The evening Argus. [volume] (Rock Island, Ill.) 1861-1871, 1862-03-05
Punishment in our schools.

EDITOR AROIs-bcti rIl ~ 10 "H"'''NN
nv all that punishment is sometimes necessa.
~, but the kind, manner, time, place and de-
rec Of it, are too little considered by our ed
ucators. If boy offends, he should be pun
isbed, but hor, when and whee are questions
that must be settled by mature deIiberation,
and judgment unswayed by passion or prcJu'
dice. Many teachers consider moral dclin.
ouency as an oifcnse against them, and imme. .
diately fy into a passion and punish without
stint What should you think OF Judge /
who should consider thief or a murderer an |,
offender against him dlone, and should come
down from his bench, take the prisoner by
the throat, and castigate him IN presence OF
the Jury and the spectators, till his passion
had exhausted him? If rule Of the school
is violated, the whole school suffers, not the
teacher alone, and for him to assume that he
alone is injured, and punish accordingly,
would be like assuming that society has no
interest in the punishment Of an offender
against its laws. assume, that for each and
every ofiense boy should be whipped, shall
he be whipped in the presence of the whole
school? Or, going to the other extreme, shall
he be whipped entirely alone? Both have
been practiced in our city schools, and both
were at one time promptly forbidden by our
board Of education.
recall an instance Of punishment in the
presence of one Of our schools, where spir.
tied, manly boy objected to the place, and the
teacher, in violent passion, caught and
threw him forcibly about, till he was thrown
with his little head against the corner Of
table, and had the buttons torn from his coat
from top to bottom When this was forbid
den by the board, pupils were taken singly
and alone into the cellar Of one Of our school
houses, and whipped till their erie, disturbed
the two schools above, aud were plainly heard
on our streets The board soon after adopted
Il rule to the effect, that no corp1rcal punish
ment should be inflicted in the presence of a
school, that when it becomes necessary to in
fict it, it should be done il the presence of
one or more teachers, and that a written re-
port, signed by the puni,her aud the witness
es, should be made to the board, setting forth
the particulars Of the ofensc, with the man
ner and degree Of punishment This rule eff
tectually put stop to corporeal punishment
in our schools, except in extreme cases. 1t
made some Of the teachers extremely angry
to have one Of their prerogatyes thus limited.
but the effect was that all unnecessary pun
ishment was done away with, there was no
chance for the teachers to punish in anger,
and no chance for them to screen themselves
in their report by suppressing facts and CLOS
sing others over by specious language. Why
has this rule been abandoned? Is the Stdtu
of our schools so changed that the old stat
prison regime has to be revived? If so, thu
report of our superintendent is at fault II,
says: Serious apprehen-ons were enter
tanned that in diminishing the masculine
force hitherto engaged, the obedience and re.
spect Of the pupils might suffer an untoward
change, and the schools relax in discipline.
But am happy to state that the ladies Sc
cured for the posts have So filled them, as not
only to relieve the public from these appre.
tensions, but to induce the belief that the
pupils have lost nothing by the suppression.
If nothing hes been lost, if the schools
have not relaxed in discipline il the scholars
have lost nothing by the suppression, why
the abandonment Of the rule, and the rcviva
ofthe system of irresponsible punishment
either to keep the schools mhere they ,cere o
make them 6siter2 That it can do neither i
demonstrable. Yet young ladies to whom
corporea punishment is either overwhelming
disgrace and grief, or source of revengetu
feeling, which PARALLELS womanly sensibiity,
have been publicly whipped. Young men,
who need only to have their unbalanced pow
ers weighed and guided wisely into proper
channels to fill their future live, with noble
success, or their eXcesscs curbcd by develop.
ing opposite and more worthy traits. have
publicly submitted to the ferulc Smaller
children are daily punished as publicly.
Surely, if cause and effect are equal the cause
which necessitates public punishment in
schools, is greater, comparatively, than that
which necessitates executions, vet confines
them to the privacy of Feels, or Jail wards land
to the presence Of few unprecedented wit
nesses. But if the non-enf0rcement Of the
rule can neither make the schools better nor
keep them where they were, it requires nc
syllogism to prove that the ostensibe object
Of such punishment wiz: the reformation o.
the punished) is lost, and the punishment de
generates into the mere infection of unneces.
sary pain A lad Of some Is years in one OF
the kock Island schools, was once requested
by his teacher to do something which did not
accord with his personal feelings at the time,
and rising promptly to his feet, with an un
blushing face, and daring which under 9th.
err circumstances would would have made hin,
a hero, replied with loud oath that he yon,d
not do it, Where was ever graver and mora
inexcusable ofcnse given in the school r.o,,,9
Yet the teacher made no reply to him I'm,
controlling himself by strong effort, while
the lad was yet on his feet looking him full
in the face, and the school waiting quietly tn
be dismissed, he said quietly Scholars, we
all respect c.; he's a noble hearted boy,
but just now, his passion is a traitor to his