[Footnote 1: Public Acts of the General Assembly of Conn., 1868, p. 296.]
In the State of Massachusetts the contest was most ardent. Boston opened its first primary school for colored children in 1820. In other towns like Salem and Nantucket, New Bedford and Lowell, where the colored population was also considerable, the same policy was carried out.[1] Some years later, however, both the Negroes and their friends saw the error of their early advocacy of the establishment of special schools to escape the stigma of receiving charity. After the change in the attitude toward the public free schools and the further development of caste in American education, there arose in Massachusetts a struggle between leaders determined to restrict the Negroes' privileges to the use of poorly equipped separate schools and those contending for equality in education.
[Footnote 1: Minority Report, etc., p. 35.]
Basing their action on the equality of men before the law, the advocates of democratic education held meetings from which went frequent and urgent petitions to school committees until Negroes were accepted in the public schools in all towns in Massachusetts except Boston.[1] Children of African blood were successfully admitted to the New Bedford schools on equality with the white youth in 1838.[2] In 1846 the school committee of that town reported that the colored pupils were regular in their attendance, and as successful in their work as the whites. There were then ninety in all in that system; four in the high school, forty in grammar schools, and the remainder in the primary department, all being scattered in such a way as to have one to four in twenty-one to twenty-eight schools. At Lowell the children of a colored family were not only among the best in the schools but the greatest favorites in the system.[3]
[Footnote 1: Ibid., p. 20, and Niles Register, vol. lxvi., p. 320.]
[Footnote 2: Minority Report, etc., p. 23.]
[Footnote 3: Minority Report, etc., p. 25.]
The consolidation of the colored school of Salem with the others of that city led to no disturbance. Speaking of the democracy of these schools in 1846 Mr. Richard Fletcher said: "The principle of perfect equality is the vital principle of the system. Here all classes of the community mingle together. The rich and the poor meet on terms of equality and are prepared by the same instruction to discharge the duties of life. It is the principle of equality cherished in the free schools on which our government and free institutions rest. Destroy this principle in the schools and the people would soon cease to be free." At Nantucket, however, some trouble was experienced because of the admission of pupils of color in 1843. Certain patrons criticized the action adversely and withdrew fourteen of their children from the South Grammar School. The system, however, prospered thereafter rather than declined.[1] Many had no trouble in making the change.[2]
[Footnote 1: Ibid., p. 6.]
[Footnote 2: Ibid., p. 23.]