyfriend who may be in trouble.

Mrs. Dixon: I knew it. Its Oliver. Hes too old for her. Hes seventeen.

Sheriff: Well, I think he mugged an old lady downtown and ran off with her purse.

Mrs. Dixon: Lacy would never be involved in something like that.

Sheriff: Yes, maam. But maybe Oliveryou know how he iswould brag to her, and tell her what he did with the purse.

Mrs. Dixon: I see. Well, Ill do what I can.

Sheriff: Thanks.

Mrs. Dixon puts down the receiver just as her daughter walks in. The phone rings again.

Lacy: Thats probably Oliver, Mom. Ill take it on the extension in my bedroom.

The girl walks into the next room. Her mother very quietly picks up the kitchen phone.

Oliver: (on telephone, laughing)and then I took out the money and threw the old ladys purse into those weeds near the railroad crossing.

CUT.

Okay, this little slice of reality TV might not make the top ten, but its all true. It happened, and so did a lot more than that, as youll see. I think the whole story is a good tease, as we say in TV, for this little book about your rights as an American kid.

Mrs. Dixon told the sheriff what she heard about the purseHe found it, along with other evidence about the crime. Oliver was arrested, convicted in a jury trial, and sentenced to two years in jail.

Justice at work?

Not according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which sent lawyers in, mouths blazing, to argue to the court that Lacys constitutional rights had been violated when her mother eavesdropped on her private conversation with her beloved mugger. So what? Well, that meant what Mrs. Dixon heard had not been legally obtained and therefore could not be used as evidence in a trial.

Does that argument make any sense to you? Well, it did to the states supreme court. The judges agreed that the girls right to privacy had been violated, so Olivers conviction was thrown out of court. (He was convicted in a second trial without Mrs. Dixons testimony, but thats another story.)

Now, its cool that we all have a right to privacy and that we are free to see to it that its enforced, but there are a couple of things to think about here. First, does a parent not have the right to protect a child from harm? And in this case, wasnt Mrs. Dixon trying to do just that by overseeing her daughters ties with an obvious criminal? You have your opinion, and others will have other opinions.

Second, is a kids personal privacy such a basic right that it cannot be overruled by the parents right? And what about the mugging victims rights in all of this? Again, you have your opinion, and others will have other opinions.

But with so many different opinions, how can we ever make sense out of situations like this? And how can we know which rights are more important than other rights?

Well, thats exactly what were going to find out in this book. By the time youve finished reading the final chapter, I hope youll understand the story of your own personal rights. It looks complicated, at first. But were going to have some fun with all of this stuff, I promise you.

You see it all the time on TV.

On cop shows, on news programs like mine, someone is yelling, Hey, I know my rights!

Well, maybe that person does, but probably not.

Sometimes its just a lot of stupid shouting. Showing off. Like the Spartans and Persians in the movie They give a bad name to discussion of rights.

But, hey, your rights are very important to your life. In this country, the reason they exist at all is because smart, brave, honorable people foughtand still fight!to make them work for you and for every other American.

Especially you, kid.

Listen up: Even though youre not an adult yet, youre just as much an American as anyone is. That includes your parents, your teachers, your boss, and the cop on the block.

BUTdo you have the same rights as they do?

No, you dont.

So, whats the difference?

Well, there are many, many differences. Sometimes the differences exist for good reasonssometimes those reasons are debatable.

Thats what this book is all about. When we finish this trip together, I hope youll feel that you know more than most people your age (and maybe some adults, too) about what your rights as a kid actually are. (And are not.)

So, do any of these rights weve been talking about have anything to do with issues you really care about, like whether or not your school can keep you from wearing clothes that show off your bare midriff? Or whether your school locker can be searched by school officials without your permission? Or whether you can bring your date to the senior prom, even if she is enrolled at another school?

You bet they do. That is exactly what were talking about. All of these are cases where you think you ought to be able to do something that other peopleparents, school, communitysay that you definitely cannot do.

Lets face it. Many American kids are complete morons. So are many American adults. As I say on TV, the Constitution gives all Americans the right to be a moron, and a lot of us exercise that right every day.

When I use the word moron, I am referring to people who are simply too lazy to figure out what their country is all about. Yeah, they like the freedom to have fun and have stuff, but they dont want to learn about how that freedom came to them.

You, kid, are an American. You have an obligation to be a good citizen. That means that you should be honest and pay attention to what happens in the United States and in the rest of the world, too. The iPods, computers, cell phones, and Black-Berries are fine, but you need to get out of yourself once in a while and look around in order to see and understand what is actually happening here in your America.

Many kids simply do not do that. Dont be one of them.

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