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Montana Morris
Dr. Jessica OHara
English 137H
4 December 2014
Changing Times: The Movement Away from Corporal Punishment in American Schools
The importance of discipline and its relationship to the growth of a child is undoubted.
From a young age, children must develop a moral compass at the hands of their authority figures,
and punishment is the most basic way to teach children this concept. When children behave in
unacceptable manners, an unpleasant repercussion must be related to that behavior in order to
minimize its presence. This punishment spectrum may range from the physical infliction of pain
to the mental distress of losing privileges. These physical approaches to discipline include acts
such as paddling and spanking, and collectively, these actions fall into the envelope of corporal
punishment. From the early 1970s until present day, the United States education system has
moved away from these corporal methods of punishment towards less violent alternatives largely
as a result of Raymond Freuds psychiatric theories in the early 20th century and due to the rise of
civil rights just prior to the commencement of the movement.
In 2002, an ABCNEWS poll randomly selected 1,015 adults nationwide and asked them
their opinions on the permission of corporal punishment in school districts. Using this random,
representative sample, ABCNEWS found that on average 72% of Americans were in favor of
banning corporal punishment in all school settings, and due to the random nature of the sample,
this statistic could expand to adults nationwide with only a three percent margin of error
(Crandall). With this credible poll, the majority clearly did not approve of physical punishments

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in any learning environment in the early 2000s. If this statistic had been drawn one half of a
century prior, the figures would have been staggeringly different. During that previous time
period, however, the debate over corporal punishment was yet to be in the public focus. Due to
this lack of public attention, media organizations, such as ABC, felt no inclination to organize
such polls. Without these parallel statistics to exemplify the paradigm shift away from corporal
punishment, one can only look into laws of the varying time periods for proof.
In a democracy such as the United States, legislation is designed to represent public
opinion. Therefore, the laws of two different eras should showcase the difference of opinion
between these two time periods, especially in regard to corporal punishment. As of 1970, only
one state, New Jersey, had outlawed corporal punishment in schools, and this ban had occurred
over 100 years before (Corporal Punishment). From this notion, one can deduce that corporal
punishment in schools was widely accepted prior to the 1970s. Dating from the early 20th
century up to that time, however, an emergent ideology had begun to brew amongst society.
By the early 1970s, many people began to question both the effectiveness and ethics
behind corporal punishment. According to Dr. David Dupper, who earned a Ph.D. from the
University of Florida, Amy Montgomery Dingus, a social worker who deals extensively with
corporal punishment, and their article titled, Corporal Punishment in US Schools: A Continuing
Problem for Social Workers, the movement began slowly in the 1920s when the psychiatry of
Raymond Freud began to take hold; with these Freudian practices, individuals believed that what
one is exposed to in their youth subconsciously affects their mental processes and behaviors in
the future. In the 1940s, people began to apply these Freudian ideologies to corporal punishment
(Dupper and Dingus 244). Based on the well-known fact that young children learn by example,
the application of Freuds theory made sense. With corporal punishment, when a young child

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makes a mistake, he or she is punished in a physical and painful manner. Therefore, by their
parent or teachers respected example, he or she learns that administering painful repercussions
is acceptable if someone does something of which you do not approve. Rather than
understanding his or her misbehavior, the child acquires a conditional acceptance of violence,
which impedes rather than progresses the maturation process. As individuals began to question
the effectiveness of corporal punishment and its relationship to violence in the mid-20th century,
ethics then became an influential player in initiating the movement.
In the 1960s, due to that link between physical discipline and violence, people began to
associate corporal punishment with Child Maltreatment Syndrome (Dupper and Dingus 244).
This developing concept, commonly known today as child abuse, questioned the ethics of poor
parenting and aimed to develop a boundary between ineffective and actually harmful discipline.
If corporal punishment, a supposedly corrective action, was failing to teach children the proper
moral values, children were being placed in unnecessary positions of both stress and pain which
was simply unethical. As this disciplinary measure was further explored, the nation pondered
whether one had the right to lay their hands or paddle on their own children for any reason, let
alone lay their hands or paddle on someone elses child as was the case in educational settings.
By placing this disciplinary power solely in the hands of the parents, it would allow the decision
to remain at the parents discrepancy until further research could solidify corporal punishments
effectiveness and influence on a childs later life.
Not only did this lack of effectiveness and potential for harm raise ethical questions, the
disparity among those affected by this form of punishment drew the attention of moral advocates
as well. At this exact time period, the United States was amidst the Civil Rights Movement. On
July 2, 1964, President Johnson highlighted the movement by signing the Civil Rights Act of

