Written by Don Byrd
A controversial law passed by the Tennessee legislature
will become law without the Governor’s signature. Described as a “permission slip” for schools “to bring creationism, climate-change denial and other non-science into science classrooms,” the bill empowers teachers to introduce alternatives to, or critiques of, standard scientific theories. Governor Haslam declined to sign the measure into law, but he didn’t veto it either.
The bill passed in both houses of the Republican-controlled state legislature. Under the Tennessee State Constitution, a bill automatically becomes law if the governor fails to sign it within 10 days.
“I do not believe that this legislation changes the scientific standards that are taught in our schools or the curriculum that is used by our teachers,” Haslam said in a written statement to Nature magazine.
