https://rethinkingviolence.com/files/original/451e9f111da2cbc424462ccf044e3aa4.pdf a2d5f12dce8c58b8c4c1132426637a3b Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document The Public School Problem In America By Dr. H. W. Evans, Imperial Wizard, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan Outlining fully the policies and the program of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan toward the Public School System Copyright 1924, K. K. K. The Public School Problem In American Out of his boyhood has come to us the sub- limely simple supplication of Abraham Lincoln: “God help father, help mother, help sister, help every- body Teach me to read and write Watch over Honey and make him a good dog. And keep us all from getting lost in the wilderness. Amen.” While Lincoln was on his childish knees, eee the phrophetic prayer that we be kept rom getting lost in the wilderness, there lived a man made in God’s image who preached and practiced the solution to that problem. Horace Mann, the immortal sponsor and patron saint of education in America, believed that— “The national safety, prosperity and happiness could be obtained only through free public schools, open to all, good enough for all and attended by all.”’ I have come to speak to you in support of that fundamental American doctrine, to proclaim its importance to every phase of our eet and public life, to urge its complete and immediate adoption as the most essential of all national policies. In his infancy Lincoln had experience with a wilderness in which boys and girls, even men and women, could lose their way—an uncharted unpeopled expanse of woods and water in which lurked the deadliest dangers. He lived to see those perils disappear. Others, vastly more vital, began to loom large and menacing. His utterances contain many warnings with respect to a new kind of wilderness in which, not citi- zens, but society, might go astray. There is no longer a frontier America, but we have a wilderness in which predominates as much of stealth and more of vindictiveness than any jungle ever knew. It does not endanger individuals so much as it menaces society. Out of it crouching creatures no longer spring upon humans to satisfy the pangs of hunger; instead we have creations that prey upon humanity to appease appetites and passions for power. A spirit of lawlessness is endian the land, and fast ripening into an anarchy that is none- theless real because garbed in the ermine of respectability and unconnected with red ban- ners and black bombs. Our ideals and traditions 3 are being weakened by disrespect and inatten- tion. The art and dignity of enactment is being superseded by the unscrupulous science of legal evasion and subterfuge. Our politicians seek not the common welfare, but their own success. Our schools are in every way inadequate; they. have not the institutional standing to which they are entitled; they do not prevent illiteracy, nor always promote patriotism; too often they teach a aided allegiance. Many of our churches are becoming bickering centers and sources of ceaseless, strife-engendering controversy, fight- ing not the forces of evil, but each other, church against church, creed against creed. Out of it all, and because of it all, there has almost ceased to exist that priceless boon to humankind known as news; propaganda, the modern curse of civili- zation that spawns prejudice and nurtures in- justice, has taken its place. Our modern wilder- ness is full of darkness. Truth, God's truth and man's truth, has become a vagrant—ragged, distorted and discredited by selfishness as never before in human history. In all things, public and private, truth must prevail. Individually, that means intelligence, health and virtue. Nationally, it means liberty and justice, the safeguarding of our traditions, the fulfillment of our ideals. To civilization it means security and con- tinued progress onward and upward. To attain truth, we must adopt, without reservation or evasion, not years hence, but now, the kind, quality and quantity of education advocated by Horace Mann. Had that been done a half century ago, we would not now be in a wilderness of chaotic conflicts and confusing controversies. The re- ligious wrangling that again threatens our security and the peace of the world would not exist. Instead af an already menacing growth of divided allegiance, there would be national solidarity. The separation of church and state would be accomplished. Our patriotism would be operative, rather than so generally inept and purposeless. Had education been founda- tionally established; had it been extended, and kept free of every perversion; had there been “*free public schools. open to all, good enough for all, and attended by all,’’performing their function of teaching ‘‘truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 4 the truth,’’ we would not today be in a life and death grapple with propaganda. I submit to you that all through the ages, whenever and wherever God’s purposes have been manifest in the affairs of men, resulting in what we call an advance of civilization, that achievement has had as its vehicle a temporarily wholesome national life. Through some nation- al entity has come every bit of ground gained by and for civilization. The elements contributing to every advancement have always been law and order, enlightenment, unity, freedom and justice. Interpreted in terms of today, the antithesis of these fundamentals may be stated as Jawlessness, illiteracy, disrupting strife and controversy, propa- ganda instead of truth, and the economic inequities that increasingly threaten the very stability of society. I now advocate the adequate education of our future citizenship through a free public school system, as I have pleaded