The Irish standard., 1892-06-04
AMERICAN FREE SCHOOLS


AMERICAN FREE SCHOOLS.
They viii Celebrate the Dedica-
ton of the Worlds Fair
Columbus Day to Be Made Festive DC
casion Throughout the United States
"A Grand and Worthy
Undertaking.
The project of converting Columbus
day into an American school festival
will be heartily commended by thought
full minds. The dedication Of the ex-
position buildings and grounds will be
national event of browning i1npor-
tance; but in order to emphasize the sig
nifcance of the discovery of the new
world and to render it Ineligible
throughout the length and breadth Of
the land it is proposed to make every
schoolhouse local center for co1nmem-
orative exercises. This plan has re-
ceived the sanction of the worlds con-
gress commission and of the American
superintendencs of education. An ex-
ecutive committee has been appointed
to organize a national movement by
which thirteen million school children
in every village and town in the union
can unite in carrying out a sim
pie but effective programme on
that historic anniversary. There is
nothing i1npracticable in the scheme.
1t. will! only be necessary for every
school to have flag Of it's own to raise
and salute on the morning of the cele-
bration, and then to be prepared to
listen to an address and to join in sing
ing an ode prepared for the occasion
under the direction of the national com
mittee. A holiday will be put to the
highest educational use if all the school
children of the country can be brought
together at the same hour to commeln-
crate the greatest event in the modern
world.
The voyage of Columbus, says the
New York Tribune. was a protest
against the ignorance of the medieval
age The discovery of the new world
was the first sign of the real renais-
sance Of the old world. 1t created new
heavens and new earth, broadened
inlmeasurably the horizon Of men and
nations and transformed the whole or
der Of European thought. Columbus
was the greatest educator who ever
lived, for he emancipated mankind
from the narrowness Of it's own ig-
norance and taught the great lesson
that human destiny, like divine mercy,
arches over the whole world. If
perspective of four centuries OF prog
ress could have foated like a mirage
before the eyes of the great discoverer
as he was sighting San Salvador the
American schoolhouse would have
doomed up as the greatest institution of
the new worlds future. Behind him
he had left medieval ignorance incrm-
bered with superstition and paralyzed
by an ecclesiastical pedantry which
passed for learning. Before him lay a
new world with the promise of the
potency of civil and religious liberty,
free education and popular enlighten-
ment. Because the schoolhouse, like
his own voyage, has been a protest
against popular ignorance and has
done more than anything else to make
our free America what it is, it would
have lowered above everything else III
that nirage-lil1e vision Of the worlds
progress.
The public school celebration on Co.
lrmbus day>is to be commended, there
fore, not only as unique method Of
diffusing among local centers of Ameri-
can life from Plymouth Rock to the
Golden Gate the significance and spirit
of memorable anniversary, but also as
a practical exped1ent for emphasizing
the value of the most characteristic of
national institutions. the free school.
When the new world was discovered by
Columbus Spain was the greatest power
in Europe, and England was an obscure
and petty state. During the first CEN
fury after the landing on San Salvador
a great Spanish empire was founded
stretching from the gulf of Mexico to
Patagonia. Slowly and laboriously the
English-speaking race obtained a foot
hold in North America. Liberty was
the breath of it's life and free education
was it's most precious bequest to sue
ceeding generations. The Spanish con-
querors never opened free school. AS
time passed their empire revolted
against them, and the constitutional
forms of the English-speaking race in
the north were roughly copied by one
southern republic after another. Popu-
lar education was neglected, as it had
been under Spanish viceroys, and con-
sequently the moral force of enlight-
ened public opinion was lacking in the
southern hemisphere. What has made
the American republic the great power
in modern civilization which it has been
for a century is the free school system.
Because it has given form and direction
TO American progress, the schoolhouse is
a proper theater for celebrating the
great event of October. If thirteen
million public school children can be
taught on that historic festival to value
Alright the inestimable benefits of free
education, it will be good augury for
another century of more enlightened
progress.