THERE must be something exceptional about Ben Carson, the neurosurgeon gunning for Barack Obama’s job as the next black American to lead the world’s most powerful nation. I wanted to know that exceptional thing and the mindset of the Republican presidential aspirant. So at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, I picked a copy of a book he had written, hoping that I will explore the brains of this first-class brain doctor. This is an excerpt from One Nation—By Ben Carson MD:
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Mum got married at 13
Two hundred years ago when slavery was going on it was illegal to educate a slave, particularly to teach them to read. Why do you think that was? Because when you educate a man, you liberate a man. And there I was as a youngster placing myself in the same situation that a horrible institution did because I wasn’t taking advantage of the education. I was a horrible student. Most of my classmates thought I was the stupidest person in the world. They called me “Dummy.” I was the butt of all the jokes.
Now, admittedly, it was a bad environment. Single-parent home…you know my mother and father had gotten divorced early on. My mother got married when she was 13. She was one of 24 children. Had a horrible life. Discovered that her husband was a bigamist, had another family. And she only had a third-grade education. She had to take care of us. Dire poverty. I had a horrible temper and poor self-esteem. All the things that you think would preclude success. But I had something very important. I had a mother who believed in me. And I had a mother who never allow herself to be a victim no matter what happened…never made excuses, and she never accepted an excuse from us. And if we ever came up with an excuse, she always said, “Do you have a brain?” And if the answer was yes, then she said, “Then you could have thought your way out of it.” It doesn’t matter what John or Susan or Mary or anybody else did or said. And it was the most important thing she did for my brother and myself. Because if you don’t accept excuses, pretty soon people stop giving them, and they start looking for solutions. And that is a critical issue when it comes to success.
Well, you know, we did live in dire poverty. And one of the things that I hated was poverty. You know, some people hate spiders, some people hate snakes…I hated poverty. I couldn’t stand it. But, you know, my mother couldn’t stand the fact that we were doing poorly in school. And she prayed and she asked God to give her wisdom…what could she do to get her young sons to understand the importance of developing their minds, so that they could control their own lives? And you know what, God gave her the wisdom…at least in her opinion. My brother and I didn’t think it was that wise. Because it was to turn off the TV, let us watch only two or three TV programs during the week, and with all that spare time read two books apiece from the Detroit Public Libraries and submit to her written book reports which she couldn’t read, but we didn’t know that. She’d put check marks and highlights and stuff—but, you know I just hated this. And my friends were out having a good time. Her friends would criticise her. They would say, “You can’t make boys stay in the house reading books, they’ll grow up and hate you.” And I would overhear them and say, “Mother, you know they are right.” But she didn’t care, you know.
But, after a while, I actually began to enjoy reading those books, because we were very poor. But between the covers of those books I could go anywhere, I could be anybody, I could do anything. I began to read about people of great accomplishments. And as I read those stories, I began to see a connecting thread. I began to see that the person who has the most to do with you and what happens to you in life, is you. You make decisions. You decide how much energy you want to put behind that decision. And I came to understand that I had control of my own destiny. And at that point I didn’t hate poverty anymore, because I knew it was only temporary. I knew I could change that. It was incredibly liberating for me, made all the difference.
To continue on that theme of education, in 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville came to America to study this country. The Europeans were fascinated. How could a fledgling nation, barely 50 years old already be competing with them on virtually every level? This was impossible. De Tocqueville was going to sort it out. He looked at our government and he was duly impressed by the three branches of government—four now because now we have special interest groups, but it was only three back in those days. He said, “Wow, this is really something,” and then he said, “but let me look at their educational system,” and he was blown away. You see, anybody who had finished the second grade was completely literate. He could find a mountain man on the outskirts of society who could read the newspaper and could have a political discussion…could tell him how the government worked.
If you really want to be impressed, take a look at the chapter on education in my latest book, America the Beautiful, which I wrote with my wife—it came out last year, and in that education chapter you will see questions extracted from a sixth-grade exit exam from the 1800s—a test you had to pass to get your sixth-grade certificate. I doubt most college graduates today could pass that test. We have dumbed things down to that level. And the reason that is so dangerous is that the people who founded this nation said that our system of government was designed for a well-informed and educated populace. And when they become less informed, they become vulnerable. Think about that…our system of government. That is why education is so vitally important.
Now, some people say, “Ahhh, you’re overblowing it, things aren’t that bad, and you’re a doctor, a neurosurgeon. Why are you concerned about these things?” Got news for you. FIVE doctors signed the Declaration of Independence. Doctors were involved in the framing of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights…a whole bunch of things. It’s only been in recent decades that we’ve extracted ourselves, which I think is a big mistake.
We need doctors, we need scientists, engineers. We need all those people involved in government, not just lawyers. I don’t have anything against lawyers, but you know, here’s the thing about lawyers…I’m sorry, but I got to be truthful—what do lawyers learn in law school? To win…by hook or crook…you’ve got to win. So you got all these Democrat lawyers, any you got all these Republican lawyers and their sides want to win. We need to get rid of that. What we need to start thinking about is, how do we solve problems?
Now, before I get shot, let me finish. I don’t like to bring up problems without coming up with solutions. My wife and I started the Carson Scholars Fund 16 years ago after we heard about an international survey looking at the ability of eight grades in 22 countries to solve mathematics and science problems, and we came out 21 out of 22. We barely beat out number 22…very concerning.
We’d go to these schools and we’d see all these trophies: All-State Basketball, All-State Wrestling, All-State this, that, and another. The quarterback was the big man on campus. What about the intellectual superstar? What did they get? A National Honor Society pin? A pat on the head, “There, there little nerd?” Nobody cared about them. And is it any wonder that sometimes the smart kids try to hide. They don’t want anybody to know they are smart. This is not helping us as a nation. So we started giving out scholarship from all backgrounds for superior academic performance and demonstration of qualities. Unless you cared about other people, it didn’t matter how smart you were. We’ve got plenty of people like that. We don’t need those. We need smart people who care about other people.
We would give them money. The money would go into a trust. They would get interest on it. When they would go to college they would get the money. But also the school gets a trophy, every bit as impressive as any sports trophy—and it goes right out there with the others. They get a medal. They get to go to a banquet. We try to put them on the same kind of pedestal as we do the all-state athletes. Now I have nothing against athletics or entertainment, please believe me.
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