Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1872-02-16
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National Education.

We have more than once called attention
to the bill now before Congress to provide for
general system of education throughout the
United States, which passed the House oil
Representatives on Friday. Though shorn oil
some of the Objectionable features of the bill
as originally introduced by Mr.. Hoar, it is, as
the. New York journal Of Commerce aptly
describes it, "the same old foe with a new
face" Whilst the presAnt bill leaves more
to the actiun of the individual States than MIR.
Hoar, in his first draft of it, intended to do,
it is the evident purpose Of those who have,
thus far, succeeded in pushing it through Con-
gress, to increase by it the Federal patronage
and to centralize at Washington, all power
over the public schools of the country. 1t is
an lnsidious bill, which means more than it
expresses on its face. Like the authority Civ
ing Congress power to enforce the constitu-
aonO amendments by appropriate legislation,
II " Ill be so construed ultimately as to take
from the States the right to frame their own
systems of education, and make it compulso-
ry on them to adopt such rules and regula-
lions as Congress may prescribe. The bill
proposes to set aside for school purposes the
E'SSSAS va tnO SoiO Va iduUS. uc
fund thus created is not to be distributed at
once pro rata among the several States, to be
applied by them to educational uses but is
to be done through Federal officials, who, for
the next ten years, are to make the distribu-
ton among the States according to the ratio
of the illteracy of their respective popula-
TONS" In other words, the real object of the
bill is to re-establish the Freeman's Bureau
at tie S"uth under another name. By the
twelfth section of the bill the Circuit Courts of
the United States are given exclusive iurisdic-
ton over all offences committed against its
provisions. AS by the preceding section,
Congress reserves to itself the right to modify,
at any future time, provisions of the bill, or
to add to them as it thinks proper, it is evil
dent that it may easily so stretch its powers
so as to exercise supreme authority over the
entire system of public schools.
| Not only may it abolish the school systems
of many of the States, on the ground that
they are not Republican in principle, but it
may foist upon them another system entirely
repugnant to the people. Who does not see,
moreover, that one of the consequences of the
passage of the bill may be, before long, to de-
mand that all the public schools shall admit
negro children on an equality with white p
Nor is this all. An uniform system of pub
lie education implies, as matter of course,
uniformity Of text books, and it can readily
be imagined what the character of those books
would be, and what section of the Union
would have the monopoly Of their publica-
ton.
The salient features Of the bill, as condens-
ed in the speech made By Mr.. McHenry in
nm - ? Ia e
general fund out of the sale of Public Lands.
I'd. The appointment of a Commissioner of
Education, under the Secretary of the Treas
ury, who is to have the distribution of the
fund, and superintendent over the schools.
Sd. The adoption of a system of education by
the States which shall include all classes of
children-black and whte-between the ages
of six and sixteen years.
1t has been several times pointed out by US
that such bill, if it were suffered to become
a law, would be clearly unconstitutional; that
Congress has no authority given to it to leg
islate on the matter; but that it is for the
States alone, under their reserved rights, to
say what sort of public school system they
will adopt, what rules and regulations shall
be framed for carrying it into execution, and
how it shall be supported. The Radicals care
nothing for constitutional prohibitions. Fol-
lowing the lead of Mr.. Sumner, they supple
ment the Constitution with the Declaration of
Independence, and failing to find any author
ity for their action iu the former, turn for sup
port to the "glittering generalites" of the lat
ter. They say, in effect, if the Constitution
does not give us the power to act, so much
the worse for the Constitution. We have al
ready done many things outside of the Con-
stitution, and if it be necessary, to attain our
ends, we propose to do it again and again.
The Journal Of Commerce well says:
''The inevitable abuses which would grow
out of the patronage and expenditure of vast
funds by the General Government upon the
school systems of the different States, is the
most striking of all objections, the one most
readily appreciated by the people. The sum
to be laid out in the operation is nothing less
than the cash proceeds of all the public lands
not set apart for other uses. This goes into
the hands of the Secretary of the Treasury, and
is through him redisbursed ameng the States
and Territories according to their population,
and after certain specified conditions have been
complied with. He and the agents appointed
to act with him, and the judges whether a COM
pliance has been made with the conditions or
not; and it would be within the Secretary's
power to refuse pecuniary aid to any State po-
litically opposed to him. He being the chief
dispenser of the patronage, could also control
the appointment of teachers in the States, and
could prescribe the books to be used-in which
latter item is a job of mountainous magnitude,
if any official chose to make itso. Less through
the direct machinery of the bill than by the
but potent influence which the Gen
eral Government could WELD, would the polit-
ical management of the schools be secured
Instead of ingenious, enthusiastic teachers,
wholly devoted to their calling, we should have
politicians at the school house desk, not greatly
differing from the same article that fourishes
in custom houses and revenue Offices. IF par
tizanship is the curse of the public service in
business affairs, how much more pernicious it
would be in the school house, where inteIli-
gence and good manners and an eye single to
duty are the first and the indispensable quail
6cations for a successful teacher"
Nothing can be more certain than that, like
the Freedmen's Bureau, all the machinery of
the Bureau of Education and all the influence
of the Federal officials, would be exerted un-
der Radical domination 10 partisan and Sec
tional spirit. Experience has repeatedly
shown Of late that wherever large sums of
money have been entrusted to such hands, a
good deal of it has filtered, insensibly as it
were, through official fingers. If, therefore,
the vast engineFy of the school system, ram- |
flying through the innumerable school districts
Of thirty-seven States, were welded by bold,
men, it could be employed with
tremendous effect in debauching popular sen. |
timent and preparing the way for that Gen.
traliZation Of all power at Washington which, |