Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-03-28
Copyright 1908, by John Elfreth Watkins.)

just Deen VOteQ DOWN Dy the
~ board of education. although
recommended by a special COM
mttee. is still permitted in three-fourths
of our cities of over 100000 population.
Although our little savages in the federal
Indian schools are protected from Tin
deed. even from "ridicule" by teachers
our only big cities besides New York
which forbid it in their public schools
are Baltimore, Chicago. Louisville, SYRIA
cusa. Toledo. Jersey City, Paterson and
Newark. y. j. In st. Paul 1t Is forbid
den, except when necessary to repel vio-
lence." In practically all Of our smaller
cities. towns and rural communities 1t is
apparently permitted. New Jersey is our
only commonwealth that has passed a
state law forbidding 1t in every COM
mu..ity In the District of Columbia
teachers are enjoined to avoid it ''as far
as may be with due regard to obedience
on the part of pupils"
Weapons Specified by Law.
Some city laws specify the weapon to
be used by its school foggers. Thus. in
Boston, il must be rattan; In San Fran
cisco. strap or rattan; in Los Angeles.
strap or switch. Girls are especially ex-
copied from the indignity and degrada-
ton of all forms Of assault and battery
from teachers in Boston. New Orleans
AMI San Francisco. While the little pH-
mary pupils can be legally whacked In
Atlanta Boston, New Orleans Provide nee
and San Francisco. the bigger and
stronger pupils of the high schools ane
immune in these cities Boston is the
only one of the twenty-nine big cities
still holding on, GENEROUSLY, to this relic
of barbar;sm. which extends immunity
TO infants in the kindergarten. Only four
of these large cities have rules forbidding
teachers to strike at the vital parts of
their helpless victims. Thus. blows upon
the head and violent shaking by teachers
are forbidden in Cincinnati. and blows
upon the face and head In Los Angeles.
while in New Orleans and Boston the
whacks must be restricted to the hands.
Cincinnati forbds such punishment for
failures in lessons. and to protect chill
dren against a teachers first heat OF
anger New Orleans. Kansas City and
New Haven forbid it's infiiction at the
time of the offense. Parents written
consent must he obtained in Minneapolis
and Providence; the principals consent
in Atlanta. Denver. Detroit, Indianapolis,
New Haven, ST Louis and Worcester.
The principal only can do the whipping
in milwaukee,. San Francisco and Mime
apOlis: only the principal or assistant
principal in New Orleans Rochester and
San Francisco. Two other teachers be-
sides the flogger must be witnesses to the
operation in Kansas City; one other
teacher in Scranton. Pa. child SEN
fenced to be thrashed in Kansas City
may receive the punishment from its
parent or guardian instead of the teach
er. Excessive punishment is forbidden
in San Francisco and Milwaukee and
lonely confinement also in the latter.
Flogging as a Moral Cocktail.
The federal bureau of education has had
prepared a series of pictures showing the
exquisite tortures to which the school
child. ancient and modern. has been and is
subjected here and abroad. This COM
mences with the "Hagellum'' Of the an
cinent Roman schoolmaster-a whip OF
leather throngs or twisted cords tied with
knots sometimes strung with bits Of
iron lead. and when We contemplate
this picture we better understand why the
ancient Romans were voluptuaries But
even in these pagan times there were
great thinkers who arose in opposition to
hoggers of youth. Quntlian. the Cele-
brated Roman teacher of oratory brand
ed corporal punishment by teachers as
DEGRADING; while PlutarCh-our old friend
with five times the proverbial lives of
cat-said that its only effect was Ito in
6uce torpor of mind and disgust for exer-
ton from recolle ction of the pain and
insult In the literature of the middle
ages We read of children so terrified by
tn, cruelty of their sChoolmasters that
they ran 10 the shrines to pray for the
protection OF the saints.
logged refractory children for punish
ment but beat innocents just to give them
a sort OF general moral cocktail.
The cruelty of this age need not as
tonish us out of our skins when we con-
slider that teachers and parents alike
worshpped god who was alleged to pun
ish their faults with the most horrible
forms of torture prolonged In an endless
hell OF fire and brmstone-one who was
forever taxing his resources to devise
some diabclical trick which would "chas-
ten the innocent while they were still
alive and kicking. People do not aspire
TO be much holier than their gods in any
age. and il would be safe wager that the
SQueerses who groaned loudest in the
gallery when New Yorks school board
refused to legalize assault and battery
upon school children were remnants Of
this hell fire and birthstone stripe.
Erasmus-the monk who laid the egg
which Luther hatched-said he was fog
ged on the general tonic principle and
for A time lost his health and interest
in study In later years he used to dine
with the master of boarding school who
after dinner usually served up boy to
be fogged by way of dessert-not that
these children deserved II. but because
EFT was f1t to humble them" and if Eras-
mus had slipped a cog and licked this