, 1922-03-03
WRITE AND TEACH OUR OWN HISTORY.

It is well to again call the attention of those who
would contribute to the friendly feeling between the
United Ststes and Great Britain that they will do their
cause no good by attempting to belittle the exploits OF
our revolutionary heroes or seek to minimize that
struggle or the War of 1912 in the public mind, or
even to hold out the vain hope that this country will
ever be reunited with Great Britain. The American
people are grateful for what Britain did in the world
war, and there is every reason why the close associa-
ton of that period should develop into mutual under
standings in the future for the good of the two nations
and the world. But the realization of that desire IS
not dependent in any way upon the rewriting of the
carly American history of tho United States or of ex-
punging from the record the brilliant stories of Amer
SCAN achievement with which that period is replete.
Unfortunately there have been and still are certain
influences Mt work in England that seek to make pub
lie opinion in this country receptive to the suggestion
that the two nations should eventually constitute a
"~British-American Union" The biographer of the
late Cecil Rhodes states that the first draft of Rhodes
will directed the endowment of a secret society hav-
ing for its object, among other things, "the ultimate
recovery of the United States of America as an IN
teyral part of the British empire" That original idea
OF Rhodes was never carried out, but We have instead
the Rhodes Scholarship Fund under which American
Young men are given instruction in Oxford uni.Sr-
sity. It is doubtful IL four years of teaching under
such influences gives the student any better education
than he would have received in our own universities,
but the effect of a course under those auspices is not
calculated to increase the fervor of his American pa
triotism. The late Andrew Carnegie once uttered the
following: 81 gay that as sure as the sun in the heav-
en- once shone upon Britons and Americans united, so
surely is it one morning to rise, shine upon, and greet
again the re-United States, the
Union"
Lord Northciiffe does not openly preach the re
union of the two nations, but he urges the spread of
the B~ritish-American gospel to such extent that If his
ideas were followed they would inevitably lead to the
extinction of American independence. In an Gamer
lean Issue" of the London Times of July 4, 1919, this
eminent British editor suggested the following meth
DDS for application TO our country: ~To mobilize the
press, the church, the stage and the cinema; press into
active service the whole educational systems, and root
the spirit of good will in the homes, the universities
public and high schools, and primary schools. 1t
should also provide for substituting the best men to
write books and articles on special subjects, to be pub
lished in cheap editions or distributed free New
books should be added particularly in the private
schools Histories and textbooks should be revised
the end in view being that the public Tin the United
States) may subconsciously absorb the fundamentals
of a complete mutual understanding"
Powerful influences of that sort have had the desired
effect There is a well-defned movement in the
United States to introduce textbooks, especially his
tories into our schools that will give the rising gen.
Grafton an entirely new idea of the circumstances sur
rounding the birth of the republic. 1t is openly as
serted by the authors of some present-day American
histories that the stirring incidents of the Revolution
which we have been accustomed to read would better
be omitted, and the whole story of that period has
been SO changed as to be hardly recognizable. For
tunately school officials are awaking to the dangers that
threaten, and are taking measures to expunge such
books from their currculums.