Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-01-10
ALREFORMSURGEO
Petition From the Public
Education Association.
PRESENTED TO SENATE
MANY SUBJECTS OF CURRENT IN
TEREST TREATED.
Child Labor Law, More Pay to Teach
ers, Medical Inspection, Juvenile
Court and More Night Schools.

Sentaor Gallinger has presented to the
Senate petition from the executive council
of the Public Education Association of this
city the subjects of compulsory educa-
ton, child labor, night schools. travelling
and school libraries, free lectures TO the
people. increase in teachers salaries. med
ical inspection, public Fairgrounds and
Juvenile court
Compulsory Education.
The petition urges compulsory education
law, and says:
THE lack of school accommodation will
prove only a temporary difficulty, as we do
not doubt that the patriotism of the clergy
men. ministers and church trustees of the
city of Washington will prove fully equal to
that found in New York under similar con-
ditions, when, during the incumbency of
Mayor Strong, many of the churches of the
city opened their doors and accommodated
public school classes and teachers in their
Sunday school rooms for halliday sessions
each school day until the pressing need was
past in order that none might miss the in
calcuiable benefits of the American public
school,
"The public economy of compulsory edu-
cation need hardly be urged upon your en-
lightened body. The fact that children
brought up outside of schools will naturally
drop into the defective and dependent
classes-the pauper and criminal classes-1s
mere commonplace and truism; and it is
not difficult to see that 1t costs less to keep
a child in school until he is fourteen than to
support him in a workhouse, reformatory
or prison for the rest of his life. The influx
of foreigners into the building trades by
reason of the extensive public buildings now
under way is adding materially to the rec
ognized increase of illteracy in the District
of Columbia. The children of these foreign
ers need Americanization by public school
training, SO that it becomes especially ur-
gent that they be brought into line in our
schools by means of strong compulsory
education law But it is not only the case
of the foreigners which must arouse atten-
ton, for our national pride is involved in
our care of American-born citizens. 1t is
indeed humiliating to contemplate that
child born within sight of the dome of the
Capitol of country which stands to all ma
lions of the world for civilization and en-
enlightenment and justice can grow up
without knowing how to read and write
Restriction of Child Labor.
Referring to child labor the petitioners
say:
ITO age limitation it is important that
there should be added educational require
ments, such as ability to read and write
English, because children who, from lack
OF enforcement of our old compulsory edu-
cation law, have reached the age of four
teen without schooling are not, merely by
reason of age, equipped for industrial life.
Provisions for this educational test are
found in the statutes of those states having
the most admirable child-labor laws, being
applied up 10 the age of twenty-one years
in Massachusetts, and sixteen years in Col
orado, Connecticut, Kansas, Illinois, Mary
land, Minnesota, Ohio, New Hampshire
New York, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, lndi-
ana, Michigan, Montana and Texas.
Equal in Importance TO age limitation
and to educational test, and transcending
both in physical and moral effect, is the
prohibition of night work. This prohibit
ton is found in the laws of Michigan, Viz
ginia, Texas. Ohio. Illinois, Minnesota, Ore
gon, Arkansas, New York, Massachusetts,,
Indiana. South Carolina, Alabama, Wiscon-
sin and Nebraska.
The President points out in his annual
message at the beginning of this third ses-
sion of the Fffty-eighth Congress that
there should be severe child-labor and fac
tory-inspection laws for the city of Wash
ington.
1T is indeed notifying to consider that
the District is on the small black list of
seven states and territories in which the
work of little children is not restricted
whatever their age, the number of hours of
employment, or whether they work by night
or by day.
I'VE respectfully urge that the District
of Columbia immedia tely profit by the
Presidents recommendation, and that Con-
gress refuse longer to allow the District to
be classed with Oklahoma, Indian terri
tory, New Mexico and Hawaii but that she
may be allowed to join her voice to the
splendid roll call of the majority of the
states, who by the wisdom of their laws
successfully protest against the labor Of
little children
More Night Schools.
Additional night schools are urged 1t
is pointed out that there are but four
night schools in the District, open only
seyenty-tWo DAYS in the wear
THE re-esta blishment of a night school
for the working people of the southeast
section of Washington is urgently needed -
the petition says. 1.-The school, which was
well attended during the three years that
it was open, was closed some few years
ago from insufficient appropriation. To get
to night school now, We are informed,
the people in the southeast and the sub
urbs within the District, including Twin
ing City, Anacostia, and Congress Heights,
beyond Anacostia, would have to go to
the Franklin School, at 18th and K streets
northwest, or to the Gales School, 1st
street and New Jersey avenue northwest.
I'VE earnestly submit that after a hard
days work on the part of a working man
or woman such a distance is a serious OBJ
stacle-often. doubtless. prohibitive-to the
attendance upon night schools, whereas
such attendance should be made both at
tractive and easy; We therefore recon-
mend that, as these important schools
should be near all the different centers
where working people live, the night school
of the southeast be reopened and held in
the Wallach School, as before, that Seem
ing to be the most desirably located school
building of the section.
Georgetown, incredible as it may seem,
Is without one night school. Two such
schools-one for white and one for colored
children-should be Immediately provided.
We also commend to your consideration
the need for a colored night school in the
neighborhood of Florida avenue, between
9th and 18th streets northwest, as a large
number of the colored working people of
the District live in that general section"
More Pay for Teachers.
An earnest plea is made for higher saia-
ries for the teachers in the public schools.
ION the practical ground of business
economy the petition states, higher
wages for teachers are social necessity,
for, as 1t has been said, 1T is a fact of busi-
ness life that competent service must be
well paid in order to be retained AS saia-
ries rank at present a girl may leave the
seventh grade and secure one of the hum
blest positions in federal department at a
larger salary than that which her seventh
grade teacher receives"
Model Juvenile Court
OF the need for a model juvenile court
the petitioners say:
ut is of the utmost Importance to the
community that a child's first offense be
made his last To accomplish this it is