Barack Obama has been accused of attempting to indoctrinate America's children with "socialist ideology".
His plan for a televised address to be shown in classrooms when children return to school next week provoked sparked complaints from parents and fuelled the growing conservative backlash against his leadership.
Critics alleged that the address planned for Tuesday was another example of state interference and so-called "big government" by the Democrat president following his record financial stimulus spending and plans for health care reforms.
Officials across the country fielded irate calls from parents after it was revealed that the federal education department had encouraged schools to make children watch the 15-minute address.
Districts in states including Texas, Minnesota, Missouri, Virginia and Illinois have declined to show the speech, which the White House said would be about no more than the need to work hard and finish education.
Other districts are still debating the issue or have announced children will be allowed to miss the event if their parents disapprove.
The school district of Quincy in Mr Obama's home state of Illinois decided not to air the president's message after phone calls "hit like a load of bricks", according to Lonny Lemon, its schools superintendent. An official in Montgomery County, Maryland, near the capital, said parents had used phrases like "Marxist propaganda" in their objections.
In comments recorded for a separate documentary to be broadcast the same evening, Mr Obama tells children: "I urge you to set goals for your own education: to study heard and get involved in your school."
Republicans seized on the prospect of Tuesday's speech as another example of the president's perceived agenda of big government interventionism.
"As far as I am concerned, this is not civics education – it gives the appearance of creating a cult of personality," said Steve Russell, an Oklahoma state senator. "This is something you'd expect to see in North Korea or in Saddam Hussein's Iraq."
In Florida, Jim Greer, the Republican Party chairman, said he was "absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology".
Critics were particularly upset that Arne Duncan, the secretary of education, had written to all head teachers announcing the president's address as a "historic speech" and urging them to build lessons around it.
Students were urged to "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president".
The White House has now changed that advice to writing "letters to themselves about how they can achieve their short-term and long-term education goals".
"That was inartfully worded, and we corrected it," said Heather Higginbotham, deputy policy director at the White House.
"I think it's really unfortunate that politics has been brought into this," she added. "It's simply a plea to students to really take their learning seriously."
The White House will make the contents of the speech available online on Monday, permitting parents to judge its suitability, she said.
In 1991 President George Bush made a similar address to schools, and like Mr Obama drew criticism, this time from Democrats accusing the Republican president of turning the event into a campaign advertisement.
Despite the furore, many more schools will show the speech – either on the internet or on C-Span, a non-profit cable channel – than will not.
"Is the president dictating to these kids? I don't think so," said Murray Dalgleish, a school official in the conservative state of Idaho.
"He's trying to get out the same message we're trying to get out, which is, 'You are in charge of your education'."
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