Year: 1875

tTOm tne OOIuulDus JOuTudi,


THE SCHOOL QUESTION.


There are few leading facts with reference to
the School Question which should be kept in mind
and reflected npon by every voter, before he casts
his ballot at the ensuing October election.


1. The whole Catholic Church is openly and
confessedly opposed to the Public Schools aud all
Catholic parents forbidden to send their chill
dren to the public schools pain of being deprived
of the sacraments. This action is in accordance
with the infallible views of the Holy See, and is
countersigued and certified by the Bishops and
other clergy in both written and oral instructions
to the charges under their Jurisdiction 1t is still
further certified and enforced by the teaching of
every Catholic journal in the United States.


3. The Catholic Church demands, openly and
without qualification, (a) the release of all Catho
lies from the payment OF any public school tax; or
10y division pro rata of the school revenues, Civ
ing to the parochial schools of the church share
of the State funds; or @ the utter destruction and
extinction of the Public School System. OF these
three, it manifestly prefers the latter.


3. The Democratic party is notified by the Cath
olc press that 1t owes its ascendency to Catholic
votes and 1t is threatened, in set terms, with the


loss of this vote unless it accedes to the demands
of the church. The Catholic newspapers have
openly exhorted Catholic voters to vote the Demo-
cratic ticket as the only means of destroying the
School system of Ohio. Other sectarian legislation
was demanded of the late Ohio Legislature, under
penalty of losing the Catholic vote to the Demo-
cratic party; and the demand was acceded to. As
a reward for this sectarian legislation, The Catho-
lie Telegraph, Archbishop Purcells organ, prom
Ised the entire Catholic vote of the State to the


Democratic party, at the October election.


4. At general meeting for consultation as to
plan of campaign aud fixing time of holding State
Convention, attended by the leaders of the party
from all parts of the State, 1t was unanimously re-
solved to sustain the Democratic Legislature in its
action and it is fair to presume that the object of
this resolution was to utilize the promises made by
the Catholic press that the whole Catholic vote
should be cast for the Democratic party, as the
party to which the church owed not only the
Geghan law, but all the sectaran legislation in its
behalf which had been placed upon the statute
books of any State.


5. The Republican State Convention, in response
to a general demand from every quarter of the
State, came to the defense of the Public Schools,
and resolved against any change of our School
System, any division of the school fund, or any
union of church and State, for this or any other
sectaran expenditure of the States revenues.


6. The Democratic press joined the Catholic
press In denouncing this defense of the Schools as
an aggressive sectarian warfare upon the Catholic
Church, and a revival of the Know Nothing cru
sade against foreigners, though non-Catholic for
eign-born citizens the most active and Jealous
advocates of the measure adopted by the Republi-
can party and were the most inhexible opponents
of the demands of the Catholic Church, from their
personal knowledge of the dangers attending the
demands, gained from experience and observation
of the character of that Church in the old countries


I. The indications of public sentiment on the
subject were plain and unmistakable, after the
action of the Republican State Convention, that
the Democratic Convention found itself constrained
to adopt substantially the same resolution that
adopted by the Republican Convention, at the same
tine betraying its anger and exposing its insincer
ty by denouncing the Republican resolution as "an
insult to the intelligence of the people of Ohio,
and base appeal to sectarian prejudices though
it differed in no material sense from the very reso-
luton of the Democratic platform, in which the de-
nuncation appears.


8. The Sunday before the Convention was spent
by Gov. Allen and other Democratic leaders in Gin
cinnati; and it is expected, though not now posi-
lively known, that this action of the Democratic
Convention was then discussed and agreed upon as
a measure of policy, by these Democratic leaders
and certain dignitaries of the Catholic Church
there present. AS evidence of this, not one Cath
olic paper in the State has denounced the Demo-
cratic resolutions, as they all did the Republican
resolutions. Not one Catholic Journal has charged
the Democracy with an attack upon the Catholic
Church, although the Democratic Convention has
been equally obnoxious with the Republican, if it
was sincere in its resolve, and the action of the
Democratic Convention were not the result of some
private understanding between the Democratic and
the Catholic parties.


9. 1t is evident from all this that the Democratic
resolve is a sham and mockery; that the alliance
between the Democratic party and the Catholic
Church still exists in full force in pettO that the
Catholic vote will still be given to the Democratic
party, as promised by the Archbishop's Catholic
Telegraph; and that the object of this action will
be to help the party that is devoted to the interests
of the church. "as the surest means of destroying
the Public Schools" CTeledo Catholic Review.)


10. The emotives of the Catholic Church we will
not discuss. Whether it is conscientiously afraid
to trust Catholic youth to the public Schools from
fear that the reading of the Bible or the acquisi-
ton of knowledge in the arts and sciences usually
taught there will make them forswear their relig-
ion; or whether it has polite fear that the intel
ligent processes of secular education will cause
it to lose its hold upon pupils instructed therein
we leave each voter to determine for himself. The
The object unquestionably is, to secure State sup
port for sectarian Catholic schools; or failing in
that, to have discrimination in the law by which /
Catholics shall be released from paying school |
taxes or, thirdly, break up utterly the school sys
TEN of the States. And this they expect to accom-
plish by and through the Democratic party.


II. 1t is for the voters of this State to determine
also, whether the State will grant this exclusive
privilege of not paying school taxes to the Catholic
Church, or whether it will grant to the Catholic
Church the exclusive privilege of drawing moneys
from the State Treasury for the support of its
tartan schools, without any further State supervs-
ion over the schools than this-that the Catholic
Church will permit the State to collect the funds
to carry on the Catholic schools If the
sentiment of the voters of Ohio revolts against this
Discrimination in favor of one Sect
then it remains for them to decide whether the
same privilege sna De extended 10 all Other Sects
and creeds, so that we shall have not only Public
Schools and Catholic Schools, but also Methodist,
and Presbyterian, and Baptist, and Hebrew, and
and Republican, and Liberal, and
white, and black, and English, and German and
Irish, and Norwegian and Ksmschatkan Schools.
Either We must have all of these and more, o. the
only alternatives are that we must either abandon
public schools altogether, or resist from the very
start this demand for a sectarian division of the
school fund, for any exclusively sectaran prvil-
ege to any part of the States revenues, for
schools or any other purpose.


We have made this statement as brief and con-
else as possible. 1t covers many ponts-cvery one
of which the voters of Ohio are called to consider
in connection with this question before voting
this fall. We have endeavored to state facts only
as facts, and to make our inferences impartial and
candid, so to merit the confidence of every read
er. With the reader we leave the duty of reflection
and decision upon the facts and inferences pre-
sented.