Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-09-04
The Teachers and the Law.
To the Editor Of The Star:

To the Editor OF The Star:
VIII YOU kindly allow me space in
your paper TO explain the necessity for
the filing of suits by the teachers against
the District to recover what was due
them legally?
The auditor in his letter to the Com
missioners as published in The Star Of
September ! says: I'm several cases
where the controllers decisions were adj
verse to the interests of the teac..ers
suits have been filed by the teachers II
the Supreme Court 1t wonld be fairer
to the teachers TO state the fact III this
way, 'In several cases where the con-
troller's decisions were adverse to TIE
Law. as afterward decided by the COURTS
suits have been filed. etc" In cases
where the decisions have been adverse
to the interests of the teachers, but
according to the intention If not the
strict letter of the Law. the teachers
have not brought suit, as in the decision
OF the controller against the awarding OF
the accrued longevity to teachers or
manual training and allied subjects i'll
the technical high school.
All suits brought by the teachers have
been decided in their favor. which would
seem to indicate that the courts and
the teachers arc able to interpret the
Law.
One Of the interesting anomalies of our
municipal government is that the cor
pora ton counsel of the District has
to defend these decisions in the courts.
Would it not be consistent even with
this form of government Tor the Com
missioners to ask for the guidance of
the auditor that the corporation counsel
interpret the law in the case? The teach
ers might not then be compelled to
pay out from their slender stipends to
obtain what is legally and justly theirs,
and the expense of litigation might be
saved them and the District as We'll
It must be evident to every mind that
no court would sustain a decision of
the auditor that absence on any day
in February except the 18th will forfeit
one days salary. but that absence OH
the 2Sth will forfeit three days salary.
vet the teachers. unless a suit is filed,
must submit to this injustice on every
future 18th of February. Again, teach
e-S are quarantined by order of the
District ard vet forced to lose part of
their salary by such quarantine-a de-
cision that would hardly hold in court.
Is 1t right to force teachers to eSpend
money in order to obtain justice?
Probably in no municipality i'm the
country have teachers been subjected to
such iniustices as in this city during
the preceding year, and one teacher was
prived of hundreds of dollars by a de-
cision just reversed in the courts by
the Lynch case. again deprived, through
illness, of money which was given her
before Christmas and then taken away
after Christmas by a decision just re-
versed in the Dean case, and finally a
victim of the 2Sth of February decision
owing TO the fatal illness of her mother,
what conception of the justice of a gov
eminent that seiZes because it can must
such a teacher have?
Very few municipalities can afford
III, 1.-
with their work, but nearly all of them
treat their teachers with justice and
dignity. It is such injustices and indig-
mites as the above even more than in
sufficient remuneration that drive teach
ers from the city and from the profess
Sion IDA NJ. DAILY.