The daily intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Territory [i.e. Wash.]) 1876-1881, 1877-08-25
County and City Official Press.
Saturday, August IS. 1877.
THE DUTY OF EDUCATION.

When the subject Of education came
up in the convention for remodeliug the
State Constitution Of Pennsylvania, a
few years ago, a clause WAS presented
ia favor Of making education compul-
sorry throughout the State. Ia favor Of
this proposition its introdacer said: Il
take it that the whole community have
al interest in the education Of every child
in tho State, and if, unfortunately, there
should exist any man in this country.
who fails to send his children TO school,
or who undertakes to say that his chill
dren shall not be educated, it is tie dHtf
and the policy Of the State, by proper
legislation. to compel it. That is
matter, all admit ought to be done. If
we are all agreed upon any one thing it
is. that the perpetuity Of free iustitu-
tons rests in large degree, upon tn
intelligence Of the people, and that in
telisence is II be secured by education.
We provide the means, whereby pa
rent, who cannot pay for the education
of his children, can have them cdu-
Gated, and if parent will not have his
children educated, let him be compelled
to do SO. We want compulsory educa-
ton. We want system that will re
quire and achieve the moral, mental
. and industrial education Of neglected
and abandoned children, and save them
from = doomed inheritance of want
and crime and woe"
At first sight it seems like an arbi-
trary excess of authority, amounting
to tyranny for the State to decree
summarily that parents shall send their
children to school whether they want
to or not, or can afford to or not, or
even If they are opposed to it Oh prin
ciple. Yet there is principls of jus
tice, of humanity and even o. nec.s-
sary responsibility involved Society AS
ut present constituted is III predial
state. The worst of 1t is tue people
are adroi,ly plundered by those whom
they least suspect. 1t Is the sly, sane
timonious old foxes who have the best
facility OF oily CANNON" to persuade
thir dupes Of their own ievotedness that
bleed them with the most unfeeiing as
siduity. Neither statesmen, nor shep-
herds nor the guardians of the popular
interests. nor public fiduciaries III any
capacity. are at this day. invariably any
more solicitous for the elevation and
benefit of the masses of the entire peo-
pie and of ameliorating and enriching
the lives of their remote fellow citizens
who are standing up face to face with
the music of the battle for existence at
the farms. the camps, the mines and the
mountains, than they are to work corrup-
tions which shall enure more exclusive
ly to their own temporary advantage
privately.
The masses Of the people must be in
struoted and informed sufficiently for
their own protection. Their safeguard
is in their own hands; and that safe
guard is general education. And here
Is found the sufficient argument for
compulsory education.
To the people Of the Pacific coast.
this question is fraught with even more
vital interest than to those of the other
States. On this coast, the children of
the poor find themselves caught be-
tween two cross ires-ground between
the upper and neither millstones Of a
crowding over-population Of their own
race from the East, and an invasion of
degraded serf labor from China on the
s.west.
Still they are not doomed to perdition
"without benefit of clergy" They have
one ladder Of escape from between the
two impinging walls of oppression that
Threaten them with certain destruction.
That ladder is education. There Is a
broad AMI boundless field which calls
tor men and women more than possibly
can be supplied. in the walks requiring
skill and trained intelligence.