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1964. This document prohibited any individual to discriminate another individual based on any
factor such as race or religion. This act also gave the federal government the power to correct the
nations segregation issue (Civil Rights Movement Timeline). As a whole, the Civil Rights
Movement promoted the rights of any individual. People deserved to act and to think at their
own expense rather than to someone elses definition, and people held innate and equal rights to
certain parts of their property. Furthermore, the African-American students were primarily the
individuals having their rights impeded as they took the brunt of corporal punishments
throughout many school districts. Due to this uneven distribution among different races, corporal
punishment became viewed as a potential infringement of civil rights because all individuals
deserved equal control over their own body.
An illustration of this racial discrepancy can be found in Jonathan Kozols 1967 book,
Death at an Early Age. In this book, Jonathan Kozol, a former Rhodes Scholar and a University
of Harvard graduate, gave his account of the sole year he taught a 4th grade class in a Boston
school district and of the vast amount of injustice that he witnessed. Jonathan Kozol held his
teaching position from August of 1964 until only June of 1965 when he was fired for reading a
poem by an African-American writer, Langston Hughes (Kozol, Jonathan 157). Following this
event, Kozol found it necessary to voice the tribulations that many young African-American
students were facing in classrooms. In order to do so, he utilized his former place of employment
as an example of the nationwide discrimination and allowed it to become the topic of his book.
Throughout the book, Jonathan Kozol discussed corporal punishments relationship to racism.
Based on his experience in Boston, the African-American student community received corporal
punishments far more frequently than the Caucasian student community, and the typical white
male teacher actually enjoyed administering these physical punishments to the black students. In

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1968, one year following Death at an Early Ages release, Jonathan Kozol received the National
Book Award for Science, Religion, and Philosophy for his work (158). This award showcased
exactly how influential and renowned the book had become.
During the late 1970s, as individual rights continued to be promoted, this story, which
Kozol allowed to surface, threw gasoline on a growing flame. The view of corporal punishment
was already altering as many began to realize its ineffectiveness and potential harm on any
student. Now, individuals realized that permitting this violent disciplinary act was also igniting
the very inequality that was deemed illegal in 1964 with the Civil Rights Act. Through this
popular publication, Kozol was able to call the publics attention to a need for further change in
terms of both civil rights alongside corporal punishment, especially in Bostons state,
Massachusetts. In 1972, Massachusetts, as an illustration of these changing public beliefs, chose
to ban corporal punishment in its schools and became the second state, alongside New Jersey
from over 100 years prior, to do so as they aimed to put the movement for banning corporal
punishment back on its feet. Over the next 5 years, only one state, Maine, followed
Massachusetts in banning corporal punishment in its schools as the movement struggled to
capture significant momentum (Corporal Punishment).
Finally in 1977, these opposing ideologies came to a pinpoint with the Supreme Court
case, Ingraham v. Wright. In this case, two Florida juniors were brutally punished by paddle until
they were placed into the hospital. At the conclusion of the case, the Supreme Court actually
ruled in favor of the state, and corporal punishment remained at each states discretion (Karst
1370). Although the federal law remained constant at this moment, the case sparked interest and
drew the attention of the masses. This incident was able to expand the masses because, regardless
of their actions, these young men were placed in the hospital with severe injuries. With this case,

