Clearfield Republican. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1851-1937, 1874-03-25


looking to the Prussian method OF ed
ucation. II this bill becomes o law,
poor parents will forfeit the control
of their own children. The State be,
comes the guardian Angel, and CON-
plete Russian serfdom will be inaugur-
ated, so fur us education is concerned.
We call the attention of our readers
to the following excellent article upon
this subject, which wo find in tho
Harrisburg Patriot, Of the 2lst, which
deserves an attentive pcrusal by every
ono who loves free government. Com
pulsory education is as lily adopted to
tho soil of this Republic as a brace
Of Kings or Empcrors, and the foster
ing Of the former will breed the latter.
The following is the article alluded to :
Wo have already laid before our
readers the full text of the bill before
the legislature to secure tho latter at
tendance of children ut school. There
seems TO be an intense desire on the
part of philanthropic people to bring
TO bear the powers OF government in
nearly every department of human ef.
fort. The old doctrine that the world
is governed too much is discarded by
these theorizcrs. They think that
the world cannot be governed enough.
1t is for this reason that, like barnacles
upon ship, every year witnesses an
extending area of bureaus, commits.
slons and supcrIntcndcncies fastened
upon the public service, to examine
into education, agriculture, statistics,
coast lines, liquor consumption, con-
sular service, freight tariffs and the
like. These encroachmcnts upon the
proper domain of private enterprise
have already swelled our civil service
beyond that of any civilized nation on
the earth, and are fast approaching, il
they have not already attained, point
where, by tho mere magnitude OF
numbers, our officials whose bread and
butter stands at constant hazard, have
become themselves menace to the
public welfare. They are distracted
from the number of citizens who have
q mind of their own.
We are led to this line OF remark,
not by any special enormity of the
bill upon which We are commenting,
for it is one Of the thousand harmless
expedients which cumber the statute
books, but fail to do great mischief
for lack Of the necessary machinery
in free state to carry the aims of its
projectors into practice. The assump-
ton embraced in these compulsory
education schemes, however, lies at the
root of the evil of paternal govern
ment. 1t has been the entering wedge
which we have seen in our own time
drag into its widening rift all the lib
critics Of people until even the con-
science of the individual has become
a matter of state regulation. Prussian
despoiism is the full grown tree Of
which compulsory education was the
seed. Its advocates blandly assume
that, because of the sad defect of ig-
norance, and because ignorant people
are more apt to commit crimes than
others less ignorant, therefore the
state has the right TO stop between
ignorant children and deliver over the
latter TO taskmasters and trainers OF
its choice. This is the rough, plain
statement, divested Of philanthropic
plalitudes. 1t is predicated on the
idea that the state in the matter of ed.
ucational training is authorized TO
supplement individual effort and as
sumo power and responsibility never
delegated by tho people and not ac-
cordant with right reason. On the
same principle, because Of the sad ex.
igencies of. war, and because soldiers
unframed in their youth make but in
different hcadway against troops bred
to the use of arms, the state has the
right TO protect itself against antici-
patod menace by compulsory military
service. The state has the samo right
TO protect itself against over-heating
and over.drinking which result in dys.
pcpsia, delirium and ungodliness, all
unmitigated evils. 1t follows, logi-
cally enough, that the state may
protect itself againts human depravity
and original sin, up TO such a point as
where the quantum of sinfulness in
the state and in the people at large
might be evenly balanced, when we
do not SEQ that the principle could go
farther.
But arc the premises correct upon
which compulsory education is ground
ed If it is asserted that vice or
crime is in any certain ratio to tho
ascending or descending scale of in
telligcnce, we deny it. Our own
country furnishes convincing proof OF
an ascending intelligence coupled with
descending mortality. Who that CON-
parcs the government of Thomas JEFF
ferson and Ulysses Simpson Grant, or
tho people of l776 with the people OF
1874 in this country will fail TO agree
with us? And yet, gratuitous state
education is on institution at bene6.
cent work among us.
We are not denying that intelligence
is n good thing. knowledge is power,
but power to do evil as we'll as good.
1t is very far from being the correla.
tive Of either goodness or honesty-so
far from IL that such an assumption is
not sufficient ground on which to
base tyrannous exercise Of authority.
There is n scale, however, by which
vice may be uncrringly measured. II
rises with the decay of private and
public virtue and sinks as virtue flonr-
isbes. But virtue is a plant Of home
growth, flourishing but coldly in our
common schools, and unfortunately,
rs all history proves, not to bc meas
ured by tho delusive scale OF what is
usually called intelligence, nor to bo
nursed into activity by subsidies or
compelled TO grow by force.
Nd
NATIONAL SHAME.--Grant is not the
only individual who 'ieathers his fam
lily nest at the public expense. The
publication of the following order,