Arizona citizen. [volume] (Tucson, Pima County, A.T. [i.e. Ariz.]) 1870-1880, 1876-04-22
Obstacles to Education.

% ing the attendance of children of re
man catholic parentage upon the pull
d lie schools, throughout the countr,
generally, has been the resistance t,
such attendance on the part of tn,
parents, actuated by the infuenc,
of their church authorities. II
y overcome this resistance and difficult,
the Legislature of the State of Rhod,
Island has lately had under considera
ton a bill which, in its first section
reads:
No person shall hereafter threaten
dissuade, hinder, or Obstruct by de
nouncing, threatening, inumidating
$ or otherwise interfering with any pa
rent or guardian who may send or wish
to send any child under his control tC
D any public school in this State which
such child is qualified to enter; mol
e shall any person, other than paren;
or guardian, attempt to hinder or pre-
vent any child from attending a public
school from which such child shall not
have been expelled, or which he is not
prohibited from attending in cOnse-
quence of some law and regulation of
such school.
And the bill, in another section, pro-
vides for Il fine of fifty dollars for each
and every offence of the kind specified
in the section quoted.
Commenting upon this proposed en-
actment the New York Independent
says:
The best thing to be done with this
l proposition is to lay ii on the table and
then leave it there. As law it would
be an outrage to religious liberty and
a disgrace to the State of Rhode Island.
If Catholic parents choose to be in
tiuenced by any threatened denial of
the privileges of the church, or by any
spiritual anathemas of the Catholic
priesthood in respect to the question of
sending their children to the public
\ school, then so be It. This is their bust
ness, and with it the State can have.
nothing 10 do without exceeding its
own province. This is a free country
for Catholics as well as Protestants; and,
/ hence, no law should attempt to provide.
any protection for Catholic parents
against the Church influences of their
priests. The question is one whiclrI
they must settle among themselves, and
any regulation of it by the civil power
would be simply an act of despotism.
Law can supply no remedies for the
victims Of superstition. Unjust assume
their competency to take care of them
selves. Nor can it justly interfere with
the right of any one, be he priest orr
layman, to denOunce and oppose the
public school system, and do what he I
can, without any act Of violence, to in
duce parents to send their children to.
private rather than to public schools.
This position of the Independent
would do very well. if there were moth
ing else to be desired or attained in
this world but religious liberty. Bread
is a desirable thing but "man shall not
live by bread alone" Religious liber-
~ IS a very beautiful and desirable
human right, but there are other rights
which the former must not be allowed
to crowd to the wall Ii Is so very easy
to step across the line from liberty to
license. The Boston Index takes up
the Independents remarks, and puts
the case in such fair and impartial
light that we give its statement of the
matter in full. The Index SAYS:
The general principle on which the
Independent rests these criticisms
namely, the improperly of State inter
ference in the internal regulation of
Church affairs,--is UndeLiably sound
one; and the Independent evidently IN
tends 10 apply this principle in all fair
ness to the case in question. If there
were no civil rights involved-If it
were simply case in which purely &c
penalties had been threaten
ed for purely ecclesiastical Offences
there could be no reasonable objection to ,
the Independents solution of the diff
Guilty. fla Catholic, for instance, should
neglect to 90 to confession, and should in ,
be refused the sacramentsl :
by his priest, he ought not to look to the !
State for redress of such a grievance; :
for refusal Of the SaCraments is not a -,
civil wrong, and cannot be recognized :
as a wrong at all by the courts or the '
But the present case is one :
of more difficulty, and we are inclined {
to differ from the view of il taken by 4,
the Independent. Bearing in mind +
that this whole school question INVOLVES '
the rights of three parties, the children, ,
the parents, and the STATE, let us ana \
lie the case a little more closely, and /
see whether there is not a manifest =
Justice in some such law as that now +.
in Rhode Island. G
l. The right of the child to a rudl- r
nentary education is sufficiently regard (,
ed, if he actually receives such an edu- 5
and it is no concern of he State, a
in that case, where the education is r
impaired The States duty as the pro- V
ector of the child's rights is discharg- h
I'd, if it does not permit the child to be h
deprived of his education by parent or p
priest. So much as this is required by |
he principle of compulsory educa- f
ion" which will yet be recognized as P
5SSCulldl W lllC uCluONAdtiC WI III VI BON-l
but more than this would be n
Inconsistent with it. |
,. If Catholic parent prefers to {
end his child to a Catholic school, ?
md sees that the child is actually in il
tructed there in secular knowledge to b
he requisite degree,-if he freely e
chooses TO submit his conscience to the o
lictation OF his priest, and voluntarily Il
urrcnderS the exercise of his con Fl
cience as an Independent individual, l
then again there IS no civil wrong, il
md no call for the State to interfere. p
But suppose that the parent conscien- RI
iously believes that his child will re y
Give better education At the public n