Fall from Grace: Arming America and the Bellesiles Scandal

Yale Law Journal ^ | 4/26/2002 | James Lindgren

[ArcLight]

Since the book’s publication, scholars who have checked the book’s claims against its sources have uncovered an almost unprecedented number of discrepancies, errors, and omissions...Arming America is changing the way that some historians think about their own profession and how some scholars in fields allied to history regard historical research and publishing. Understanding this book and the scandal it generated is important for scholars and teachers across the social sciences, humanities, and law. Any graduate or professional student who aspires to be an academic might profit by exploring the twists and turns of the Bellesiles scandal.

[ArcLight]

This is a PDF file of a fascinating article...

[Joe Brower]

Interesting read. Not wanting to offend his fellows in his profession and risk incurring the ire of a "fellow intellectual collegue", Lingren is careful to frame Bellesiles' "work" in terms of "error".

Not being so constrained by diplomacy, I can call Bellesiles lame effort at reinventing history for what it is: a blatant fraud.

[Little Bill]

When this thing came up I thought it was BS. My family fought in King Phillips War. 1649, 40% of the White population in NE dead, the various French and Indian wars, many New Englanders and Southerns Dead, The Reveloution in upstate NY.

The Common denominator is that all citizens in NE and the South were milita members and required by law to keep 100 rounds and a firelock and to train periodicly. The third oldest unit in the US Army is the Essex Regement, 101 Infantry, Mass National Guard, 1680.

[Rytwyng]

ping

[Rytwyng]

Not wanting to offend his fellows in his profession and risk incurring the ire of a "fellow intellectual collegue", Lingren is careful to frame Bellesiles' "work" in terms of "error".

I noticed that, as well. Why is the word "Liar" so taboo nowadays?

[Shooter 2.5]

When I wrote a review of the book for Amazon.com, I used the examples of artwork and literature. A head of household seemed to always have a picture of a gun in his hands or somewhere in the background.
I wonder how long Emory College is going to support their scandal.

[Little Bill]

If you look at pictures taken in the West in the 1860 and 1870s', over the fire place there was lots of guns. When the Feds pulled out of the west during the War Between the States, the milita took up the slack, my Great-granddads served in the Second Utah Volunteer Cav, during this period.

[white trash redneck]

What a devastating critique!

It is testimony to the political correctness that reigns on university campuses that this fraud hasn't been ridden out on a rail clad in tar and feathers.

However, some good may come of Bellesisles' writing - an honest debate on axe control. On the one hand, we'll have the pro-axe rights group claiming that "Axes don't kill people - people kill people." On the axe-control side, we'll have the gnashing of teeth about the need for axe control, for the children, of course, and about the deadly, semi-automatic form of the axe, the chainsaw.

[ClearCase_guy]

Why is the word "Liar" so taboo nowadays?

Now, now. If we used the word "liar" everytime it was deserved, people would start to think that Democrats and Academics were incapable of ever telling the truth. We can't have that!

[TC Rider]

Interesting article.

The poor b@stard who wrote it felt compelled to give his gun grabbin' bona fides at the start. I guess he didn't want to be called a "foaming at the mouth, racist, intolerant, homophobic, insensitive, gun loving, right wing, extremist conservative".

[AnAmericanMother]

I was a history major and later a trial lawyer, so maybe I can shed some light on this. Among scholars, as among lawyers, the bald word "liar" is instinctively avoided.

With scholars, there is a tradition of courtesy, which Lindgren avoids breaking by just setting out his facts. Notice how Lindgren tried to approach Belleisles and was repeatedly rebuffed (and insulted). He carefully recounts all this.

When I first began trying cases, I was told by older lawyers NEVER to call a witness a liar in front of a jury. They think you're mean if you do that. Just get the facts out, and let the JURY decide he's a liar . . . they like it better if it's THEIR decision. I think Lindgren wants his reader to make the final call. It's a slam dunk, anyhow.

To my added shame, not only am I a lawyer (albeit an honest one . . . they do exist) but I graduated from Emory University. I have already written the chairman of the History department, but received no reply. If we don't keep the heat on Emory they will whitewash this whole thing . . . .

[Drango]

Wow...the author, a self described gun loather, has ripped Bellesiles a new one by examining the orginal documents and shining the light of truth on 'em.

The NY Times in response has said nothing. Columbia University, which awarded Bellesiles the Bancroft Prize has made him Dean of the History department. /sarcasm

[Leisler]

HTMF file of article here

[Cicero]

You took the words out of my mouth. If you call someone a liar, the normal reaction is that you must be mean and out of control. "Liar" is a fighting word. It gets people riled up so they become unwilling to look at the evidence. It's better to demonstrate that someone is lying, calmly and factually. Then let people draw their own conclusions and persuade themselves.

[CatoRenasci]

You put it very nicely. Although my primary field as a graduate student was European intellectual history, I also studied military history and American history. Historians simply don't call each other liars -- for the simple reason that traditionally, even if one is pressing one's ideological case, historians don't falsify evidence or intentionally distort it. Push it as far as it can go on your side, sure, but acutally lie or cite it for the opposite proposition? Not done. In one seminar I participated in, some 30+ years ago, someone was caught out by the rest of us at intentionally misrepresenting evidence. The very liberal professor, after closely questioning the guilty party, asked them to withdraw from the seminar and suggested they find something else to do before they were asked to withdraw from the graduate program.

This is the fruit of 30 years of Howard Zinn and his ilk, placing ideology over accuracy.

[PoorMuttly]

Liar!

All interested parties are invited to request clarification. See Alamo Girl entries for examples.

[Gumlegs]

On the axe-control side, we'll have the gnashing of teeth about the need for axe control, for the children, of course, and about the deadly, semi-automatic form of the axe, the chainsaw.

Don't minimize the problem! A chainsaw is a full-auto!

[AnAmericanMother]

You are absolutely correct.

My undergraduate years were in the early 70s, when the older professors were still what I call "classical liberals" - or liberals with honor, if you will. My concentration was in military history, but I did a lot of classics as well. No professor in either the History or Classics department would tolerate fudging or hiding the ball . . . and CERTAINLY not when every "error" was in favor of the student's thesis, as in Belleisles's case.

Those old guys are now retired or deceased (I read with sorrow that the wonderful Dean of the Chapel at my college, Ernest Gordon, recently passed away) and the young Turks are unabashed polemicists for whom truth is secondary to ideological purity.

The fact that Emory is stalling this debate and trying to whitewash even so blatant a cheat and fraud as this horrendous book, instead of debating whether to drop Belleisles off the top of Woodruff Library or tie him to the Seaboard tracks down at the railroad depot, is proof enough for me. :-D

[borkrules]

It's not just Emory that should be red-faced over this. Look at all the prominent periodicals and authors that gave glowing reviews to this piece of unabashed fiction. Wills should be ashamed of himself, were he even capable of the emotion.

[AnAmericanMother]

Frankly, I don't blame them so much as I blame his department head and whoever supposedly peer reviewed his work.

Reviewers can't anticipate that somebody would engage in wholesale alteration and even manufacture of "data". I agree that the liberal gun control mavens (and I include Wills in that bunch - like the ACLU, he only supports the parts of the Bill of Rights he agrees with) jumped all over this book with way too much glee. They were so anxious to believe that it clouded their judgment. But, on the other hand, unlike scholars in the field, they had no way to check Belleisles's falsified data.