The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1878-02-28

\ / propose, by constitutional amendment
| TO put the public schools, if we must hay
them, exclusively on the capitation tax, and
| il you choose, OH the Literary Fund. and tt
| raise the capitation tax to 81, with authorlt.
| TO the Legislature to increase it in TIN
| future, if deemed advisable. Let us see HOY
! this scheme will work:
Double the present capitation tax is. 81 .90l
/ Interest on Literary Fund bonds........ oi,3ls D
For public school purposes. ......... s4Ss.25l
The saving to the treasury OF the State b,
this arrangement, which can easily be effect
ed, will be one-fifth of the net real and per
sonal property tax, or 1886, 900 per annIlm
This plan is recommended by several con
siderations, which seem to me absolutel.
conclusive.
(a) There is an increasing collision between
property and public schools. The publi
school tax, particularly as we have it in Vir
| ginia, is essentially unjust. L know mel
who pay from $500 to 81 200 per annum TO
the support OF public schools, who neve
enjoy their benefits, real or supposed. Thei
parental duty compels them to select teach
ers for their children, to direct and super
wise their education, and sternly forbid
them to delegate to the State the Solemn re
sponsibility which God and nature have i'm
posed upon them. The tax, as genera
statement, is heaviest on those who do no
patrenize the public schools, lightest on tlos
who do. 1t is a confiscati0n of private prop
erty. The public school will never cease tt
be the object of assault until this collision Ii
destroyed. The quiet and efficiency of the
system demands that this hostile agitation
4 should come to close.
(b) 1t will throw the support OF public
schools on persons who enjoy its benefits
and not on property, which is not interested
in the scheme. Certainly those whose votes
uphold the system, will not hesitate to pay
50 per annum for the support OF schools,
which suit them so we'll, and which will edu
cate their children with no additional charge.
Others will give the annual tax as a gratui-
| ty, and say and care nothing more about it.
A failure to pay the tax should forfeit the
privilege of the schools. This arrangement
would perhaps bring in the 81 900 who are
reported delinquent in the payment of the
capitation tax !; and so, largely increase the
fund for the support of public schools. 1t is
objected to this that the children would SUI
fer from the worthlessness of parents.
answer that the State cannot undertake to
be more concerned for children than their
parents; that parental love is the divine
plan for the protection of the young, and
that if that divine plan fails, we can scarcely
hope successfully to amend it. stoutly
maintain that it is not the business OF gov
eminent to take care OF babies
(c) The proposed change is necessary from
considerations that do not pertain to the
public school, but most profoundly affect the
peace and security of society and the rights
of individuals. 1t will purify suffrage. Those
who do not pay the tax cannot vote. 1t is
property Qualification, a principle already
recognized and enforced by tine require
ments Of the one-dollar tax as the condition
of suffrage. 1t TANKS the 18th Amendment.
See its operation. If the tax is paid, good
so much is contributed to the public treasu-
ry; if not paid, better; the delinquent is
debarred from suffrage. and public admins
tration is in safer and more responsible
hands.
The success of such an amendment, II
submitted to the vote of the people, may be
made perfectly certain by little tact and
management. The one-dollar capltatlon tax
prevailed; the proposed tax OF 81 would en-
counter less opposition by the numoer al
ready excluded from suffrage. Men are De.
ginning to see that private property and
universal suffrage cannot co0xist; and not
only the actual owners of property. but all
learning at length that they can expect nc
protection from the law unless suffrage be
adequately restricted.
In the matter of education, so called, II
does seem that we have simply gone crazy
Educated labor is so much more efficient
1t can so much better open the ditch, guide
the pillow, scatter manure, worm tobacco,
pick the Gotten, and hoe the corn Under
its skilfu touch, our waste places are to be
made to bloom and blossom as the rose
Rather, labor is to pass away, and be recall
ed only as the barbarous relict OF an extinct
economy ''In the sweat of thy face shalt
thou eat thy bread,o is the silly imposture
of an exploded creed! The putrefaction
Of morals advances at equal pace with this
silly demand for universal schooling at the
public expense. At bound we put to sham
our great prototypes in the matter OF State
education. Europe has compulsory. public
schools; but they are not ''public fret
schools Austria, Prussia, Holland, Swift
zerland, SaxoEy, give free buttons in strict
ly primary education, as a general rule, tt
those only who are admittedly too poor te
pay; tuition and other fees are required
without distinction, Of all who attend the
schools higher than the primary. But in ou
public schools. we give free tuition not only
in reading, writing and arithmetic, but il
geography, grammer. composition, history
eIocution, phonetics, calisthenics, algebra
geometry, trigonometry, French, German
I.atin-and not to the poor only, but to all
More A boy may step from one OF OIL
high schools into The University, which
now the capstone OF the system. and sta!
there as long rs he pleases, accomplishin:
the most complete education obtainable il
this country at the public expense. 1t ha
been left to Virginia, with piteous pleas o
poverty on her lips, to offer to every DO.
within her limits, whether rich or poor, ant
without distinction of race, color or previOu
condition, free tuition from the alphabet VI
to and through the University! Well, sh'
does not do it with her own money. and per
haps that makes the thing defensible
Let us see what a crime we are committing
in the name of education. In addition
the statistics already given, we shall emplo
a few more:
| Local taxat'n 5000
Total cost of public schools commence. 81 ,l25, 81
The University. the Virginia Military In
stitute, and the Blacksburg College are
now receiving per annum. .........".. 75,O'
Public cost higher and lower education Sl,200,9 81
The State of Virginia, and the cities an
COulltlcS NY SCPdldoO etSuiOAs AIioOS Va AouAi'
numbers, 81, 100000 per annum for publ
education an amount more than sufficient
prior to 1860, to meet all the expenses 9
the State government for full two years. W
!, we can't retrench we can't pay our debts
we are very poor A citizen of distar
country, whose information about us, W
will suppose, is entirely derived from our al
preparations of money to public purposes i
the decade ending in 1860 and in the last dt
cade, would conclude that in the former pei
iod we were young, just beginning and yer
poor, and that in the latter we had mad
such rapid strides in wealth and had accumr
, lated so much, that even invention, strain
ed and tortured, seemed inadequate to &c
duce the unhealthful plethora. There il
however, some satisfaction in the reflectlo
that, as honesty and justice wax weak an
faint, charity and philanthropy mount to til
ascendant! We can't pay for the statt
7 that is to perpetuate the memory of Wash
ington; we can't pay for the railroads an
, turnpikes that have quadrnpled the value {
our lands; but somehow we have manage
to raise, since 1871, s1,946, 900 for the pre-
! tended education of negroes, with the result
not of qualifying them, to any extent, TO
the duties of citizenship, but of renderin
them, so far as any effect at all can be dis
, covered, unhappy and inefficient in the onI
sphere of life and labor in which they ca
he contented and useful