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The Youth of today is ever the people of tomorrow. For this reason we have set before ourselves the task of inoculating our youth with the spirit of this community of the people at a very early age, at an age when human beings are still unperverted and therefore unspoiled. This Reich stands, and it is building itself up for the future, upon its youth. And this new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing.
— Adolf Hitler, National Socialist Dictator of Germany, 1937
This ruling against the homeschooling Konrad family of Germany is yet another ominous development in the erosion of civil liberties in Western Europe. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is a creature of the Council of Europe (COE), which is distinct from the institutions of the European Union. To give credit where credit is due the COE did pass an anti-communist resolution earlier this year that enraged Soviet Communists and their comrades worldwide. Nevertheless, the infiltration of European bodies by lawyers and judges of Eastern European origin, who may not necessarily be clandestine communists but were still educated within the framework of Marxist law, poses a severe threat to citizens who are anti-statists by conviction. The Fifth Section of the ECHR that passed judgment on the Konrad case consisted of seven judges, five of whom are Eastern European nationals:
- Snejana Botoucharova, born 1955, Bulgaria; graduate, Lomonosov University, Moscow, 1984; attorney at law, Sofia, 1980-84; senior assistant professor, 1984; chief assistant professor, 1987, Kliment Ohridski University, Sofia; the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe notes: “Mrs. Botoucharova-Doїtcheva (Bulgaria) – legal adviser to the Union of Democratic Forces and several times deputy in the National Assembly – did not reply under the section entitled ‘other public activities.’ It is true that Mrs. Botoucharova-Doїtcheva had, in the past, fulfilled the function of secretary in local communist party branches.”
- Karel Jungwiert, born 1944, Czech Republic; graduate, Faculty of Law, Charles University, Prague, 1969; trainee barrister, 1969-71; barrister, 1974-89
- Volodymyr Butkevych, born 1946, Ukraine; graduate, Faculty of Law, Kyiv State University, 1965-81; professor, dean, Faculty of International Relations and International Law, Kyiv State University; director, Institute of International Relations and International Law, Kyiv State University, 1984-98
- Margarita Tsatsa-Nikolovska, born 1950, Macedonia; graduate, Cyril and Methodius Law Faculty, Skopje; judge, trial court “Skopje I,” 1978; judge, District (later Appeal) Court of Skopje, 1986
- Rait Maruste, born 1953, Estonia; graduate, Tartu University Law School, 1977; PhD candidate, Leningrad State University, 1984; assistant professor, department head, Tartu University, 1985; president, Supreme Court, Republic of Estonia, 1992-98
The other two presiding judges were the trial president Peer Lorenzen of Denmark and Mark Villiger of Switzerland.
Siding with the German Federal Constitutional Court, the ECHR observed:
The Federal Constitutional Court found that the interferences with the applicants’ fundamental rights were also proportionate given the general interest of society to avoid the emergence of parallel societies based on separate philosophical convictions. Moreover, society also had an interest in the integration of minorities. Such integration required not only that minorities with separate religious or philosophical views should not be excluded, but also that they should not exclude themselves. Therefore, the exercise and practising of tolerance in primary schools was an important goal.
This self-serving statist ruling against homeschooling–along with those European laws protecting sodomy and others that severely limit the vocalization of dissent– is one of many legal and institutional components advancing a rigorous communist jurisdiction throughout the “new European Soviet.”
The issues of admitting the Not-So-Former Soviet Bloc republics into the Council of Europe, the principal mandate of which is to defend human rights throughout member states, and by extension “ex”-communist judges onto the ECHR, has plagued COE leadership. The following history is excerpted from a July 8, 1997 report published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty:
Controversy has erupted in some Central and East European circles following the recent publication of an interview in an Alsatian newspaper (“Les dernieres Nouvelles d’Alsace,” 26 June 1997) with the Council of Europe’s outgoing number-two man. Deputy Secretary-General Peter Leuprecht told the daily he was taking early retirement this month in protest at what he called a lowering of the Council’s human-rights standards for its new Central and East European members. Leuprecht characterized those once rigid Council standards as “soft” for Eastern members.
Leuprecht is the first Council official to say in public what many in the Council of Europe Secretariat have said in private for years. The majority of Council officials clearly believe that, under pressure from West European member states like France and Germany, the 40-state organization has granted membership too fast and uncritically to many of the 16 former communist nations that have joined over the past seven years.
Velvet-gloved totalitarians and anti-homeschooling “educators” in North America will no doubt be greatly encouraged by the current COE ruling. This includes the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation, which is hopelessly wedded to the “progressive,” otherwise known as Marxist, transformation of society.
