Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-12-08

- PEAkING on the subject Training
the Civic Conscience" before the
Christian Endeavor convention of
~ the District held last week in the
New York Avenue Presbyterian
Church, DR.. Edwin Heyl Delk Of Phila-
delphia declared that the greatest need
in America today is respect for the law.
He pleaded for training in the family,
the school and the church that would
make every citizen feel his duty to obey
the law himself and to see that others
obeyed the law. His address was as fol-
lows:
There are two persistent facts in the
constitution of man. He is by nature
religious being and also a political being.
The one factor expresses itself in re-
ligious association we call the church, the
other in a governmental association We
call the state. Neither is an artificial
product or mere compact. Both spring
out of human relations and impulse. The
single Individual or citizen cannot fully
express the moral idea. 1t is only in mu-
tn al rela ATOMS in the state, that the indi-
vidual comes to his true self. There Is a
civic conscience. The state, however, is
composed of individuals. 1t is by the
training of individuals in the natural rela-
tons of the family, the school. the
science is made sensitive and robust. The
civic conscience, like the personal con-
science, is not quickly bred, but develops
slowly under the pressure of events and
tho inspiration of the noblest ideals of
character and conduct.
THE family was the primal unit of
political society. From the family as the
center and type of organization the state
grew by wider and wider additions of
families and groups of families. The fam
Ivy fha Rr~st py,1 fpo
first school for the training Of the civic
conscience. If the future citizens train
ing is poor at this point, all the after
training is weak and deficient. Consider
few of the notes in true family life
which make for such training. First of
all there is the note of authority. In the
parent is vested the sovereignty of the
group. Without the exercise of such au-
thority and the enforcement of parental
command the family would live in con-
fusion and end in domestic chaos. Again,
the family life is dependent upon subordi-
nation and obedience. The child must
leai that his will and wish are secondary
to the plan. and authority of the parent.
The child dare not claim too large
place in the family life Child study as a
scientific consideration is one thing, but
children controlling the actions of a whole
family is quite another state of affairs.
1t is at this point that our American fam
lily life is weakest. Our boys and girls are
ence and choice in the sphere of the
home. The impudent assertion of the
boy and the pampared Indulgence of our
girls unfit them for any genuine regard
and obedience. In many families every
thing is made to bow to the within and the
whine Of the children. Such surrender of
authority Is as bad for the children as it
is demoralzing to the status of the fam
lily life. Further, the family is the first
and most natural sphere for the express
sion of disinterested and mutual service
THE next sphere of activity in which the
embryo citizen finds himself Is the school
and playground. Let the child understand
that the headmaster and teachers stand
in the place Of the parent for the five
hours of the school day. Authority, obedi-
ence and discipline are to continue. True,
the exercise of this authority has unfortu-
nately for it's end the intellectual training
Of the child. But it IS still the moral side
Of the childs life which is in sorest need
of instruction and development. There
are hundreds Of children in the common
schools of our great cities. both of for
eign and native parentage, who are with
out the faintest idea of moral standards.
Any teacher in the lower grades of our
various schools and in some of the higher
grades will confirm my statement that
numbers of boys and girls will look you