Arizona silver belt., 1889-09-14
STATEHOOD ys. THE SCHOOL QUESTION
 IN NEW MEXICO

electors of the Territory, is now in session in Santa Fe, but soon after the convention organized and business was announced in order, Demetric Perez, of Sceorro county, sprung the school question winch, like Banquo's ghost, so utterly desolates the hearts of both Protestants and Roman Cath olies, because it will not down at eithers bidding; and as evidence that the appari,ion has come to stay until the final vote, yea or nay, by the peo- pie at the polls, it has entered more extended area than that of Santa Fe and now pervades the whole Territory. Archbishop J. B. Salpointe, through the columns of the Las Vegas Optic, voices the position of the Catholic church as in favor of a religious at mosphere pervading the school room, and as his church cannot hope to be allowed the disbursement of the en- tire school tax, he asks, "Give us an organic school law, which will be truly unsectarian by giving to every denomination equal rights both Tn the choice of teachers and in the matter of religious instructions. The rev erend prelate further says, "Let the State see to it that the teacher is com potent to give the secular instruction required, but let his religious and moral character be determined by those whose children will be intrusted to his care or by their chosen repre- sentatives,"
 In subsequent issue of the Optic ex.Chief Justice s. B. Axtell has re- ioinder to the Bishop, of column in length, in which the following ap- pears: "The Bishop says, Let the State determine whe IS competent to teach the secular branches, and the church whe is competent to teach the religious branches. The teacher would hold two certificates -one from the State and one from the church. He would be responsible to both, and might be removed by either. This would not be common school, and is not the American system. With our mixed population, it IS entirely i'm practicable. Under our great organic law, it is clearly unconstitutional, for it unites church and State
 "The State has no right to provide for religious institutions. However strong the argument may be, that re- ligion IS absolutely indispensable to the welfare of the people, the State can neither provide for its teaching nor its support. The fact that very large majority of the people of this Territory are Catholics ought not to have any weight in the settlement of the question of common schools. Should we adopt such rule it would be too fuetuating. Populations con- stantly change.
 "The right of every individual to worship, or not to worship, must be left to the dictates of his own con. conscience and not to the opinions of majority of his neighbors,
 II do not know that anybody se- riously disputes the right, even of an ignorant and bigoted parent, to shape the religious convictions of hls child, but do most seriously and earnestly dispute the right of the State to inter- fere by any system ofreligious schools. "
 The Santa Fe Democrat also vigor- ously eriticises the Archbishop's views upon the school question. The editor expresses the belief "that free schools are for the sole purpose of educating the head" To this the Optic "emphat- lcally differs" and says: "Witbout go- ing into a discussion that would be almost interminabls, we call his atten- ten to the fact that some of the most thoughtful educators Tn the East, men who are devoted heart and ssul to the common school system, are deploring the growing tendency of that system to materialism. It is painfully ap- parent to them that the education of the heart is being sacrificed to the ed ucation of the mind, and the work turned out by this vast system year after year is demonstrating this fact with growing force. The Optic dees not agree with Bishop Salpointe in his conclusions, and it has repeatedly put itself on record in very emphatic terms as being in favor of a system of free, non-sectarian schools, but it pro- tests agalnst the theory that such schools are for the education of the mind alone, without reference to the development of the moral and relig- ious nature of the pupil"
 Should the convention refuse to adopt clause embracing the views of the Archbishop, the constitution will meet the opposition of the church at the polls, and on the other hand if his views are accepted by the convention, Congress will not sanction such an innovation upon an accepted rule of