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Banger
Daily News.net
Actor Dreyfuss wants
civics to be school priority
By Judy Harrison,
from the Web. June 29, 2009
BAR HARBOR, Maine -- Richard Dreyfuss
the Oscar-winning actor did not make an appearance Friday at the Maine State Bar
Association’s summer meeting. Richard Dreyfuss the activist, historian and
civics teacher did.
“We are bound together only by the ideas that were born in the Enlightenment and
actualized in the Constitution, the Declaration and the Gettysburg Address,” he
said. “If those ideas are not taught and taught and re-taught, we are not
bound [to them].”
Dreyfuss, who comes from a family of lawyers, said that he has retired from
acting to focus on creating a K-12 civics curriculum and implementing it in all
public schools in the nation. He said it would teach reason, logic and
critical analysis as well as how the “democratic experiment” that became the
United States of America was designed to work.
“If you want to build a Ford or a Porsche, you must first learn about the
working of the internal combustion engine,” he said. “I believe the
mechanics of how democracy works can be taught just as the workings of the
internal combustion engine can.”
At 61, Dreyfuss looks more like the music teacher he played in “Mr. Holland’s
Opus” than he does Matt Hooper, the shark expert that shot him to fame in
“Jaws.” It was Stephen Spielberg’s first hit and not the many films in
which Dreyfuss has played lawyers and politicians from which the summer meeting
borrowed its catchy moniker — Summer Stars: Jaws to Laws.
More than 300 attorneys from around the state and their family members gathered
at the Harborside Hotel in downtown Bar Harbor for the association’s semi-annual
meeting. Topics included the recently passed law that allows for mediation
in foreclosures, renewable energy, the graying of the bar and social networking
for lawyers.
Dreyfuss, however, drew the biggest crowd. Judges and attorneys grabbed
the best seats 30 minutes before the actor was scheduled to speak. Leigh
I. Saufley, chief justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, and Attorney
General Janet Mills sat in the front.
Dreyfuss admitted that like the Jimmy Stewart character in the Frank Capra film,
“Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” he might be fighting for a lost cause. He
quoted Stewart’s character: “They’re the only ones worth fighting for even
if you know you’re going to lose.”
“The lost cause I refer to is this — we control this country,” Dreyfuss said.
“We actually are the sovereign power here. How much money, time, effort
and creativity goes into distracting us from that.”
In his 90-minute presentation, Dreyfuss said television, computers and the age
of instant gratification have all but destroyed civic and civil debate.
“Civility is about more than just manners,” Dreyfuss said. “It is the
oxygen that Democracy requires or else it dies.”
Saufley, who said she was a big fan of Dreyfuss’ films, said she agreed with his
basic message that “we need to think deeply about how we engage in civic debate”
and “to model it for our children.”
The chief justice added that the courts and the legal professionals around the
state are where she often sees the kind of civil discourse Dreyfuss said was
missing from discussions on a national level, particularly those on television
news shows.
“I believe the legal practitioners here are the most generous and civil in the
country,” she said.
Bangor attorney M. Ray Bradford Jr. called Dreyfuss’ remarks “captivating,” but
said the actor should have issued a more direct call for action from the bar
association and its members.
“If you say the word ‘civics’ to people under the age of 25,” Bradford said,
“most of them are going to think Honda. A car brand is more popular than
the word itself. Maybe we need to find better ways to bring [Dreyfuss’] message
home. He should have asked all lawyers to make the civics process work.”
jharrison@bangordailynews.net (990-8207)
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