The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-03-29

| ious, that may be utilized for the ad-
 vancement of educational questions of the county and for the needs of all classes of wealth, religion and politics. The coun- try school has the right to the very best superintendent, one who can keep pace
 with the most advanced educational
 thought. who becomes fully acquainted ligently meets them. One who from tho
 with the needs of his county and intel- public platform can arouse patrons, pu- pills, officers and teachers to a sense Of the responsibility involved in the work of educating for twentieth century life.
 who has the ability to organize by using the means at hand, who does not stop when he reaches the circumscribed peri meter of statutory duty, but seeks con- tact with humanity for it's betterment in all possible points. Who has a mission, an ideal, sees clearly, thinks to finish. knows he Is rghqt and goes ahead. We cannot command in Alabama such ser- vice in the county superintendents with out paying at least living salaries and otherwise making 1t more attractive so as to secure our best men and placing | them in special training for 1t. The friends of education in Alabama should rally, and I believe will rally, to the support of the supervision bill now on the calendar of both the house and the sen- ate.
 Another important measure which has
 passed the senate and Is on the house calendar Is a compulsory education bill. This bill Is liberal, requiring that the child must be sent to school only two months out of the year. It is but step, a short step, in the right direction fail to see how anyone objects to a law for compulsory educaton. Someone has said: "Illteraey has no rights; 1t is con- trary to our national ideal Every Hitter
 ate citizen makes popular government less certain" The theory that no child must be permitted to grow up in ignorance 15 | emnently a correct one. for ignorance is the ally of crime and poverty. It Is the purpose of the school to attract away | from crime and thriftesness towards morality and thrift Considering the dif- | faculties against which the school has had to contend it has by no means failed 10 prevent crime nor to promote industry and thrift. American education has set itself an ideal. higher than any nation has ever | set itself, that of saving itself from | pauperism and the maudin public charity | which engenders 1t. Alabama has reached l the point In her public school system In | her march towards material greatness and governmental glory that she can af- 1 ford to require the education of every child.
 | The teachers of Alabama have year | after year endorsed the proposition of | taxation for school purposes by school | districts. They have believed and believe
 now that the highest evidence of de- 1 mocracy is the God given right for | man to tax himself for the education Of | his own children. Alabama has almost | reached it's limit from a state standpoint 1 in its aid to public schools. If we are I to continue the present rate of advance , ment we must do us every other state | in the union has done and allow school 1 districts under certain conditions to levy
 a tax upon themselves for school pur- | poses. There can be no valid argument | against it. When you say that com 1 munity cannot tax Itself to aid it's own l children you stab to the very heart our 1 cherished democratic ideals The legisla-
 ture must be shown that it is important i that this amendment to the constitution be submitted to the people of Alabama | and when it is submitted the teachers OF | Alabama, the friends of education in | Alabama, the parents of Sl per cent of | the children in Alabama who live in the l rural districts, must put their sholders
 to the wheel and see that in the general
 election the amendment Is adopted.
 We have just cause to congratulate our
 selves upon the healthy educational sentl-
 ment in the state of Alabama. 1t has not
 been long since the great majority of
 our public men were indifferent to this
 great cause of education, the education
 of the masses. There has been a wonder
 full change, and now it Is rare indeed
 that you will find a man who will not
 go the limit to provide means for eduea-
 ton. The people of Alabama have be-
 gun to learn that there is a democracy in education which prevents any child
 from getting the most good out of this I world. unless every other child has It. l The people are beginning to learn that | in order to get the best for their ehil- | dren they must give the best to every | other child The people of Alabama arc | learning that if we would place our be- | loved state where by right she ought to be, we must educate, not only the favored few, but tho gerat masses-the masses
 from which our future leaders of thought
 and action are bound to come.
 On the last night of the battle of the | Wilderness when Stonewall Jackson was | killed the command fell upon Stewart. | All night long this Henry Navarro of
 the nineteenth century rode up and down his wavering lines shouting; Charge.
 charge men In the name of Jackson.
 And they did charge. All night long
 they charged until the coming of day
 saw the enemy driven back across the
 river. And now, fellow teachers, friends
 of education everywhere, let us charge the
 forces of vice and ignorance-let us charge
 in the name of the seven hundred thous-
 and children In the state of Alabama
 children In whom is wrapped up not only
 their own destiny but the eternal glory
 of our state.