New-York tribune., 1920-10-03
not, not fit by age or training for their

work.
We have had to face the fact that
IN physical training and in the teach
ing OF American civil! government and
american history, and the principles
on Amerlcanism and of Americaniza-
tion, we have been deplorably delin-
quent, But nowhere, think, is there
more cause for alarm than in the fact
snat the annual school term of the
rural school in the United States only
averages l37 days year; that four
hfths of the rural schools are one
teacher schools, requiring instruction
IN many grades, and resulting in hasty
ana necessarily careless teaching.
we. must face the fact that illit-
eracy is twice as common in the coun-
try as IN the city, and that the op-
TO have high school education is all
too slight.
10 whatever extent the Federal gov
ernment unde rtakes the stimulation Of
Ihe pubic school system Of the United
states 1T must pay full attention to the
situation in the rural part of the coun-
try. We must have no bureaucracy in
eoucation, no monopoly of it's sources
but we owe it to the childhood of the
nation and the childhood of the agri-
cultural districts of our land to place
at its disposal the utmost in educa-
tional facilities.
"As time goes on civilizations and
governments wisely take on the func-
tions of watchfulness for the human
resources of the people. For instance
the progress of adult education in GER
tain European countries, especially the
United Kingdom, has been astonishing
To civilization of common sense it
must seem ridiculous. indeed, that edu-
cation or the facilities for education
should be a closed door at this or that
stage Of life.
Bulwark Against Radicalism
"While the world was satisfied with
education directed principally at facts
which are fixed and the, historical past
perhaps there may have been some
slight sense in measuring off SO many
yards or years of education. We have
kind knows, and will demand, education
in those flowing and flexible movements
of life which principally concern the
present and the future.
at is my belief that the conception
Of adult education will develop in
America. This is not only because we
have a special obligation never full
filled during all the time that we have
boasted about being the melting pot
to the Immigrant, of teaching our Ian
guage and a course of Americanism, it
is also because education of the adult,
which teaches the facts of current life
at home and abroad will be the true
bulwark against extreme radicalism
and will be the basis for an intelligent,
free and tolerant thought.
"The future will require that we use
government to conserve human re-
source, human health, human welfare
human happiness, as we'll as mere hu-
man prosperity in the material sense
When we have set forward upon that
obligation we may find that it is the
urban and industrial population which
requires the most loyal service and of
social justice from us ALL But it is
the consuming and the urban and in
dustrial population which must eter--
nally keep before its eyes the welfare and
the prosperity of the American farmer
not only as to his material prosperity,
but also as to the safety, the health,
the education and the happiness of the
men and the women and the children.
These are the principles which create
and maintain the fabric of a national
life one for all, and all for one, and a
united America"