Geoff Metcalf
Monday, Aug. 26, 2002

The Washington Times ran an article on Friday about Michael Bellesiles – "Emory Continues Probe of 'Arming America' Author" (http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020823-23126206.htm). Duh!?!? This has been going on for over two flipping years!

Notwithstanding his once-upon-a-time reputation as a "respected scholar," Emory University historian Michael Bellesiles' thesis of early American gun ownership was, is, and will always be fiction.

Bellesiles claims that American colonists did not, by and large, own or value firearms. Oh, really?

I interviewed Dr. Joyce Malcolm, a professor and historian, in December of 2000 and she wasn't convinced. In her critique of Bellesiles' work in Reason magazine, Malcolm took on his research methods, conclusions and use of selective information.

Note: You can read the entire interview at http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/qa/21237.html. Remember, it is almost two years old.

Subsequent to the Malcolm interview I spoke with Clayton Cramer, another Second Amendment author and historian. That interview was in May of 2001. Cramer claims Bellesiles didn't just cherry-pick facts to support his fiction – he flat-out made stuff up.

Note: You can read that entire interview at http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/qa/22899.html

Emory University has Bellesiles on "paid leave from his teaching duties." Their six-month investigation is continuing. Apparently, when it comes to "truth, justice and the American way," Emory moves at ponderous glacial speed.

Reluctantly, Emory was forced to begin its investigation of "Arming America" after critics exposed chronic extensive errors and apparent fabrications in the book.

In the fall of 2000, "Arming America" was received with enthusiastic endorsements. Reviewers showered kudos and called it "exciting" and "valuable." Bleeding-heart liberal left-wing wackos were salivating over new "proof" of a non-existent gun culture.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, Bellesiles claimed that private gun ownership was rare in early America. Is that why the first three battles of the War for Independence were fought over gun control? That historic dust up on the Green in Lexington Mass., WAS a direct result of the British attempt to confiscate powder and ball.

The anti-gun/gun control advocates attributed Bellesiles with "demolishing the myth" of Second Amendment rights to individual ownership of firearms. The book even won the prestigious Bancroft Award last year despite the protests of Malcolm and others.

By the by, even left-wing liberal icon and Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe has conceded that the Second Amendment IS an individual and not a "collective" right.

Cramer and Northwest University law professor James Lindgren began to document errors in "Arming America." LOTS of errors, gross errors, egregious errors … and fictions.

Scholars especially damned the misrepresentation of 18th and 19th century probate records, which 'Mike' claimed proved that guns were rare in America's early days. Lindgren, Cramer and others suggested Bellesiles had fabricated some sources out of whole cloth. They specifically note that he cited California records that had been destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Whoops.

History professor Randolph Roth at Ohio State University wrote that the conclusions of "Arming America" were "not supported by the sources Mr. Bellesiles cites, the sources he does not cite, or by the data he presents." Which is a very politic academic way of saying "he lied."

In business and government, when someone misrepresents facts with such abandon, they usually end up in court. In academia they get placed on paid leave to defend or ignore the indefensible.

The questions I was asking TWO YEARS AGO eventually became a refrain, and Emory announced an investigation in February. A couple of months later, the university announced that its internal review was done and it had "concluded that further investigation would be warranted by an independent committee of distinguished scholars."

Then in May, the National Endowment for the Humanities announced it was withdrawing its sponsorship from a fellowship awarded to Bellesiles through the Newberry Library in Chicago.

What took so long?! The book came out in the fall of 2000. Professor Malcolm wrote a piece eviscerating the Bellesilles thesis in Reason magazine shortly thereafter. I interviewed her on the air in December 2000. The scholastic feeding frenzy followed throughout 2001. And still, this academic fiction has not been resolved?

And by the way, what about the committee that bestowed the once-prestigious Bancroft Award?

Bellesilles is to academia what Al Gore is to politics. Why stall, obfuscate and defend the indefensible?

"Arming America" was embraced and lauded by academia and media because it offered "presumed facts" from a "reputable" scholar that supported a politically correct preferred reality … that had NO basis in reality.

I have too often noted that "some people don't like facts that contradict their preconceived opinions." The corollary of that is also true: "People LIKE facts that support their preconceived opinions."

Emory and the tenured masses of academia have some serious fence mending to do. They should start with breaking Bellesiles' sword, ripping the buttons off his blouse, and marching him out of their ivy-covered palace in shame.

In 1676 Geoff Metcalf's direct ancester Michael Metcalf returned to his home in Dedham, Mass., to discover Indians had burned his home to the ground. Michael collected an armed militia from his neighbors and marched south to fight in the 'King Philips War' in Rhode Island. ALL those militia neighbors had and used guns.

Visit Geoff Metcalf's Web site at http://www.geoffmetcalf.com. He may be contacted at geoff@geoffmetcalf.com

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