| An in-depth analysis of Smith v. Board of School Commissioners of Mobile County was conducted to ascertain the conditions which precipitated Smith, the underlying themes of the trial, and the impact on secondary home economics curriculum. A triangulation approach was used to collect data from document analysis, content analysis, interviews, and a questionnaire. The trial transcript and court decisions were analyzed and interviews were conducted with the three attorneys who represented the three parties in the trial, the Alabama Home Economics State Supervisor, the two home economics witnesses, and the five authors of the challenged home economics textbooks. A questionnaire was sent to a random sample of Alabama home economics teachers, with a 58% return. A content analysis of the home economics textbooks, which were revised after Smith, was conducted to determine the extent of change of the challenged passages in the textbooks.;Smith was a federal court trial in which 44 textbooks were banned in Alabama in March of 1987. This study focused on the five challenged home economics textbooks which were charged with establishing the religion of secular humanism and were found by the district court to be unconstitutional. The appellate court found that the books promoted values such as tolerance for diverse views and logical decision making and reversed the ban in August of 1987.;Major findings include: (1) Conditions which precipitated Smith included an active ultraconservative religious influence in Alabama. (2) The underlying theme was a clash of beliefs over diverse views of secular humanism and different interpretations of home economics. The clash was fought in a federal district court at the instigation of the judge. (3) The censorship of the home economics textbooks in Alabama did impact on the secondary home economics curriculum as evidenced by: change in content of the state curriculum guide, change of attitudes of home economics teachers, and change of content in the challenged home economics textbooks. |
