The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-10-03 00:00:00

cStourbage Obstrser,

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 3rd, 1885.
_
THE FREE EDUCATION PROPOSAL.

TITE latest plank in the platform of the party
of political advancement in this country is
the cry of free educatien, the demand for a
State-provided system of primary schooling
without money or price. But although the
advocates of such a revolution are at present
chiefly found among the statesmen who
move in most things in the van of Liberalism,
the questions involved are of far vaster
national import than pertains to matters
uhich can properly or conveniently be
classed as things belonging to a mere party
propaganda, to be supported by thorough-
going and loyal adherents to one party lead,
and opposed by "the other side" simply on
the ground of political difference or party
strategy. Independent thinkers generally
found at most points in accord with Liberal
home r olicy, or espousing the thought and
action defined in the attitude of the Con-
servative leaders, will doubtless, in many
instances, discover themselves widely at
issue with their wonted chiefs on this sub-
ject, which threatens to assume the magni-
ude of a "burning question" at no distant
date, and will, indeed, certainly have promi-
nent part among the themes for hot debate
in view of the approaching General Election.
The man who is not content to do all his
thinking secondhand, and swim smoothly
along in the party stream, adopting as his
own the expressed opinions of some favour-
ite statesman, will pause, we think, to weigh
well the why and the wherefore of this
newest call upon our good Grandmother
the State to stir herself to discharge with
all her skill and wisdom the duty of individ-
uals. Are such sweeping changes as would
perforce follow the adoption of the free
education idea at all necessary? Are those
whom we are told .i'lwould thereby be most
benefitted asking foi the alteration, or even
regarding it as desirable? In a word, is
the contention of the High Priest of the
movement that there is in the country a
great and growing determination that
primary education should be free to all a
truthful interpretation of public opinion?
o these questions we think the unbiased
mind will return a distinctly negative reply,
and look upon the plans just now being
widely put forth in this connection as mis-
chievous, mistaken, and dangerous. "Free
education" is a sounding electioneering cry,
calculated to carry weight with superficial
folk, and by dexterous manipulation and
eloquent exposition may servo, mayhap, to
eatch.a sprinkling of new supporters for
those candidates for Parliamentary bonours
who can skilfully employ it in their electoral
programme. But that this latest craze of
restless political spirits gives promise ot be-
coming of greater and more enduring value
than that of furnishing a convenient and
showy motto for emblazonment in letters of
alluring gold upon party banners we cannot
see. It is LTA that the State should secure
the elementary education of every child to
which it gives birth; or rather that wise
legislation should so provide schooling that
it be within the reach of the guardians of
each girl and boy in the land, the State
itself actilig as guardian of all who lack the
care of t:.otze able and willing to discharge
the duty of endowing them with a whole-
some and proper educational equipment.
The State is able to do all this already. If
the present system fails in it object in some
instances, as doubtless it does, the fault
lies with the administrators of the existing
law, not with the system, which is, we hold,
sufficient for all practical purposes when
properly applied. No new laws are neces-
sary wherever the spirit of the old is fully
acted upon. Let us see that we make ade-
quate use of all the "appliances and means
to boot" which we at present possess, and
not rashly set about the institution of
changes in our National Education Economy
which wonld have the effect of upheaving
all the good substantial work of years past.
Our educational barns are sound substantial
structures, to adopt a Scriptural allegory;
it would be folly indeed to pull them down
for the more pleasure of building greater.
The proposed alteration would speedily wipe
out of existence every voluntary elementary
school in the land, and State—provided in-
stitutions would have to take their place.
By local voluntary assistance and manager-
ial zeal, these parochial educational estab-
lishments and auxiliaries of various religious
denominations have hitherto held their own
with the Board Schools in most cases. The
competition has often been keen, and per-
haps not altogether unhealthy; and still the
voluntary schools survives, vigorously alive
to-day. The: State-subsidised Board School
does all the voluntary institution of old left
undone; the two together furnish ample
primary educational accomodation for the
requirements of the country. The School
Board rttes, which press hardly enough
already, would be double what they are at
present were the whole work of elementary
• sehoolino: left, to the School Boards. But
free edurai ion, killing the able-bodied volun-
tary schools, would throw the entire cost of
primary teaching upon the State. If we do
not elect to send our children to the Board
School, we are not; now exempt therefore
from oi),,,ribu.i.ing oar quota to the local
ra*e. Sonic ip sestrcely relish this state
of things, though we grumblingly bear it,
remembering that a shilling spent on school-
ing the nation in the wherewithal to get an
honest living is both better and more satis-
factory than the same sum expended upon
gaols for repressiug it crime. And we
continue the while to pay for the education
of our own children at the proprietary or
voluntary school; and also, in a great many
cases, to maintain our annual subscription
towards the school in connection with our
own church or chapel. The "Free Educa-
tion" proposed would reduce all elementary
schools to the dead level of the Board School,
at which ?be carefully-trained children of
respectable householders would have to rub
shoulders with youngsters whose speech and
action, out of the range of tutor's authority,
were of a most objectionable order. Or, it
might be, an invidious distinction would
arise between schools and schools; one State
school, though. carried on upon exacfly the
same foundation as the rest, acquiring a
reputation of gentility, and another obtain-
ing, in conrse of time a bad name for the
characteristic roughness of its scholars.
This would pave the way for endless abuses;
and the chief effect of the change would be
that, while many children of well-ordered
families would, at greater cost than now, be
educated at private academies, those adopt-
ing this system of schooling for their charges
would have to contribute their share to the
State system, which would supersede the
voluntary schools and bring about an alarm-
ingly augmented educational taxation. And
would the working classess be thereby
materially bonefitted ? No. The advocates
of !Fee education speak, conveniently, of
• using the "resources of the State" to "pay
" the piper" for this proposed grand new
national schooling; but out of labour would
idallibly come in the end the wherewithal
frlr the settlement of the account, so that the
v.orking classes, by the operation of the
natural jsws which govern society in general,
wtiether it will or no, would after all have
1.•1 bear their part of the burden. Some ad.
nerd poiitioiszts look' ts dasesidowaxeut of

