The Chautauquan, Vol. 05, March 1885

by Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle; Chautauqua Institution

The fact, then, that this remarkable inequality in the cost of educating the children of the different localities in the Union does exist, can not be successfully controverted; and that there is no method of equalizing the burden save by government aid can not be truthfully denied.

The time has gone by when it could be said that Mr. A., who is poor in this world’s goods, but surrounded by a full household of ruddy youths, must provide for their education from his own depleted pocket, just as Mr. B., who is rich, and has but a single child, provides for its instruction out of his plethoric pocket.

The principle is now fully acknowledged that it is the duty of the state or government—of the people, as a body-politic—to bear this burden, and thus to equalize it. This is the principle upon which our common school system is founded, which, notwithstanding the tax it imposes, is even now looked upon by the people as one of our most important institutions, second only to the republican basis on which our government is founded.

To bring this vital institution as near to perfection as is possible, to distribute its benefits as equally as possible, to render the tax as light as is consistent with efficiency, and to bring the burden to bear as equally as is practicable on all sections and localities, should be one great aim of our Federal legislation.

All the great nations of Europe are beginning to throb with the divine impulse which is first seen in the great, questioning eyes of the speechless babe. Some of them have lain for long centuries encrusted in the densest ignorance, and awake but sluggishly to a realization of the tremendous national power, which others have long since discovered, embedded in the education of the masses. Thus Russia, with her population of 78,500,000, although almost exhausting herself with wars for territorial aggrandizement, has awakened to the necessity of granting to her schools $9,000,000 annually—a mere pittance for such a nation, yet containing the germ of higher promise. So also Austria, with her population of 22,144,244, is slowly stirring. Education there is now made obligatory, and in 1881 she supplemented prior national aid to it by a grant of $6,500,000. Italy, in 1882, with a population of 28,000,000, gave like aid to the extent of $6,200,000, beside providing school buildings and other necessary desiderata—previous aid having borne good fruit in a marked decrease of illiteracy. Prussia, with a population of 27,251,067, is fortunate in the possession of endowed schools with regular incomes. Yet she gave national aid to education to the extent of $10,000,000 in 1881, and $11,458,856 in 1882. France, with a population of some 37,000,000—independent of the millions of dollars expended for a like purpose annually by her departments and communes—gave in 1881-2 to the extent of $22,717,880 for the education of her masses. Little Belgium, with a population of but 5,403,006—about one twelfth of ours—in 1882 gave national aid to education to the extent of about $4,000,000; for she perceives, as a direct consequence of periodical aid of this character, that Belgian illiteracy is surely and rapidly decreasing, while in like ratio her prosperity is increasing. Great Britain is similarly alive to the necessity for government aid to elementary schools. Such aid was given by her in 1882 to those in England and Wales, whose united population is 25,968,286—less than half the number we boast—to the extent of £2,749,863, or—roughly calculating at five dollars to the pound—nearly $14,000,000. This, too, in a land that is also rich in well endowed universities, colleges, grammar schools, and other institutions of learning. Such aid was also given in 1882-3 to elementary schools in Scotland, whose population is but 3,734,370, to the extent of £468,512, or, say $2,342,560; and to Ireland, with a population of 5,159,839, to the extent of £729,868, or, say $3,648,340. Thus, in addition to the great educational advantages arising from the numerous well founded and amply endowed educational institutions for the various grades and classes of the British people that have long existed in England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland, we find the government of the United Kingdom aiding elementary instruction to the extent of about $20,000,000 in one year—the combined population being but 34,862,495 souls; the United States, with a larger population, is without the advantages either of such national aid or such endowed schools as those countries possess. Even the colonies of Great Britain are equally impressed with the importance and essential necessity of general public education. Taking as an example that one of her colonies with which our relations are most intimate—the province of Ontario. Its population comprises but 1,913,460 souls, yet the amount expended there upon education in 1880 reached $3,414,267. A similar ratio of expenditure to the total population—counting the latter at 55,000,000—would call for nearly $100,000,000 in the United States.

But while it may be of interest to note what other peoples and other governments are doing toward the advancement of general education within their borders, and while the contrast with that which is done, or fails to be done, in the same direction in the United States, furnishes food for instruction and ultimate benefit, yet it by no means follows that this nation, destined, as every one of its citizens proudly believes, to march in the van of the world’s civilization, is to limit its aims, its labors, its appropriations in the furtherance of education—the prime factor in all civilization—by the standards of other nations. The rather should the comparison, while it may for the moment bring to our cheeks the blush of shame, act as a stimulus to higher effort and larger expenditure, if necessary on our part to reach that preëminent position of prosperity, power, and enlightenment, of which the intellectual alertness of our people and the genius of our institutions give abundant promise.

In considering this subject we must not fail to remember that among the nations of the world ours stands alone in this: that here the sovereignty is in the people. An ignorant sovereignty is a tyrannical sovereignty, whether held by the many or the few. Its capabilities for good can alone be drawn out by education. That Liberty sits enthroned in this land is due solely to education and that proper spirit of freedom and independence in thought and action which is begotten of education. As has been well said by another: “We have gained all that we possess by reason of the education of the individual, and we hold it upon the same tenure. What we hold for ourselves we hold for mankind, and we hold it for both upon the same condition by which it was gained, and that is the continued and universal education and development of the people.”

Every child born in this great republic is born with the inherent right to be educated. He is born heir to that popular sovereignty which, upon coming of age, he is entitled to exercise. The coming responsibilities rest upon him from his very cradle up. He has an absolute right to such an education as will enable him to properly meet them. His parents who brought him into the world weighted with such responsibility, did it with the implied obligation on their part to give him that education without which his birth would be either a mockery or a crime. As with the parents, so with the state-local, and so with the state-national. If the parents fail in meeting this obligation it becomes a binding obligation upon the state-local, and if the state-local fails the obligation devolves upon the nation.

Again, the obligation of every parent in this republic to educate his children so as to enable them in due time to intelligently and wisely exercise the great power of the franchise, implies the obligation on his part to give them, up to that point, equal educational advantages. By a parity of reasoning it logically follows that in case of failure by parent or state-local—whether from inability or other cause—the obligation to secure to all children within its domain not only facilities, but equal facilities, for the attainment of a sufficient education to enable them to cast an intelligent ballot, rests upon the nation. Nor does this obligation cease when such equal facilities are provided. It goes further. It extends, if necessary, to the compulsion of those children to avail themselves of the facilities which the nation provides for their education.

That it is the right, then, of every American child to have a rudimentary education, and that it should be equal to that of every other American child, seems clear; and that where, through any cause, that child fails to get such education, it is the duty of the national government to enable him to gain it, seems equally manifest.