The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1875-01-29
The Compulsory Education Bill.

Governor Hartranft in his annual mes
sage has suggested that compulsory edu-
cation will be good thing, and according
ly a bill has been read in place by Senator
Payne, OF Luzerne county, mainly copying
the provisions of the New York compulsory
education law. Its provisions (printed at
length in our columns) are mainly as fol-
lows:
All parents or guardians who have charge
of children betweeL the ages of eight and
sixteen years are to be compelled to have
them instructed i'll spelling, reading, writ
ing, arithmetic, grammar, geography and
the history of the United States, for six
teen weeks in each year.
All persons employing children, between
the ages of eight and sixteen, are required
to see that they have been in attendance
at school for sixteen weeks in the year pre-
ceding such employment.
Ii parents guardians prefer to give
children within the terms of the act sixteen
weeks of education in the branches of learn
ing fixed upon, at home, or at private
schools, they are at liberty to do SO.
In cases where parents are too poor to
buy the necessary text books they are to be
furnished out Of the public fund.
Upon school directors and school trus,
tees in townships, towns and cities is de-
voived the task of carrying these provisions
into effect. They are to ascertain the num-
Der OF children of the proper age, to deter
mine tue qualification of parents as in
structors i'll cases where private instruc-
tions are to..be given; to see to the apprelen-
sion OF vagrant or truant children to Judge
of mental or physical inca apacity and TO at
tend to the collection of fines for violations
of the law. For assistance in these duties
they are authorized to call in the police
and constabuary forces of the state The
school boards of each judicial district in
ttn cf.fo Il,
powers and may adopt their own rules for
carrying the provisions of the law into ef-
feet, subject to the approval of the COM
mon pleas judges.
The school boards are authorized to sue
for and collect fines imposed upon parents
and guardians for neglecting to comply
with the law, which are to be placed to the
account Of the school fund.
To any person who will give the matter
attentive study it will soon be APPARENT
that MIR. Payne's bill is foredoomed fail
ure. SO far as it provides for comforting
extraordinary powers upon school directors
and trustees ii is clearly inhibited in the
constitution. The legislature is not at lib
erty to delegate any such authority as this
bill proposes to confer for the performance
of any municipal function. The authority
to enforce upon parents guardians CONS
pliance with the law, in case of conscien-
tious scruples @so TO the quality Of Instruc-
toG. ri the public schools, is more than
doubtful. No provision is made for chi>
dren who are not properly clothed. The
compensation for tue labors OF directors,
policemen, physicians and others is left TO
be yariously determined. The nature of
the duty imposed upon directors is SO un-
certainlyifixed that it may be either defeated
by laxity OF made oppressive by harshness.
The theory of this law is that crime
springs from ignorance and morality from
education. Neither one of these pI Iopos-
tions is wholly true or wholly false. Both
are utterly valueless as the basis for legis-
lation. When the state has made e6uca-
tion free for all the children within its bor-
ders above the age Of six years, it has
reached The limit of constitutional action.
the task of making mon moral has been
wisely left, as the author of Christianity
left it, matter out of the domain of statute
law. Wherever it has been undertaken ii
has proved a failure.
The report of the superintendent of com
mon schools shows that out of $50, ia pu-
pills who attend the public schools there is
an average attendance each day OF 543, 026,
or 81 per cent. According to the census
of 1870 there were ,086, 140 children of
school age in the state. From this state
ment it will be seen that there are at least
$50, 600 children in the state who are either
instructed at private schools or do not at
tend school at all. With compulsory at
tendance, including the per centage of
children who attend irregularly, the num-
Der of pupils at the public schools, for four
months Of the school term would be doub-
led. The number of scholars for each
school house in the state, there being 10,-
GIG fit for use, would be 100 The number
of children to be looked after in the matter
of truancy by the directors, police and con-
stabulary would be half million. On look
ing over the crude and uncertain legislation
proposed for vast an undertaking, we
think the legislature will discover such
disproportion of means TO ends as will serve
to defeat this bill, if it is ever reported for
further action. .-Harris5urg Patriot.