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individuals began to correlate corporal punishment, as these actions were lawfully deemed, with
violent forms of abuse.
Following this event, even parents who ethically accepted paddling as an effective
manner of punishment wanted that responsibility to be held in their own hands. As a parent, one
may accept their child receiving corporal punishment for various rule infractions; however, if the
corporal punishment resulted in the destruction of his or her childs safety and in a visit to the
citys hospital, the parent would no longer be understanding. After the Supreme Courts ruling on
Ingraham v. Wright, it was evident that regulations in order to prevent such events were unlikely
to be successful. Without specific restrictions as an option to avoid abuse, complete eradication
of corporal punishment in schools presented itself as the only option in states willing to promote
a positive change. In the twenty years following this Supreme Court case, twenty-four more
states banned corporal punishment amongst their school districts (Collazo). These twenty-four
states intended to save their youth from unnecessary pain and to improve their mental and moral
aptitude for the future.
Although the states that made changes intended to improve their students lives, the
question laid in whether or not the disciplinary alterations actually helped in the long term.
According to a distinguished scientist, Dr. Murray Straus, decreasing corporal punishments
resulted in a positive outcome in these states. After compiling data from various past studies and
performing extensive research at the University of New Hampshires Family Research Lab, Dr.
Straus found a statistically significant, positive correlation between spanking and psychological
disorders later in life. With Dr. Strauss research, he simply monitored the type of punishment to
which various children were subjected and collected data on the subjects mental health. With the
association that he obtained, the occurrences of depression and antisocial behaviors were notably

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higher in the group who was spanked throughout childhood; Straus published these findings in
his May of 2000 book, Beating the Devil out of Them: Corporal Punishment in American
Families (Walsh).
While there are still several components of opposition to Dr. Straus publication, the
resistance appears to be negligible. In his study, Dr. Straus focused on spanking with ones hand
rather than an object of power such as a paddle. Many argue that using an object of power results
in a better disciplinary effect. Rather than making the punishment a more personable, learning
experience, using a paddle may actually cause the punishment to seem more violent which would
refute this potential argument. Others claim that his potential personal bias against any type of
physicality towards children had an impact on his findings. Although his clear opposition to
corporal punishment can be confirmed, the statistics behind his study are extremely unlikely to
be skewed. As a professor at a prestigious university, Dr. Straus would be hard pressed to falsify
data regardless of the cause as he would lose his credibility and job if this could be proved.
Despite these potential drawbacks, when viewing his work objectively, it makes sense. Even with
the intention of improving behavior, young children learn by example, which dates back to the
same Freudian principles that started this movement. With corporal punishment, young
childrens pliable minds are placed in stressful, violence-provoking situations, and they respond
negatively to this.
Over the past fourteen years following Strauss findings, this movement away from
physical punishment continues but at a surprisingly much slower pace. Today, nineteen states
still allow corporal punishment at each school districts discretion although many urban areas in
these states have set city ordinances against it. According to the most recent survey by the
Department of Education, corporal punishments per year decreased by 7,000 from 2006 to 2009,

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but the numbers, 223,000 and 216,000, are still very high (Collazo). With these considerably
high numbers, many young students still suffer from the side effects of supposedly corrective
actions today. Of these still subjected to physical punishments, many are either disabled or come
from minorities. For example, according to the US Department of Education in 2009, AfricanAmerican students accounted for 35.6% of all corporal punishments throughout the US, yet they
make up only 17.1% of the national student population. Furthermore, the number of disabled
individuals afflicted by corporal punishments nearly doubles the numbers on those who are not
disabled (Rollins 248). With this large disparity among those affected, one sees problems similar
to ones the movement faced at its conception during the Civil Rights Movement.
According to Alex Collazo, an Economic Philosophy graduate of Columbia University,
and his article, 19 States Still Allow Spanking in Schools and the Statistics Are Shocking, this
discrepancy among those facing corporal punishment is the cause of this movements stagnation.
The disparity is one key ethical reason why the movement should continue; however, these often
minority individuals who are affected by corporal punishment lack the political power to seek
out further change. Therefore, the legislation is binding the overall public opinion that the ban
should be nationwide (Collazo). This oppression of the minority and disabled individuals being
affected may be a result of several factors. These individuals may lack the affluence to motivate
legislative action. There is a clich saying that money is power, and this statement is rarely far
from true. Another potential explanation is that the majority in control in those states may have
very conservative, or nearly racist views, which causes them to refute potential bills that would
ban corporal punishment. A third option may be that the oppressed group simply lacks the
gumption or intelligence to stand up and utilize their freedom of speech against corporal
punishment.

