New Britain herald., 1917-09-28
TEACHING HISTORY
A Difficult TASK
Changes Wrought by War Add to
Instructors Burdens

Washington, Sept 2s.-How the
lessons of the great war may be
taught In the school room is told in
Teachers Leaflet No. i, on "Oppor-
tunities for History Teachers" just
issued by the United States Bureau of
Education Of the Department of the
Interior, for distribution to teachers
of history throughout the United
States.
That the American teacher of his
tory is this year planning his work
under conditions at once perplexing
and inspiring, is the bureaus state
ment in announcing the new work. In
its appeal to teachers the bureau
says:
THE Nation has finally been drawn
into great war, a war which de-
mands for the successful prosecution
not only sufficient and courageous
service in the Army and Navy, but
also the loyal cooperation Of mil
lions of men and women who are not
enrolled in the fighting forces nor d.
rectly responsible for the civil ad-
ministration on which those forces
depend.
First Of all comes the duty of
keeping, for teacher and pupil, the
habit of at least trying to see things
as they really were and are. This is
not easy at any time. It is peculiarly
difficult at such a time as this when
too many people believe a slight dis
tortion of facts may be a patriotic
country as we'll as loyalty to history
hat h,
squarely in the face.
'The training Of young people and
of the parents through the pupils to
take an intelligent part in the deci-
sion of public questions is important
enough at any time, but it is Pc
culiarly so in this war whose mean
ing for the individual citizen is not
SO easily brought home. In 1928 and
1927, when the Monroe Doctrine was
! under discussion, Daniel Webster re-
; ferred to the people who thought
J that Americans had no interest in the
| European system of mutual insur-
! ance for hereditary rulers against
[ popular movements What, thew
| said, havt we to do with Europe :?
! The thunder, it may be said, rolls at
i distance. The wide Atlantic rolls
| between us and danger; and, how
ever others may suffer, we shall re-
! main safe. Webster's answer to this
T. question was strikingly similar to
some of the utterances of President
| Wilson,: I think it is sufficient an
| swer to this to say, that we are one
| Of the nations Of the earth. We
| have as clear an interest in interna-
tional law as individuals have in the
laws Of society That was said long
before the steamship, the submarine
and the wireless had broken down
still further our splendid isolation
Today we are fighting for our own
rights, but over and above those spe-
cial rights of our own we are fighting
for International law itself, without
which no nation can be safe, least of
all those democratic governments
which are less effectively organized
for war than for peace.
No one can take an intelligent
part in a great conflict for the safety
of democracy under an orderly sys-
tenn Of international law unless he is
really interested in and knows some
thing about other nations than his
own-about the difference between a
republican government like our own
or that OF France or the scarcely less
democratic constitution of Great Brit
ain on the one side, and, in sharp
contrast to all Of these, a strongly
monarch1al system like that OF the
German Empire, in which the most
important measures affecting the ma
tional welfare may be practically de-
termlned by single hereditary SOW
&re1gn or small group of such SOW
ereigns."