The Daily clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1866-1888, 1878-02-06
JACKSON, February 4, 1873.
Afle school E1aws.
LETTER FROM A TEACHER To HON. A. NJ. WEST,
EDUCATION.
UNION CHURCH, JEFFERSON COUNTY

CHAIRMAN OF THE SENATE COMMITTEE ON
EDUCATION.
UNION CHURCH, JEFFERSON COUNTY,
January y, 1873. (
DEAR Saskatchewan | have had the honor
and pleasure of meeting you on several
occasions, still do not feel warranted solely
on this account to address you, but when |
consider that you are a member OF the
Senate and commissioned to make laws that
will affect not only the welfare of your
immediate constituency, but also that of tn
citizens of this county, and when | remem-
Der that you are the Chairman of the Com
mittee on Education, | feel fully Justified
in penning you few lines on the subject OF
schools.
The present school law is a huge and gi-
gantic fraud upon the people of the State,
and susceptible Cor apparently so,) of as
many constructions as there are minds to
canvass il. We have only a terIG, not ex-
ceeding five months, thus shutting the doors
of the school room against the poor children
OF the State for seven months in the year.
Your large comprehension will not fail to
perceive how injurious this system must be,
or, at least, how little o.! good it can accom-
pliSh. Put boy in the school room for
five months, and then debar him from it's
privileges for the next seven, and, before
his time to enter again approaches, he will
have forgotten all that he had previously
learned. Then, to accomplish any good,
the session should be, at least, extended to
nine months.
The law also ignores "grades," and paws
all teachers the same, thus placing an ordi-
nary or unlettered intellect on "a par with
the brightest minds in the profession
Offering no reward for application or merit.
Let there be three grades, QSC, u and 3D.
of schools, and thus equalz4 the burdens
between white and black.
The salary paid is too small, there being
no pecuniary inducement for men of high
order OF intellect to enter or remain in the
profession, unless the pay be supplemented
by the patrons Of the school, which, in many
ghborhoOE, they are unable to do, owing
to their I'M pOverished condition. The rural
districts OF the State have not sufficiently
recovered from the ravaging effects of the
war to employ competent teachers for their
schools. The wants of the youth OF these
districts are certainly deserving of care
full consideration by their Representatives.
Admit that some are able and do make up
such deficiency, are you not forcing those
OF your constituents, who are deeply and
vitality interested in the education OF their
children, TO pay, as it were, a double tax
tor the support OF schools? The salary
In this and Adams county is only $50 per
mouth, which with term of five months :,
aggregates grand total of one hundred
and fifty dollars, barely sufficient to paw a
years board for a single or unmarried man.
man OF family cannot accept this salary
only and honestly live, and married men,
you know, to be better qualified to control
mixed (male and iemale) schools than single
gentlemen. This system, if persisted in
must eventually drive from the profession
all men of talent and ability, and lelve che
rising generation, who are to become our
future Legislators, and mothers of legislators
to be taught only the three R's-Reading.
Riting and Rithmetic, and even these
very meagerly; for the instruction now
| of
frequently inferior to the average acquire
ments OF an intelligent child of six wears
OF age under more suspicious circumstances
The salary should be SO increased as to paw
500 per month to a teacher of a first grade
school, and the other grades in same ratio
The great difficulty, in the way of per-
fectng the school law, seems to be to frame
such law as will make the hardships and
benefits of thorough school system fall
equally on white and black 1t ap-
pears to me that this might be obviated by
first grading the schools and paying ac-
cording 60 grade.
| am Democrat, and in full accord with
that Democratic shibboleth, "Retrenchment
and Reform" but | can See no economy in
cheap education. Lop off all the surplus
branches that may be necessary, but for the
sake of our free institutions be liberal on
the subject of education. The people of the
Southern States have now high aud i'm
perative obligation resting upon them, (and
1t is one of the momentous questions in ref
erence to which Governor Stone spoke so
eloquently in his Inaugural,) and especially
is the trust reposed in our Representative
one of very exalted nature. Owing to
the political and civil relations existing be-
tween the two races, all the hallowed aspi-
rations of the soul, all the fond recollections
OF the great minds of other days, and all
the interests and demands of high order
OF civilization require that the youth of the
State should be so educated, that they M ay
themselves and honor to the State, the high
places of the land; and these now appeal to