The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-01-04

menace and a disgrace to dozen states.
A great movement has begun for better
schools and for the stimulation of a
popular sentiment to support them, and
in this are enlisted able, eloquent and
devoted men who are giving their lives
to the cause. They are striving to edu-
cate the parents, to show them the ne
cessity for training their children and
to point the opportunity offered in the
vast systems OF schools already in OPP
Grafton. This has brought about mighty
quickening of the public conscience in
marked Improvement of the schools and
in turning public attention to the great
work of the time. 1t must result in
better education of the children now in
the schools and a more liberal support
of all educational institutions.
RIGHTS OF THE CHILD.
But the most pressing problem is to
get into the schools the children who do
not now attend them. The child who
never enters the schoolhouse must be
brought in, and there must be some
method of reaching the submerged parent
before illiteracy can ever be wiped out.
Will any "force of public sentiment"
ever compel the father who cares little
for his children and less for book lar
MIN TO send them to school? What eff
feet will a thousand eloquent speeches
or convincing arguments have upon the
parent who neither listens nor reads nor
thinks?
Along with the declaration generations
ago of the rights Of man and in a later
day of woman's rights there needs to be
another declaration-this time of the
rights of the child.
1t must be proclaimed that every child
brought into the world has the right to
a sound body, free from faint of blood;
to sound mind, pure and clear as the
air of heaven, and to a chance in the
struggle of existence-a right to have his
body and his mind trained so that they
may meet the demands of this strenuous
complex modern life.
free State, where every citizen has
hand in government, cannot afford to
rear race of weaklings and ignoramuses
to cumber its soil and menace it's in
stitutions. 1t cannot afford to have its
vast raw material of mind and energy
go to waste for lack of training.
In our sytems of free government OPP
portunity for development must be af-
forded those who are in the future to hold
our country in their hands.
Many parents realize their obligations
to their children and toll and struggle,
that they may reap in another genera
tion. Their sacrifice and devotion form the
brightest chapter in our national life.
They are the most useful part of the
State. and nothing can give them such
praise as the result of their efforts
MUST BE CARE OF THE STATE.
But there are other children born to
poverty and left to care and toll and
crime-children whose eyes of infancy
looked out upon ignorance and degra
dation and who have always been shut
from the light like cave bats kept in
darkness so long that the light blinds |
them.
These children who are not the care
of their parents must be made the care
of the State. And thus it can turn
menace into a blessing. a source of ex-
pense and crime into mine of virtue and |
civic wealth.
l contend that no parent has the right
to deny to his child an education and
chance for the development of his ply
steal and intellectual powers The faith
er who keeps his little one from school
and places him at work where the long
hours and unwholesome atmosphere stunt
the body and dwarf the mind is as crimi-
nal as the villain who stabs it to death
One kills the body and the other slow
ly murders body and mind and soul
The only thing that will reach the
venal parent is the force of law
No nation or state has ever wiped out
illiteracy by the force of public opin-
ion" 1t has been done in every instance
by the same method that protects So
ciety and insures every man his rights
of property and person.
REMEDY LIES IN LAW.
Law is based on the public good, which
in it's last analysis is the good of the
indivdual-for the public is made up of
individuals. There never was any danger
of general hardship in just and right
eous law to the man who was honest
Its penalties are visited only on the per-
sons who invade the rights of others
and thus menace society-on criminals
who deserve punishment.
And who shall say that the man who
denies his own tender flesh and blood,
that should be as dear to him as his
hearts core, its right to a chance in
life, is not q criminal
No law. however, can be enforced with
out the support of public sentiment. If
1t meets not with the approval of the
it remains a dead letter on the
statute books. So that no legislative
act, no matter how good it may be, can
be effective if it comes not in its own
day. Revolution is justified many times
when evolution is the safer and surer
way.
No great reform, no great movement
comes to its contamination in an hour.
Every revolution that ever succeeded and
stood the test of time has had before 1T
years of preparation, of tillng the
ground, CT sowing the seed, though to
the eye it sprang suddenly into full s
lower. stJ. ,
The ground is being thoroughly prepar-
ed by the governors and college presi-
tents and faithful ministers who are
preaching the gospel of education in the
south. They have been planting the $
seeds that are to result in a rich harvest. I
And some of the plants are ready to |
BURST into bloom t
Not every one of these States is