Christians be warned: You can worship Jesus in your closet, but you must sacrifice your children to Caesar. The many gods of multiculturalism, otherwise known as polytheism, demand your homage.
BRAVE NEW SCHOOLS
Court Upholds Nazi-Era Ban On Homeschooling
Decision: State Must Avoid Dissent, ‘Separate Philosophical Convictions’
Posted: September 29, 2006
A new ruling from the European Human Rights Court has affirmed the German nation’s Nazi-era ban on homeschooling, concluding that society has a significant interest in preventing the development of dissent through “separate philosophical convictions.”
The Strasburg-based court addressed the issue on appeal from a Christian family whose members alleged their human rights to educate their own children according to their own religious beliefs are being violated by the ban.
The specific case addressed in the opinion involved Fritz and Marianna Konrad, who filed the complaint in 2003 and argued that Germany’s compulsory school attendance endangered their children’s religious upbringing and promotes teaching inconsistent with the family’s Christian faith.
The court said the Konrads belong to a “Christian community which is strongly attached to the Bible” and rejected public schooling because of the explicit sexual indoctrination programs that the courses there include.
The German court already had ruled that the parental “wish” to have their children grow up in a home without such influences “could not take priority over compulsory school attendance.” The decision also said the parents do not have an “exclusive” right to lead their children’s education.
The family had appealed under the European Convention on Human Rights statement that: “No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching is in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.”
But the court’s ruling said, instead, that schools represent society, and “it was in the children’s interest to become part of that society.
“The parents’ right to education did not go as far as to deprive their children of that experience,” the ruling said.
“Not only the acquisition of knowledge, but also the integration into and first experience with society are important goals in primary school education,” the court said. “The German courts found that those objectives cannot be equally met by home education even if it allowed children to acquire the same standard of knowledge as provided for by primary school education.
“The (German) Federal Constitutional Court stressed the general interest of society to avoid the emergence of parallel societies based on separate philosophical convictions and the importance of integrating minorities into society,” the ruling said.
The court noted it was a similar argument that arose in Holland earlier, where a politician, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, sought to close down all religious schools because only the state could properly teach children “tolerance.”
The U.S.-based Home School Legal Defense Association has confirmed that nearly 40 homeschooling families are embroiled in legal battles over the issue in Germany. The group, which has quickly growing influence around the globe on the issue of homeschooling, said the German families are facing persecution for trying to educate their children in a Christian atmosphere without exposing them to the state’s harmful secular values, especially sex education.
In fact, the HSLDA just recently announced a campaign to address the persecution Christians in Germany are facing from education authorities.
Ian Slatter, a spokesman for the HSLDA, said it was launched after a mother was arrested and jailed on criminal homeschooling counts.
A report in the conservative Brussels Journal said Katharina Plett was arrested and ordered to jail while her husband fled to Austria with the family’s 12 children.
Slatter said just a few days into the campaign, there already has been a large response from American homeschoolers, with e-mails and telephone calls pouring in to the German embassy.
A website for the Practical Homeschool Magazine noted one of the first acts by Hitler when he moved into power was to create the governmental Ministry of Education and give it control of all schools, and school-related issues.
In 1937, the dictator said, “The Youth of today is ever the people of tomorrow. For this reason we have set before ourselves the task of inoculating our youth with the spirit of this community of the people at a very early age, at an age when human beings are still unperverted and therefore unspoiled. This Reich stands, and it is building itself up for the future, upon its youth. And this new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing.”
The HSLDA said the German embassy can be reached by e-mail through its website, by telephone at 202-298-4000 or by mail at: Wolfgang Ischinger, Ambassador, German Embassy, 4645 Reservoir Road NW, Washington, DC, 20007-1998.
“It is beyond belief that Germany is still enforcing a law that was written for one reason only – to be used by Hitler to control and indoctrinate German youth. It had no other redeeming value,” said Shoshona Bat-Zion on a homeschoolers’ blog.
The Pletts are part of a group of seven Baptist homeschool families who have been targeted frequently by authorities. Two families have left Germany and five others have enrolled their children in a Christian school, but their court cases remain pending.
Link: WorldNetDaily
The Home School Legal Defense Association contains more information on the Konrad case. The official ruling related to the same case can be accessed here.
Once Upon a Time in the West 
>Now what the hell is wrong with home schooling? Even if one disagrees with it, why should it be banned? I mean if parents of a child don’t like private or public schools they should have a third option of choice.