For its first 174 years, the federal government was, as one writer put it, only a benevolent spectator of what the states were doing in elementary and secondary public schools. In some cases, not much was done. As late as 1914, six Southern statesAlabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolin

Goals and outcomes are two favorite words of managers and planners, right up there with projections, delivery dates and customer satisfaction. Planners try to envision the transformation of a market, a policy, a school, that may flow from their ideas and activity. Similarly, but perhaps more certain

Most Americans were in a party mood on New Year’s Eve two years ago. Although they had been admonished that 2000 was, properly speaking, the closing year of the 20th century, they generally celebrated its first day as the start of a new millenniumand celebrated with carefree exuberance. There

Our Christmas cover this year, painted by Ansgar Holmberg, C.S.J., depicts children from around the world adoring the infant Jesus. When Sister Ansgar first mailed us a rough draft of this painting, she wondered: Should Jesus be receiving the world from us, or should he be offering it to us?Christ d

Since Sept. 11 not a day has passed without reminders of the tragedy being thrust before us. Grief, loss and mourning remain part of our national consciousness, like a dull ache that sometimes becomes acute. Advent, Christmas and the coming of a new year, the first without lost loved ones, will be a

Military tribunals have been around for a long time in the United States, and they have often been controversial. The very idea of such courts is now provoking dissent both here and abroad. On Nov. 13 President Bush signed an executive order permitting individuals who are accused of terrorism and ar