The age-herald., 1901-05-26

grace of it's illiteracy. As Dr. Curry forcibly puts it, 1t will not do to say you are to poor to educate the peopie-you are too poor not to educate them.
 Nothing has so retarded the rapid growth and development of our State as the absence of a we'll regulated system of public schools so as to place within the reach of every child in the State. both rich and poor, the means of ob- taining. free of tuition fees, such in- struction as will qualify him for the re- sponsble duties of life.
 The productive power of labor in Mas sachusetts is said to be nearly double that of the average for each inhabitant of the whole United States. and the reason assigned is the superior educa- tional advantages she furnishes to her people.
 You cannot expect skilled labor to enter our State, if by doing so their children are to be denied the means of a common school education. We must 1ght ig- norance as we would fight malaria. for 1t Is only by educating its people that a State can gain and maintain a proud po- sition among the nations of the earth.
 It has been urged in some quarters as reason why this movement for a new Constitution should be defeated that we propose to adopt suffrage plank which
 
 obtain an education. while the child of the white man will be without a like stimulous because protected in his right to vote without regard to the density of his ignorance.
 I do not understand that any delegate to this convention Is pledged to any such legislation We are pledged. mot to de- prive any white man of the right to vote,'' but this does not extend unless this convention chooses to extend 1t be- yond the life of voters now living. It Is a question worthy of careful cons1dera- tion. whether we would be warranted in pursuing any course which would have a tendency to condemn any part of our population to a condition of perpetual ilIiteracy. Provisions of the Constitu- tion prescribing educational quaiiflca- tions for the voters as 1t affects those who now have no right to vote but in the course of time will acquire the right are wisely intended to serve not as curse but as a noble stimulous to the requirement of education and to a proper preparation for meeting and discharging the duties of a citizen.
 There is strong reason why those who have fought the battles of the State-those who have been trained in the duties of citizenship, and possess character, judgment and intelligence which enable them to appreciate the re- sponsibility it imposes, should not be de- nied the right to vote, even though they may lack the clements of an education, but 1t does not follow that 1t is to the interest of the State that the indulgence should be extended to the second genera tion-especially so when 1t is considered that the facilities for learning to read and write are within reach and so easy to obtain.
 The States of Mississippi, South Car olina and Louisiana, in dealing with this great question, have rightfully consid- cred that the betterment of the facilities for securing an education for all the people was a necessary and essential part of any just and wise scheme for the regulation of the right of suffrage and for the purification of the ballot.
 There are other matters of importance I might refer to, but have already con- tinued much longer than was intended. Your work is before you. The respon-