the State Church and the utilisation of the
wealth thus subverted to do much towards
meeting the cost of "free education ;" but
even supposing the country consented to that
extreme measure, the capital so obtained
would not long suffice to imeet the demands
of the new order Of things. The man with
small income might be carefully guarded
from having to contribute directly to the
taxation incident upon State-provided edu-
cation—your far-seeing Radical law-makQr
would vigilantly look to that, doubtless.
But the man with an income of say five
hundred pounds a year, derived from fifty
working men's cottages now let at an annual
rental of ten pounds, if called upon to con-
tribute fifty pounds extra to the Imperial
revenue by reason of increased taxation of
whatever form, would at once charge his
tenants at least a pound a year more rent,
and so reimburse himself. Revenue is de-
rived from income, not capital; we must
never lose sight of that; and so long as I
labour, be it delving the earth or the pursuit
of the highest:profession in the land, is the
chief source of income, no section of the ,
community can really be exempted from
paying its part to the maintenance of
national institutions. These chimerical
schemes propounded by politicians from
time to time for providing benefits for one
class at the expense of another, though they
may prove effective in raising round their
authors a harvest of fleeting popularity
from thosOvho seemingly receive the sop,
are thus in reality but delusions of the hour,
Wills-o'-the-Wisp of the night of political
darkness, which will flee away before the
morning light of larger knowledge. Why
"free education" more than free food, cr free
raiment? The latter are more even neces-
sary to existence. The advocate of the first
should, to he at all consistent, insist upon
the State supplying all its inhabitants with
these other indispensables of life. But as
we would rather purchase such clothing and
food as becomes our station, and is within
our means, than permit Government to set
up a gigantic monopoly from which we
should be compelled to procure our supplies,
the tax-gatherer calling upon us for ,the
settlement of the accounts, so do we prefer
the present excellent system of national ele
mentary teaching to the proposed impracti-
cal. plan of "free education." A State
should supply the necessities of those who
are indigent through poverty, and compel
its criminals to discharge their duty, but
leave those who are able and willing to ful-
fil their own obligations of this character to
do as seems best to themselves.

