New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1851-03-31
A Shameful Surrender.


The Free School principle is abandoned
in the bill which has passed the Assembly.
A State Tax of 100000 is to be levied,
and the proceeds devoted to the support OF
Common Schools, but whatever the cost OF
any Schools may be in excess of its pro-
portion of Public Money is to be paid by
the old, detested Rate Bill.
This bill ought not to become a law. In
the first place, it will be Encouragement
to efficient and spirited efforts to improve
our Common Schools. In most Districts,
$3.50 school can be kept up six or eighs
months in the year without resorting to
Rate BILL but for every thing beyond $3.50
Special tax must be levied on the dis
trict. The destitute, the mean spirited and
the ignorant will thus be rallied out at
every school meeting to vote down every
proposition for keeping the School more
months than the law requires, having bet
ter teacher than has sufficed hitherto, &c.
Meantime, many children of very poor or
very miserly parents will be kept out of
school, wholly or in part, from dread of the
Rate. bill. Can it be that We are going
back to this wretched, mischief making
contrivance?
The People are not fairly dealt with
by their representatives. The first Free
School law was passed by the most en-
lightened and practical Legislature we
have had in ten years with great unanimi-
ty. They submitted the act to the People
for approval, and it was approved by an
overwhelming majority. And that very
fact has been held by Judges who hate the
Free School principle to invalidate and null
lily the law An act of the Legislature is
law; but let the People endorse and at
firm it by direct, emphatic vote, and it
then no law
The People decided in favor of Free
Schools, but the Squiroarchy of the town.
ships determined to break them down.
They commenced petty, malignant war
fare against the new system before it had
taken effect. Boards of Supervisors neg
lectedt to levy the requisite County Tax;
Property-holders refused to pay them when
levied, and went to law, where they found
Judges to uphold them in their factious
course. The Districts were thrown into
confusion and anarchy by such nullifica-
ton, and all the blame was laid on the
Free System. And therefore the last Lee
gislsture sent the whole matter back to the
People, calculating that Free Schools
would be voted down in the midst of the
clsmor and trouble made by their deter
mined adversaries.
They were mistaken. The People, by
twenty-five Thousand majority, reat-
6rmed their devotion to Free Schools.
Though tens of thousands voted for Re
peal, in order (as they sald) to obtain "a
better Free School Law yet majority
could not be bullied nor csjoled. And now
the Assembly has disregarded the repeated
popular verde. and sacrificed the principle
of knowledge Free to All. 1t will be a
sad day for New Y ork when the bill be-
comes a law.
We were ready and willing to consent
to any change which saved the vital prin-
ciple of Freedom. State Tax, Poll Tax,
Income Tax-aEy tax or any cOntrivance
which did not tend TO keep children out Of
school we should cheerfully have accept
ed. But any law which virtually says to
a poor man or widow with half dozen chill
dren-"Tbe State has undertaken, as mat
'ter of public policy, to have all the chill
'dren within her borders educated there
fore please send them to the district school
and pay for their schooling" is a scandal
and an outrage. If the State don't care
whether all the children are educated or
not, she should say so and leave schooling
entirely to private enterprise and endow-
ment. But for the State to attempt a sys-
tenn Of Universal Education and then say
to her poorest citizens, Send your children,
and pay their school bills, is suicide. II
we were TO tax the destitute at all, it
would be by imposing fine Of l24 or 25
csnts per day for every day they kept q