I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death! — Patrick Henry
What was it about our Founding Fathers that made them so zealous and militant towards the idea of liberty? “Give me liberty or give me death!” Really? Perhaps it is similar to the Cuban immigration into Florida that has changed that state from a swing state to a solid red state. Like our colonial ancestors, they have experienced the fallout of socialism, communism, and extreme government oversight. Or perhaps they, like John Adams, realize, “Liberty once lost is lost forever.”
Legislative Motivation
2025 saw an all-out attack on homeschooling liberties across the nation. Virginia, Connecticut, New Jersey, Minnesota, and my home state of Illinois saw unprecedented attacks that included mandatory registration, visits from public school officials, investigations by child services organizations, fines, and even jail time. These efforts, if successful, would have taken us back to the educational and legislative stone age, all in the name of progressivism.
Protecting children from abuse was the supposed legislative motivation, but the reality was that every single instance of abuse that was used as an example was from parents who were public-schooling at the time of the abuse. They only started homeschooling once they were reported to child services, who also dropped the ball on following up with these parents. These were not true homeschoolers! Yet, more than one state legislator has hypocritically twisted the facts to serve their socialist purposes.
Is it a Big Deal?
Some younger homeschoolers have asked if registration is really that big of a deal. Our response should be a unified, resounding “Yes!” First, in capitulating to the government, we would be going against Natural Law. Even AI understands this:
Natural law holds that parents have inherent rights to raise their children, which includes the right to make decisions about their upbringing, education, and healthcare. These rights are also recognized in law and protected by the Fourteenth Amendment, which establishes the fundamental liberty interest of parents in the care, custody, and management of their children.
It is parents’ fundamental right—and responsibility—to raise and educate their children according to the dictates of their hearts. To give the government any obligatory oversight would be parental abdication.
With the Shekels Come the Shackles
Second, history has proven time and again that when you give the government an inch, they will attempt to take a mile. It is not that homeschoolers are unreasonable. We just know how the government ALWAYS works. Do you remember when ObamaCare was supposed to give us more choices at a reduced cost? How has that worked out? Still, citizens fail to learn from the past. Too many young homeschoolers have been indoctrinated by college professors—few of whom work in the real world—who believe that socialism is the cure to societal ills.
Additionally, it is concerning how many and how quickly homeschoolers in more conservative states take government money through ESAs without thinking of the implications. Whether it is choosing state-approved vendors or mandated registration, they have sacrificed a certain degree of liberty. History has consistently proven, “With the shekels come the shackles.”
The Parents’ Responsibility
Finally, we parents are responsible before God for the upbringing of our children. God gave children to parents, not institutions, to steward their souls. Over ninety percent of fathers and mothers in America try to put some of that parental burden on the public school system, somehow thinking it absolves them of Divine responsibility. It does not. Historian Edward Gibbon noted that the Athenians ceased to be free when the real freedom they wanted was freedom of responsibility. Parents, we cannot escape the fact that we are responsible before God for inculcating their minds with a biblical worldview.
Guard Your Rights
It has been postulated that Covid was a testing ground to see if Americans would give up their liberties. In spite of questionable data and obvious agendas, most of the nation shut down with little more than a whimper. People died alone. Churches shut down. People wore masks even when driving alone in their cars. Sure, there were a few Patrick Henrys sounding the alarm, but these were quickly cancelled by the culture. Ironically, God used this season to expose the failure of the public school system, and homeschooling exploded. The lesson that we learned from this social experiment was that Americans no longer truly valued liberty.
Homeschoolers must guard their rights and not give an inch. We must not fall prey to incremental surrender that interprets small losses as incidental until the cumulative effect totally redefines what homeschooling is. We must never accept legislative restrictions as the “new normal,” which causes subsequent generations to walk in ignorance of previous liberties. We must never tire of educating—and re-educating—new generations of homeschoolers in our historic battle for educational liberty, the preciousness of those liberties, and how hard it is to regain liberties once they are lost.
As Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction.” May homeschoolers across the nation continue to echo the same sentiment as our forefathers, “Give us homeschooling liberty, or give us death!”