The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1870-10-28
THE DEMOCRATS AND THE PUBLIC
SCHOOLS.

The Democratic School Board of Lou
isville, Kentucky, recently directed that
McDonald's "Southern School History
of the United States" written by the
principal of the Louisville High School,
an ex-officer in the rebel army, and pub
lished by an ex-rebel firm in Baltimore,
should be substituted, as textbook in
the schools, for Anderson's pictorial
School History of the United States"
which had been decried as a radical"
work. The character and spirit of this
school-boOk, from which, by Democrat
ic appointment, the children of Louis
vile are to learn the history of their
country, may be inferred from the fol-
lowing extract. The author, speaking
of the massacre of the Union soldiers in
Baltimore, and of what followed, says ::
"The defiance of Baltimore excited
the liveliest resentment in the North.
The streets were posted with placards,
calling for troops, and headed Ven
geance upon Baltimore? The noblest
and meanest passions of the human heart
were appealed to, for the purpose of OBJ
tanning volunteers. 1t was said, THE
capital is in dangerP Let patriots
stand by their country in her hour of
needp At the same time influential
journals declared that the Southerners
were degenerated that the men were
towards and DULLES, and the women
beautiful, and loaded tcith .jelcekS. Booty
and Beauty was one of the watch-words
of the hour"
Here we have the wretched falsehood
of Beauregard's Manassas proclamation
offered as history, and serving the same
purpose for which it was originally ut
tered, namely, to inflame civil hatred.
And as if to show that the sympathy
with rebellion is as timid as it is posi-
tive, it is alleged, when objection is
made, that this history was used in the
schools only as far as the account of the
late war.
The consequences of the adoption of
such textbooks are but too evident.
They are placed in the hands of children
at the most ductile and unsuspicious age,
and their entire feeling toward the gov
eminent of their country is colored by
them. The story subterfuge of saying
that a certain part of the book is not
taught is merely contemplate. It is
furnished to the schools by Democratic
direction as the history of the country,
and the child reads that the rising of
the people to save their government was
stimulated by the basest appeal to the
worst of passions. The direct and nee
essary result is to implant hatred of the
government, and to foster the spirit
from which the rebellion sprang. 1t is
another indication of the essentially and
radically disorganizing tendency of the
Democratic party. 1t can not forgive
the victory of the Union and of liberty.
1t will not accept the situation, and ac-
quiesce in the conditions which are in
dispensable to the repose of the coun-
try.
Meanwhile the spirit which writes
and the party which adopts such his
tory as this calls itself the conciliatory
spirit and the conservative party. But
every fresh fact shows that it conciliates
nothing but disaffection, and preserves
only malignant jealousy of fidelity to
the Union. Its Cancellation and con-
servatism in national affairs are exactly
as evident as its honesty and economy
in the municipal management of New
York.-HdTPer's Weekly.