Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1875-04-28
Compulsory Education.

pliSory EdQcatiou there Is rot Tord
that leads tie reader % beliese that
tue writer compre.cnds rhat Is Involeed
~ Compulsory Indication, further than
That y {, 10 furnish certain amount Of
intellectual training and ciothing for
the scholars. With him il IS education
and clothing beyond tha; he does Dot
soc. He might as we'll have added en-
ire support By the State board antl
lodging for tie pupils. Indeed he
might have followed his idea or system
10 conclusion, and advocated as such.
that the State sball come in and take
tie place Of ,he family and establish a
system for the ;eating, clothing aud cd
ucating q: the children. For if the
e;a:e La. the right TO compel the at
ieudance at schools and clo.he the
r;holars, it has the right to maintain
rear, clotbe, and educate them. Ii has
the right 10 DO whatever other thing i,
plssses with the parent and child.
By the sysfem that Compulsory Ed
ucatiou iuculcates the citizen is re-
duced to a cipter lie is nothing; the
State is everything. This is no new
doctrine it is old. 1t may seem new
hy clothing it in the garh cf COmpul-
sorry Education, but the reader and stu
dent of past governmental events among
men sees IN At nothing more or less than
the State usurplng the rights of the in-
diyidu,l. 1t has been done number
less tunes iu the past. Ii will be done
here f II be allowed to insinuate itself.
Give it place TO ger,niuate, and in
time 1t will leaven the whole body. 1t
doubtless will require generations to
develons itself, but ;ha; il will DO so
there is nothing more certain.
There is not single case in all the
past, TO our knowledge, in which peo-
pie, who of their own free will changed,
even in the least, from the Liberal to
the Arbitrary, ever recovered them
selves. The arbitrary power OF the
State over the individual has been what
the world has been fighting against for
ages, and il has only been within few
Years that tie people Of this country
have got rid Of 1t. Shall We now in
troduce it in new form, ouly to again,
after The lapse of years, reach the same
despotic Iesalt We are yet suffering,
aud will suffer for many years to come,
financially, BY having 10 pay the in
debtedness that the Rebellion Of the
South imposed on the country. tbs,
was a war of the State against the
right of the individual. Ii is true that
1t was not Compulsory Education it
was Compulsory Labor. The principle,
however, is all the same. Perhaps this
reference TO the practical working of
too much interference BY the State over
individual affairs, as illustrated, may
induce "A Poor Man" to assume tha,
if the people of the South had been
educated the State could never lave
violated tie rights of her citizens, As
was done. But it Was done by educa-
ted men. The head and front of the
Southern Rebellion was the educated
aud cultivated men aud women Of the
South. He, however, disposed of this
point last week, by leaving America
and going 10 Europe, where the first
Illustration that he produces is among
II people having snong government.
\ happy place to 60 for an iiiustra-
zion, indeed He presents the saying
Of Freuchman, that if the French
people bad been ss vel! educated as
the people of Germany, King William
could not have taken Paris. lie has
not risen to the position from which he
sees that it is only Frerehman's eS-
cu-e for getting whipped. Ii may do
as French excuse, but there is Nc
more argument in it than to say that If
,hc intellectual training OF the two
armies had been egaal, the war would
have only been series of drawn bat
ties, with no result for either side ex-
ccpt that Of the slaughter OF people (;
or that when Napoleon the First
marched all over Germany with his
French army, they were the better ed
ucatsd, and because of that they were
victorious. The moral purpose and
patriotism that animate the rank ard
fie of an army has as much and more
10 DO with its fighting quality than mere
intellectual training. The fact is, the
Freuctman is unfortunate in his excuse,
aud "A Poor Nsn" is unfortunate III
using the trenchman, and the two to-
gother msk, peor side for Compulsory
Education.
After doing Jules cimop- the freuch-
mau-be introduces Saxony aud Bel
gium. We have nothing 10 say against
saxony and Belgium or Prussia for
maintaining system Of Compulsory
Education. Ii is in accord with the
sp,rir Of their governments but Sax
onv. ISclE;c,r aaj Prussia are not the