COMMENTS ON CURRENT THINGS.
THE sharp conflict between political parties
at the Registration Courts, while evoking a
good deal of strong feeling born of Liberal
and Conservative zeal, has had also its
humorous side. All sorts of trivial objec-
tions have been raised, and many amusing
cldims preferred by the agents on either side
with the hope of strengthening the position
of their party at the polling now looked for-
ward to. The service franchise, the under-
graduate vote, and the claims of the military
to enjoy the burgess right, have all given
rise to much learned legal argument and
oratory; and altogether, the putting of the
new electoral law into operation has been by
no means an easy task to the Revising Bar-
risters. Somewhere this week a policeman
was placed upon the register, on the ground
that during the twelvemonths ensuing the
man might possibly relinquish his office of
guardian of the peace, and so cast aside the
disability which now deprives him of the
privilege of exercising the suffrage of a
citizen. This unique public servant at
present stands in the position of a dead man
on the voters' list, and must abandon his
chosen and houourale avocation to bring
about his civic resuscitation. To preserve
the literal accuracy of the ordinances of
authority the name of a voter has been in
another case retained on the list because at
the legal date its owner had a rightful claim,
though he has since joined the great major-
ity; whilst the name of a railway guard who
died by drowning within a few days of the
sitting of the district court has been struck
out sans ado. A London solicitor's claim is
disallowed because, though he paid much
more than the qualifying rent for his office
premises, and kept a housekeeper as well as
a wine cellar on the place, besides sleeping
there sufficiently often to bring him in any
ordinary case upon the burgess-roll, his oc-
casional repose in town was taken upon a
sofa instead of in the orthodox bed. Many
other hair-splitting differences have been
drawn between the bona fide voter and the
imitation article ; and decisions have in some
cases been arived at contradictory to rulings
elsewhere. The Revising Barristers' lot has
not been a particularly happy one, and some
little of the work accomplished in their
courts may be pulled to pieces on appeal ;
but, on the whole, considering the magni-
tude of the statutory changes which have
been put into effect during the past few
weeks, the business done must be regarded
as very satisfactory.

SNOW before Michaelmas has not been seen
in Southern Europe before this our year of
grace during the present century, at least so
says that high meteorological authority air.
Symons. We have had smart snow showers
in Scotland, Yorkshire, and even as far
south as Kent and Dorset, not to speak of
heavy hail and biting notth winds, with
frosts which caused all the gq,rdeners' an-
nuals to assume the sable hues of decay
fully a month earlier than was the ease last
year. "It is all over with the dahlias—they
have suddenly, in one night," writes a sol -
rowing south-country florist, "put on mourn-
ing array—died without warning while still
in the brightest of their bloom." Now that
a "killing frost" has come so much sooner
than common let us hope that King Winter,
having favourcd us so long before the ortho-
dox time with the visit of his avant courier,
may delay his own coming until well to-
wards the Christmas season. A. real St.
Martin's summer would be specially enjoy-
able to the many who have had their annual
sojourn by the seaside or in the country
shortened by the untimely arrival of dis-
agreeably cold weather. Since the spell of
September-winter which so chilled every-
one, there has, happily, been a return of
summer days in many districts, giving
colour to somebody's light assertion that
the frost and snow which paid us such an
unwelcome visit was nothing more than a
dereliet storm belonging of right to the
winter to come, but which, having lost its
way among the trackless spheres, fell to the
earth and ended its career by a premature
and inglorious death.

That Complexion has always been held to be the mor.
vely in which the rose and lily contend for master)
in which their beauty is blended. Great sacrifices are
made to produce anappearance corresponding with ths
combination, but they never succeed. It cannot ap-
proach Nature. The only arrangement that can be made
to render man or woman independent of all expedients is
to freely use HAGAN'S MAGNOLIA BALM. It preserres the
akin from premaure wrinkles and furrows —rtnden.
smooth and supple, and restores he hue which ma; hay.
aded through illness, exposure to a noxious attnoephsr.
the heat ot sun.mer or the frosts winter. To be oi
tamed all Chemists and Ferfurntrs throughouht
World Prize ss. 1;d. L:tiropt..th I ),, I 111