Public School Education

by Michael Müller

The French Revolution, among other things, diffused communistic and socialistic theories. Nay, communism and socialism seemed to have, for a moment, the fullest sway in those revolutionary proceedings. It is from such socialistic revolutionists that came the idea, or rather principle, which was made a law, that the State should educate the children of its subjects. Accordingly the school-system was arranged, which Napoleon I. highly welcomed and retained, as he saw in it a welcome instrument of his despotism. In fact, nothing pleases State-absolutism or despotism so much as the complete control of education through the system of State-schools. As the result of impartial history, then, we see that the foundation of the State-school system is nothing else than the objectionable Protestant State-church, and especially revolutionary socialism.

But most absurd did the State-school system appear after it had been transplanted into free America. Here this "State system of education" was at first applied to the poor, and other unprovided-for "waifs of society." But not long after, the State claimed to have a paramount interest in the children of all classes; it made no distinction, it knew not the rich from the poor, but opened its scholastic treasures alike, and it was thought to be all right.

What an absurdity! The State, as I have remarked, must scrupulously abstain from violating any of those rights which it was organized to protect. It must not paralyze or take away the industry of the individual, family, or private institutions by substituting for it its own industry. The State should rather protect and promote the industry of its subjects, as well as other rights and liberties. Let me speak more plainly: the State, for instance, should protect trade, but it should not be itself a tradesman; the State should encourage agriculture, but it should not be itself a farmer; the State should sustain honest handicraft, but it should not work at shoe-making or tailoring, and bread-baking. So, in the same manner, the State should promote and protect education, but it should not be itself a school-master, and give instruction.

What a cry would be raised if the State erected State workshops, and thereby ruined all other similar trades! Now the State does the same thing, as far as possible, in regard to education. What an absurdity! In our free country, State education has no more foundation in good sense than the old sumptuary laws, that regulated the length of a boot or the dimensions of a skirt.

If the State claims the right to educate our children, why does it not just as well claim the right to nurse, feed, clothe, doctor, and lodge them? Indeed these necessities are more indispensable, and must be supplied to a considerable extent before education can be given at all. Why should the State throw all these burdens on the parents, and assume that of instruction? It cannot claim to know more of grammar than of the art of nursing and cooking. It is even said that the tailor and barber have more to do in fashioning the man than the school-master.

Again, how absurd is it not for the State to undertake to teach all alike, without regard to their circumstances or prospects in life, the same business. This scholastic equality soon ends, if it ever had a reality. They cannot all expect to be Newtons, Humboldts, or La Places. They cannot be all, nay, not one in ten thousand, "professors," or "editors," or what not. We cannot, if we would, escape the sentence imposed on our forefather in the garden: "Thou shalt eat thy bread in the sweat of thy face." As well might the State claim that all the children from seven to seventeen years of age should sit at the same table, provided at public expense, and be served with the same food and the same number of dishes. If the State (in order to prepare the rising generation to make citizens, which must be its reason, if any) thinks it necessary to prescribe a State education, it is equally important that their food, and even their clothing, should be of the approved State quality and pattern!!! All know that this was the old Lacædemonian plan, and how it ended history tells;—in ferocity, avarice, dishonesty and disruption. All admit the folly and wickedness of forcing a people into uniformity in matter of religion. Now it is just as unreasonable, just as absurd, just as wicked to force the people into uniformity in the matter of education. One species of tyranny as well as the other disregards the just claims of conscience, tramples on the most vital rights of individuals, and usurps the most sacred right of the family.

The State may, indeed, require that the children should be educated, in order that they may one day become worthy members of society, and fit subjects for the State; but claim, and give, and control their education, the State cannot. There is in all this matter a feature not always clearly represented. It is this: any provision made by the "State" for education, must refer to the poor and otherwise unprovided, and be justified on the grounds of the State standing to these classes in loco parentis; beyond this, though the State, as to "charitable uses," may be defined parens patria, yet, as to the people at large, it has nothing to do with their education whatever. If this simple though undeniable fact were properly understood, it would save a world of trouble and confusion.

I am speaking of a "Christian State," and the State in America is Christian. The very graves, if necessary, would open and give up their dead to bear testimony to its Christian origin. Its civilization is Christian, and is the product of the principles of the "New Law" as taught and promulgated by the Church. The distinguishing feature of this civilization is, that it has asserted the dignity of freedom of the individual man, while the ancient, or Gentile, civilization, sunk the individual man in the composite society called the State. In that case it was but reasonable that the State should, as owner, take upon itself the burden of providing, not only for his government, but also for the education of his offspring. These, too, belonged to it, on the maxim of Roman or Pagan law, that partus sequitur ventrem, or the offspring follows the parent. This is the origin of the Pagan doctrine, "the children of the State"—a miserable relic of barbarism. It is important to keep this fact in mind, when we deny the supremacy of the State in the matter of education.

Our children, then, are not the children of the State. The State has no children, and never had, nor will. The State does not own them, nor their fathers nor mothers, nor anybody else in this country, thank God! We have not got that far yet on the road to civil slavery, and I hope we never shall. We are not Pagans, nor Mahometans, nor Russians. We have not sold out, and don't intend to! We are free, for with a great price our forefathers have bought this freedom; and better still, we are made, through the mercy of our Divine Author, Christians, and heirs to a heavenly kingdom. Our children, too, are free; they belong by the order of nature to their parents, and by the order of grace to our Lord Jesus Christ. They are children of God and heirs to His heavenly kingdom. It is not on the State, but on parents, that God imposed the duty to educate their children, a duty from which no State can dispense, nor can fathers and mothers relieve themselves of this duty by the vicarious assumption of the State. They have to give a severe account of their children on the Day of Judgment, and they cannot allow any power to disturb them in insisting upon their rights and making free use of them. The State has no more authority or control rightfully over our children, than over a man's wife. The right to educate our children is a right of conscience, and a right of the family. Now these rights do not belong to the temporal order at all; and outside of this the State has no claim, no right, no authority. When the State has children, it will be time enough to teach them. How long will it take our enlightened age to learn this simple but important truth?

Nothing shows better the absurdity of the State in claiming the right of education, than its incompetency for the task. The State is forbidden any interference with religion.