Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1909-09-01

make them as nearly so as they can.
This TACT leads me to be optimistic,
yet laugh now and then at the joke
suggested by it all. And now, since
yea cannot see the joke, | viii ex-
plain it to you.
After the people have paid out SO
much for our schools, and our teach
ers have done their work so well, our
boys and girls go out to find among
grown folks a very general disregard
for law. | know a member of school
board. who has also been in the legis-
lature at Madison to help make laws,
who, just before the assessor made
his rounds. drove the most OF his
cattle to his pasture in another town,
where the assessor did not begin his
work until later. After the home as
SCISSOR had listed his property, this
lawmaker managed to get his cattle
back again before the assessor IN the
neighboring town had got around TO
his pasture. This action of promi-
nent citizen, church-goer, member
of the school board and of the state
legislature, came to be common talk,
and the boys and girls just of
school knew it. They knew too that
he had violated the law in both letter
and spirit-all for the sake of keep
ing a few more dollars in his bank,
for he was a banker withal. These
same young people, as they came to
understand more and more the ways
of men found that others were prac-
ticing deceit in order to evade their
lawful taxes. How natural for them
to conclude-some of them-that they
need not take seriously the lessons
they had learned in school concern
ing strict obedience to law. Why
should they when respectable citizens
were showing no respect for 1t.
And then these young folks find
men going hunting and fishing when
the law says they must not do so,-
thinking it good fun to fool the game
wardens These men consider them
selves respectable citizens, yet they are
bringing contempt upon law, the very
foundation of our republic. They
think they have done enough for the
government when they help suuort the
school, and so they, by their example.
they teach young people that what
they learned in school about the dig
nity of law is all nonsense outside the
school room.
1t is law in Wisconsin that no
cigarets or cigaret paper shall be sold
fafn of Yf1n
are everywhere smoking them. ] do
not pref md to know just how they get
them. l presume the ingenuity and
greed of man combine to find ways by
which they may be furnished without
open violation of the letter of the
law: but l do know that every man or
boy who gets hold of cigarets does 1t
contrary to the spirit of and intent of
the law, and that in doing so they
really show contempt for all law.
There is real truth in the saying of
the Master that he who breaks the
law in one point is guilty of all for he
thus manifests a disregard for law. He
means to break such laws as he
chooses il he can do so without be-
ing caught at it.
And every case Of graft, big or
little. is an expression of contempt for
law. Our young people, when they get
into the work of the world come to see
so much of this, and to hear yet more,
that-unless they are thoroughly
grounded in virtue-they become in
different concerning the matter. And
there is gambling in various forms all
contrary to law, all the way from the
parlor to the dens where mep and
women make a business of vice. Our
boys and girls come TO know that
these things exist and that sworn of
ficers of the law do not interfere with
them: and some of them wonder why
the school teacher laid so much stress
upon the sacredness of law and the
duty of respect for it. And so ] might
go on and on telling how much con-
tempt for law is discovered by our
young people after they get out of
school and come into contact with the
world.
Do you wonder then that some
times think This wh,Ie business Of
education is big iole? 1t is like
setting up, at great pains, long row
of bricks. and then sitting them to
knocking one another Gown again. In
| one sense it is amusing. yet in an
other it is the most awfuuy serious of
all the problems we as nation have
t. consider.
We are in no danger of inter
ference from other nations; yet we
are in danger of trouble from within.
II We do not regard as sacred the
principle of law that is the very foun-
dation of our government. there Is
surely danger ahead No structure is
safe when it's foundation is broken
| up
We who are in school work must
cultivate both faith and good works,
and keep on as we are doing-only
more So