The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1908-10-28

Two of the worst enemies to child
hood and youth are overwork and
idleness. Close confinement at man
ual labor is dulling, sitting, and de-
structive to the childhood; idleness
is poisonous and ruinous to youth.
Attendance upon school may be used
as a corrective for both evils. The
State, in order to protect at least
one class of children against over
work, has passed a child labor law.
Barring some notable exceptions, the
abo%rtiveness of that law is a common
Jest. To illustrate: In 1905, n
of u city school superintendent
lost more than twenty pupils from
one school within two months. In
company with n Of the cotton mil
superintendent of that town Ia mai
in favor of schools), the school su'
p%erintendent went from house to
house in the mill village enquiring
for these missing children. In one
afternoon he located twelve Of them,
every one Of them unlawfully en-
gagged at work in the mill, though
only three of their names appeared
on the payroll.
Now, the child of the lazy. greedy,
selfish parent is at work, and NOT
in school. The child Of the igno-
rant and Indifferent parent is neither
at work nor in school; he is idling.
Both children need to be educated;
the State needs both of them; and
the State has already decreed that
the taxpayers shall establish and
maintain schools for both. There
remains but one logical thing to do
compel the parents of both to send
their children to school. There is
but little logic in compelling people
to pay taxes to support the schools,
then permitting the parents OF the
children who most need the schools
deliberately to keep them from the
benefits of the schools. The poorei
the child the more is the need FOR
compelling his parents to send him
to school. Compulsory attendance
laws are aimed at the selfish and in
different parent, not at the child
Of. what advantage are good teach
ers, long school terms, and fine
school houses, unless the children
attend the schools? In a recent cleo
ton to increase the local school tax
in a district in North Carolina, where
they have recently enacted a kind
of local option compulsory law, q
certain taxpayer made this dec'ara'
ton: IF you vote to compel lne
children of this district to go to
school, increase my tax as you
please; if you are not going to put
the children into the schools, l am
opposed to any further tax That
mans argument has no answer.
Some opponent to a compulsory
law says, "You have not enougl
school houses and teachers to tak7
care of the thousands Of children
not in school," That argument is
worthless, unless we are willing t.
admit that the white people of tn:
State are actually unable to take
care of their children. Let some
philanthropist offer to aid Souti
Carolina in matters educational
then you get an answer to that ques-
ton. Will the school houses ever
be built or the teachers employed
until there is a need for them?
Would it be wise for a farmer to lei
a s5O0-crop waste in the fields, rath-
er than build $100-house in which
to store It?
The last argument of the oppo-
nents to compulsory attendance Is
that it can not be enforced without
truant officers, and that truant Of
fcers must be paid . Certainly. The
present child labor law of this State
is a dead letter, because no provis-
ion is made for its enforcement. And
the police Of Charleston, Columbia,
and other places, have to be paid,
but it pays to pay them. We are
perfectly willing to pay an officer
Of the law to arrest little negro
boys in a 10-cent crap game, but 1t
is too much to pay an officer of The
law to see that a lazy selfish father
sends his child to school. We are
paying today in actual money evecy
year five times as much in tribute
to the industrial supremacy Of New
England and other sections, as 1t
would cost us to put every white
child in the State in school for six
months in the year! What econ
omists we are! And what philoso-
pliers we try to be!
WILLIAM H. HAND.
University of South Carolina.