New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1912-11-10
EXPLAINS MOORE REPORT
John Collier Says Investigator
Received Every Consideration.

tsCOCiFCu Lively SOhoiuOA osASAA'
Certain general misunderstanding re-
garding the report OF Professor Ernest c.
Moore, which has been rejected by the
school committee of the Board OF Esti-
mate, prevail among various people. &C.
cording to John Collier. secretary Of the
legislative committee of the Peoples In
stitute. Mr.. Collier said yesterday that
he had talked with several people who
evidently did not grasp some of the facts
concerning the report.
THE school committee has not, as an
afternoon paper has stated, side-tracked
or suppressed Professor Moore's report,
said Mr. Collier. THE report has been
public since october 81. Any newspaper
is free to print it in whole or In part.
It will, in due course. be published in
full In the minutes of the Board Of Esti-
mate, available for general distribution
Neither has Professor Moore. as stated
In one newspaper. been compelled to pup
lish the report himself The report was
made public by the Board OF Estimate
prior to the publication Of any report oy
the members of the Hanus investigation
THE Board of Estimate school COM
mittee did not attempt to secure mourn
cations by Professor Moore OF his recon-
mendations. This fact is fully proved py
the published correspondence given out
by the school committee on October 81.
The school committee asked Professor
Moore to submit the records, documents
etc, on which he had based his general
izations, and asked, among several nun
dred other questions. whether he mad
read the minutes OF the local schooi
boards and of the Board OF Estimate
itself bearing on school matters. He de-
clned to answer these questions or 10
furnish the data, on which he had pre-
sumably based his conclusions, which
data are OF course proper part OF
the investigation itself, and should be
handed over to the school committee
Under these conditions the action or the
school committee in formally re)ecuns
the report, yet at the same time making
Il public, was eminently proper and neces-
sary. The committee ia not seeking mis-
ceuaneous and unsupported opinions Dut
new facts pointing 10 new poilclesi anu
those Professor Moore has utterly failed
to provide.
Mr.. Collier said the report was remark
able, not because It attacked the Board
Of Education and the Board OF Estimate
for, as he put IL, these bodies are being
attacked daily by somebcdy"-but because
OF the central proposition which Mr..
Moore lays down, and in support OF when
he has written his brief This proposition
is: THE school Is an institution co-ordi-
nate in dignity and importance with the
government. the church and the family
and must not be subordinated to any OF
them.
Like a good scholastic, Professor
Moore proceeds to lay down the law
based on the above preconception. and his
results must rejoice the heart OF every
Tammany philosopher" continued MI.
Collier. stripping the rhetoric away from
his recommendations and interpreting
them in terms OF New York's local prob
lens, these recommendations amount 20
this: That the educational authorities
shall be set free from those financial
checks which have been elaborated DUR
ing the last eight years on behalf OF mu-
niclpal economy and honesty; that the
educational authorities shall not be re-
ouired TO render scientific account OF
their work: that education shall be COM
nitted unreseryedly TO the hands OF So
called experts, who shall be not only
charged with pedagogical detail, but shall
have autocratic power over accounting
the installation OF ventilating apparatus,
the purchase OF supplies. and, last and
worst the determination OF the city's
educational policy. This is scholastieism
run mad The Moore report is dangerous
and lamentable because 1t dogmaticaliy
makes propositions like the one spoken OF
and will tend to produce reaction into
the conditions that prevailed twenty-five
years ago In public education. Even these
theories might be interesting If they were
supported by evidence. but the school
committee has rejected the report on the
sufficient ground of its authors formal
refusal 10 produce evidence"