Prize rescinded for (spurious) 'Arming America' book

UPI ^

[Dallas]

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 (UPI) -- Columbia University's Board of Trustees has rescinded a major prize its selection committee had awarded to an author despite early red flags that his book on gun-ownership rights was based on flawed research.

On Friday, the university announced that its trustees had voted to rescind the prestigious Bancroft Prize given in April 2001 to former Emory University history Professor Michael Bellesiles for his book "Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture."

The thesis of the book is that there were few firearms in early America and most of the guns that did exist were old and broken -- an assertion that provoked vigorous and widespread skepticism before the prize was awarded.

The Bancroft Prize is given for works judged to be "of enduring worth and impeccable scholarship that make a major contribution to our understanding of the American past."

Columbia said its trustees made their decision based on a review of an investigation of scholarly misconduct by Emory University and other assessments of professional historians. These investigators concluded that Bellesiles "had violated basic norms of acceptable scholarly conduct."

Bellesiles was allowed to provide his input before Columbia made its decision.

The book "had not and does not meet the standards ... established for the Bancroft Prize," the trustees found.

Columbia also requested that Bellesiles return $4,000 in prize money. It is the first time the prize has been withdrawn since it was first awarded in 1948.

Columbia's recent evaluation of "Arming America" by its trustees, administration and faculty contrasts sharply with the original review by the Bancroft selection committee in 2001. Columbia's prize committee issued the award though there were several indication it was based on flawed research.

"Arming America" was embraced by many scholars because it appeared to confirm what several already believed: that the Second Amendment protects only a collective right to bear arms, and individual gun rights were unimportant to America's Founders.

In October, Bellesiles resigned from his professorship at Emory after a panel of historians built on the work of critics (most notably James Lindgren of Northwestern University) and found the author was "guilty of unprofessional and misleading work."

The National Endowment for the Humanities also withdrew its name from a Newberry fellowship awarded to Bellesiles for a second book on guns. (The NEH and the William & Mary Quarterly were the first to seriously examine the charges against Bellesiles).

Columbia's provost, Jonathan Cole, told National Review his school's decision came at the end of a careful process that began in the fall of 2001. But before the Bancroft Prize was awarded the previous April, scholars already had shown that Bellesiles's main probate data -- through which he tried to show that few guns were inherited as parts of estates -- were mathematically impossible. Further, he cited records that were destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906.

When asked by National Review last fall, Arthur Goren -- a Columbia emeritus professor who was then chair of the prize committee -- said he wasn't aware of a public debate or serious questions about "Arming America" when the committee considered it: "We reviewed 150 books over a four-month period," he said. "As you undertake that process and seek to recognize innovative work, among other things, it is probably inevitable that some of the books will touch on controversial topics."

A scholarly manuscript detailing most of these problems was sent, however, to one of the original Bancroft panel members, Rutgers historian Jan Lewis.

On April 18, 2001, the day Columbia presented Bellesiles his prize, the Columbia College Conservative Club held a roundtable discussion on the author's work. No Bancroft committee member or member of the school's History Department attended.

"On April 9, I e-mailed members of the History Department and the Bancroft committee with a summary of the case against Bellesiles, including some clear cases of fraud," said Ron Lewenberg, then president of the CCCC. "I received no responses." Lewenberg repeated the mailings with the same result.

"I was not allowed to put the packets in the mailboxes of professors and staff, so with the approval of the secretary, I placed them on the desk," he said. "According to a friendly TA (teaching assistant), whose anonymity I have kept secret for the protection of his career, Professor Eric Foner saw the handouts and threw a fit. All of the packets were thrown out."

On Tuesday Foner, who was not on the committee, said he had no recollection of the event and found Lewenberg's account "implausible."

"Anybody can leave anything in the mailbox of professors," he said. "Our mailboxes are in a public hallway."

Last week, Foner defended the process the committee followed, saying it worked "on a basis of trust."

"We assume a book published by a reputable press has gone through a process where people have checked the facts," he said. "Members of prize committees cannot be responsible for that."

Joyce Malcolm, a history professor at Bentley College who has written a book on the Anglo-American conception of gun rights and who was an early skeptic of Bellesiles's research, disagrees.

"The sad part is that if the prize committee had taken the trouble to read the serious criticism of the book before bestowing this award, they would never have been put in this embarrassing situation," she said. "The award was meant to be for a work of impeccable scholarship, and it was clear before April 2001 that 'Arming America' was not such a book."

The book's publisher, Knopf, said it would continue to publish the work's paperback edition.