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Although these factors may stand in the oppressed individuals ways, if the USA can
collectively get the movement to regain momentum, there is promise for the future of the youth
in America. Looking towards Finland, who banned corporal punishments in all of its schools in
1983, a positive example presents itself and exemplifies the USAs potential future. The Finnish
National Institute for Health and Welfare released 10,000 random surveys to a representative
population of individuals aged 15-80 in 2011. These surveys defined acceptable physical
punishments as paddling and spanking alongside the pulling of hair and ears to the point of
tolerable but not extreme pain. Anything beyond these parameters was defined as abuse rather
than corporal punishment. From these surveys, they found significantly higher amounts of
physical punishments in those individuals who grew up in time periods prior to 1983 (sterman,
Bjrkqvist, and Wahlbeck 575). Furthermore, they found significantly higher instances of major
depression, alcohol abuse, and suicidal thoughts among those who were subjected to above
average amounts of corporal punishments (579).
With this decrease in physical punishments following the policy change in 1983 in
Finland, it can be concluded that the younger individuals tended to have physical punishment
numbers below the average amount. If those below the mean amount showed less of a tendency
towards destructive behavioral patterns, then banning these physical forms of punishment had a
clear positive influence on the youth of their country following 1983. Based on this illustration in
Finland, alongside the previous research by Dr. Murray Straus, the nineteen states that permit
corporal punishment in educational settings are allowing children to experience a great disservice
as these violent acts are leaving students susceptible to a variety of mental conditions later in life.
Years ago, the United States started a trend towards this ideal where children may
develop optimally, free from corporal punishment in classroom settings, yet today, this

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movement brakes at the foot of legislation. As the nation sits on the cusp of a brighter future,
hundreds of thousands of students remain at risk for a variety of mental disorders to this day. As
my father always told me, If youre going to start something, then you should finish. I hope
lawmakers heed my fathers advice in the near future rather than forcing a violent incident, such
as with Ingraham v. Wright, to restart this trends engine.

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Works Cited
"Civil Rights Movement Timeline." Philadelphia Tribune: 2. Jan 16 2011. ProQuest. Web. 22
Nov. 2014.
Collazo, Alex. "19 States Still Allow Spanking in Schools and the Statistics Are Shocking." Mic.
Mic Network Inc., 26 Feb. 2014. Web. 27 Oct. 2014.
"Corporal Punishment in Public Schools, by State." Infoplease. Infoplease, n.d. Web. 28 Oct.
2014.
Crandall, Julie. "Poll: Most Approve of Spanking Kids." ABC News. ABC News Network, 08
Nov. 2002. Web. 27 Oct. 2014.
Dupper, David R., and Amy E. Montgomery Dingus. "Corporal Punishment in U.S. Public
Schools: A Continuing Challenge for School Social Workers." Children & Schools 30.4
(2008): 243-250. Academic Search Complete. Web. 27 Oct. 2014.
"Kozol, Jonathan." American Social Reform Movements Reference Library. Ed. Carol Brennan,
et al. Vol. 3: Biographies. Detroit: UXL, 2007. 155-162. Gale Virtual Reference Library.
Web. 27 Oct. 2014.
Karst, Kenneth L. "Ingraham v. Wright 430 U.S. 651 (1977)." Encyclopedia of the American
Constitution. Ed. Leonard W. Levy and Kenneth L. Karst. 2nd ed. Vol. 3. Detroit:
Macmillan Reference USA, 2000. 1369-1370. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 27
Oct. 2014.
sterman, Karin, Kaj Bjrkqvist, and Kristian Wahlbeck. "Twenty-Eight Years after the
Complete Ban on the Physical Punishment of Children in Finland: Trends and

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Psychosocial Concomitants." Aggressive Behavior 40.6 (2014): 568-581. Academic
Search Complete. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.
Rollins, Judy A. "2012: Revisiting the Issue of Corporal Punishment in Our Nation's Schools."
Pediatric Nursing 38.5 (2012): 248-269. Academic Search Complete. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.
Walsh, Wendy. "Spankers and Nonspankers: Where They Get Information on Spanking." Family
Relations 51.1 (2002): 81-8. ProQuest. Web. 27 Oct. 2014.