If I'd been paying better attention, that would have been 95 right and 1 wrong, but I saw "Atlantic" when I should have seen "Arctic". Call it taking a test at 3AM.
There were maybe 15 questions I had to think about. There were roughly the same number that I wouldn't expect someone educated in a foreign country to know, like who was the President during World War I?
So, maybe for foreigners learning about their adopted country, it's about right. Anyone who was educated here should be able to pass it, though.
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Going through only the first four questions confirmed my prediction that neither the (author of the) Naturalization Test nore the Christian Science Monitor have any clue what a (prospective) citizen should know about our country.
Each of the questions was about something that's completely non-essential to the alleged purpose of the test.
To be sure, they /were/ the kinds of things that one would (waste vast amounts of time to) memorize, but...
Apropriate questions would be such as:
o What is the distinguishing feature of the US historically?
A: It was founded on the basis of individual rights, making it the only moral country in history.
o What are "rights"?
A: freedom of action that doesn't violate others' equal freedom
o Where do rights come from?
A: the nature of Man
("God" probably should be accepted, since that's what our founders thought, but "government" is right out.)
o What are the three or four principal entities of the US
government?
A: Executive, Legislative (House, Senate), Judicial
o Why so many?
A: checks & balances - ie, so that power doesn't become concentrated in one entity
o What are the proper functions of government?
A: protecting individual rights (& so, police, military, judiciary)
o Why the separation of church and state?
A: Government has no business legislating morality; religion must never have governmental power.
o For what segment of society is it appropriate to use/initiate force?
A: The government should be the
sole repository of the use/initiation of force.
...and so on.
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