-0-

[No Truce With Kings]

The unkindest cut was that they asked him to return thee $4000 that went with the award -- especially since he no longer has a day job.

Cannot get a job teaching and now McDonalds and Burger King are not hiring. Wouldn't be this guy for a bet.

[goldstategop]

Alfred E. Knopf is going to publish fiction? That's good - people can see for themselves the gun banners agenda is motivated by anything BUT a respect for the truth. Michael Bellisles may have been discredited but the ugly cause that fathered him lives on.

[Dallas]

He could be a democrapic speech writer....they're always looking for that kind of talent.

[the_Watchman]

The book's publisher, Knopf, said it would continue to publish the work's paperback edition.

The facts have never stood in the way of Knopf before! Liberal authors gravitate to this publisher.

[islander-11]

A psudo-intellectual liberal college professor writes a Barbara Streisand filled book that tries to attack our Constitution. He uses phony, made-up data to challenge the wishes of the founding fathers and the basic rights of American citizens. He is the champion of the left for about two years, until the BS meter spins off the dial and he is discovered to be a liar.

I'm sure the Washington Post and NY Times will have this story on page one, above the fold...

[mvpel]

I've printed up stickers detailing the various travails this book has seen and stick them in the inside cover of the book whenever I see it in a bookstore.

[eureka!]

At least he is not a lying plagiarist like Doris Kearns Goodwin. They're the worst. You can't trust a word they haven't written....

Seriously, nice to see this fraud revealed. Oh, that the Clymers in the lamestream presstitution racket would suffer similarly for their daily doses of lies and half truths foisted on the sheeple....

[SteveH]

Bellesiles Bancroft bang

[Ronin]

I imagine this book will still be published and still be quoted and still be referenced years and years into the future.

10 years from now anyone who disputes any assertation in the book will simply be branded as one of the howling hordes of Nazis that destroyed the work of a fine, upstanding PROGRESSIVE author and scholar.

Facts? We don' neeed no steenkin' facts!!!!

[goldstategop]

Doncha know? Liberals like Bellesiles are never wrong to the Kool-Aid drinking crowd.

[goldstategop]

We just know the NRA is evil cause Bellesiles told us so.

[willyboyishere]

"...records destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake and
fire of 1906".

-----I see a future for Bellesilles as the official Bill Clinton biographer.

[willyboyishere]

"...records destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake and
fire of 1906".

-----I see a future for Bellesiles as the official Bill Clinton biographer.

[hoosierham]

Without the pressure from supporters of truth and freedom I doubt the trustees would have reviewed and rescinded this award.

Now Knopf should be forced to publicize the revoking of the award with just as much effort as they did the original award.

[goldstategop]

Tell that to the posterior covering liberals in the New York publishing industry. And they're still seething over the success of Ann Coulter's Slander .

[pepsi_junkie]

From the Review at Amazon.com:

"He is more interested in discovering the truth than in taking sides. Nevertheless, his work shatters some time-honored myths and icons--including the usual reading of the Second Amendment--and will be hard to refute."

Hah!

[xm177e2]

He's still going to make a ton of money selling that book. Just because it's been exposed as a filthy lie doesn't mean people are going to stop buying it.

[Cacique]

Hey Ron you're famous.

[friendly]

Post #6: LOL.

The UPI report says "flawed research." How about "total fraud."

One liberal democrat sc*mb*g lying, dishonest deceiver in the media down, 100,000 to go! Hey, it's a start! It can be done!

[RJL]

I just checked our local county libraries for Arming America. It's still there, still listed as non-fiction.

I have pasted my note to them below, I hope libraries nationwide will receive many, many, similar notes.

Hennepin County Libraries,

The book Arming America, by Michael Bellesiles, Call#:344.0533B, has been proven to be a fraud after a lengthy peer review by Emory University.

Further, Columbia University's Board of Trustees has rescinded the prestigious Bancroft Prize awarded to Michael Bellesiles for Arming America in April 2001.

I don't think that a fraudulent book should be available at Hennepin County Libraries. If it remains on the shelves of the Hennepin County Libraries, it should, at the very least, be moved into the fiction category so no one will confuse this book with the truth.

RJL

[Grut]

Cannot get a job teaching and now McDonalds and Burger King are not hiring. Wouldn't be this guy for a bet.

By this time next year he'll probably be the darling of the college lecture circuit, at about $10,000 a pop.

[rmlew]

I'm fine with Foner denying the smaller claim. I never expected him to admitt to suppressing evidence.
He failed to deny being unaware of the controversy. He simply passed the buck saying that it was not the job of the Bancroft Committe to ensure that they were endorsing proper work.

If Foner wants to claim that he never had a stack of papers thrown out, that's fine with me. I did what the secretary asked and the packets then dissapeared.
I won't divulge the name of the TA, because his career can be destroyed.
I don't care one whit that this apologist for Stalin is calling me a liar. He has called me far worse before.

Here is the origional story:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/808010/posts

[gieriscm]

The 9th Circuit cited Bellisiles book extensively in their opinion on whether or not the Commie-fornia semi-auto rifle ban was constitutional. I'm really hoping the USSC takes this case from them and shreds it.

[jimkress]

The book's publisher, Knopf, said it would continue to publish the work's paperback edition.

Unbelievable. A publisher who continues to publish a book knowing full well that the material presented therein is false.

[RKV]

They don't care - its all about money.

[rmlew]

We need to freep them

[Redcloak]

It should be noted that the recent 9th Circuit decision (Silveira v. Lockyer) that called the 2nd Amendment a collective right, rather than an individual right, cited other works by Bellesiles twice.

[No Truce With Kings]

xm177e2 said:

"He's still going to make a ton of money selling that book. Just because it's been exposed as a filthy lie doesn't mean people are going to stop buying it."

Grut said:

"By this time next year he'll probably be the darling of the college lecture circuit, at about $10,000 a pop."

Grut's probably closer to the truth. Bellesiles cannot quit the day job on what he is going to get from this book. He gets royalties, but those are based on sales. Let's say he cut a Clinton-style deal, and gets 20% (5-10% is more likely) of sales. The pb edition sells 50K copies, at an average price of $10.00. In that case he would get $100K for that run. Not really a lot of money for someone in his position.

More likely the book sells an additional 20-30, and most of those are remaindered. And he gets 7%. Then his take would be $14,700 -- a little better than working at McDonald's, but not much. That assumes the publisher does not do some fancy bookkeeping that shows that sales were negative or something.

Lecture circuit is more likely, but having the Bancroft prize pulled makes him damaged goods -- even at liberal universities. You are not supposed to get caught lying. More likely he gets $2-5K a talk, maybe 10-20 lectures a year. Probably can pull down between $40-80K that way, but he has to pay expenses, and self-employment tax.

Mind, that is probably what he was getting as a prof, with benefits. So he *is* taking it in the pocketbook, like the weasel he is.

[Magoo]

Checkout customer reviews for this book at half.com

http://half.ebay.com/products/customer_reviews.cfm?item=4881876&prodtypeid=1

[Texas Eagle]

The Bancroft Prize is given for works judged to be "of enduring worth and impeccable scholarship that make a major contribution to our understanding of the American past."

Wait a minute. If part of the criteria is "impeccable scholarship", why did they bestow this award on Imbellesiles in the first place? Something tells me they knew this book was a load of crap to begin with and they are only rescinding the award because of the embarrassment that comes with being caught lying.

[Shooter 2.5]

Write a review of your own. It's also possible to write one on Amazon.com. My review is listed among the first five and that's going back about two years.

[Yehuda]

Excellent work!

[RJL]

Checkout customer reviews for this book at half.com

http://half.ebay.com/products/customer_reviews.cfm?item=4881876&prodtypeid=1

LOL...Thank You, well done.

[dwills]

hopefully carter will be getting a call from stockholm soon too

[SteveH]

The book's publisher, Knopf, said it would continue to publish the work's paperback edition.

Knopf is Hillary ($8M) and Bill ($10M) advance publisher. I won't be expecting them to discontinue the book just because it's the non-factual variant of non-fiction... :-/

[SteveH]

Prized, No Longer: Columbia University rescinds Michael Bellesiles's Bancroft Prize.

Posted by xsysmgr
On 12/17/2002 1:03 AM GMT

National Review Online | December 17, 2002 | Melissa Seckora

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/808010/posts

[sunshine state]

Speaking as a librarian, your best bet if you want the book removed is to make a formal challenge to the book. This usually involves putting your reasons in writing and turning it into the library. A committee will look over the book in question and make a decision.

Usually this is a tough row to hoe, since libraries like to err on the side of inclusion, rather than exclusion. Since there is fraud involved here, it should be easier.

[VietVet]

"I've printed up stickers detailing the various travails this book has seen, and stick them in the inside cover ... whenever I see it in a bookstore."

Neat idea! How can I get some of those stickers?

VietVet

[Grut]

...but having the Bancroft prize pulled makes him damaged goods -- even at liberal universities.

Give it a year of revisionist denials and he'll be a martyr to VRWC machinations and the Bancroft Committee's administrative cowardice - in other words, a 'saint' to those with a will to believe.