for a rigidly enforced immigration, adapted to our ideals and needs. The two remedies go together. Neither alone can re-Americanize and safeguard our sacred institutions, If this country continues to be flooded by inferior peoples whose assimilation is impossible, the task of enlightened advance- ment will be hopeless. Our indifference of the last three decades in this connection has already made it extremely difficult; but if we now place an embargo upon every alien element not in harmony with our requirements, it is not yet too late for the redemption of the Republic by means of the public school for children and its auxiliaries for adults. Let immigration of every undesirable type be stopped, completely stopped, until our own illiteracy and internal strife can be superseded by a literacy based upon unselfish, unshackled truth and patriotism built upon eager, unqualified, un-coerced acceptance of the principles that are the very foundation of our government. In the meantime, with the further over-burdening of our composite people through unmergeable immigration at an end, we can, with some assurance of success, give constructive attention to the emancipation of America from ignorance and prejudice. Wecan free our beloved country from every darkness and danger. Our Children the Cheif Asset of the State You cannot disassociate citizenship from civilization. We have a government, of by and 5 for the people. The great problem, then, concerns two vital things; the character and the ability of our composite people. Their development, hith- erto neglected, is a public responsibility pas mount to all other constructive duties of the state. We area Republic. The consent of the governed is the underlying principle of our public life. That being basic, the only sure highway to national success is adequate democratic education. Every statesman worthy the name has recog- nized that its children were the greatest asset of any state, and has based his hope for a glorious national future upon their highest development as individuals and as citizens. Out of each de- cade from the Declaration of Independence to this hour, I could summon the most notable witnesses to attest the truth of that doctrine and the necessity for its completest attainment. George Washington, in his farewell address, gave this council: “Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.” Let me recall another voice from the days of our infancy. The famous “‘Ordinance of 1787” contains this historic declaration: “Religion, morality and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.”’ That was our earliest educational statute on a national scale. While it gave legal standing toa mighty principle, it did not soe either the means or the machinery of fulfillment. Two gen- erations later, we find Daniel Webster paying this tribute to its fundamental value: “I doubt whether one single law of any lawgiver, ancient or modern, bas produced effects of more distant, marked and Jasting character than the Ordinance of 17&7 . . . It set forth and declared it to be a high and binding duty of Government to support schools and advance the means of education. The greatest American tragedy was not un- folded upon any battle field, or in any series of catastrophies. It exists in the fact that neither the advice of Washington nor the spirit of this ordinance were carried out. That was why Daniel Webster referred to it. In 1866, seventy- 6 mine years after, James A. Garfield, later to occupy the White House, presented to Congress an Education Association memorial from which I quote: “Your memorialists beg leave to express their earnest belief that universal education, next to universal liberty, is a matter of deep national concern. Our experiment of republican institutions is not upon the scale of a petty municipality or state, but it covers half a continent and embraces peoples of widely diverse interests and conditions, but who are to continue ‘one and inseparable.’ Every condition of our perpetuity and progress as a nation adds emphasis to the remark of Montesquieu, “ it is in a republican government that the whole power of education is required.’ ”’ The occasion of that memorial was the fight for more adequate public school education then engaging the attention of thoughtful, patriotic Americans. Of that attempt I shall speak later. I refer to it here because you should understand that this present battle began two generations ago, and also that at no time, from Washington to Lincoln, or since, have the educational facilities of the nation been more than a be- ginning of what were required for the safety and advancement of a great Republic. In his remarkable book on ‘“‘Child Labor and the Constitution,’’ Mr. Raymond G. Fuller savs: “What nation shall be greatest among the nations of the ‘New World’? That nation shall be greatest that puts children first in its thought, in its politics, in its economics, in its ethics The nation that accepts the leadership of little children and sets them in the midst of its counselors, that nation will lead all others in the health, intelligence, moral- ity, efficiency and happiness of its citizens and in national prosperity both material and spiritual. On the quality of nations international peace and progress depend ”’ To show the extent of our failure, I present the opinion of Dr. Alexander J. Englis, Profes- sor of Education at Harvard University, who said in 1922: “In the first place let us recognize that in all parts of this country public education is very, very far from being that which we should all like to see it, that in parts of the country it is almost unbelievably bad, that vocational education has scarcely begun to be recognized, that the amount of illiter- acy and of near-illiteracy is alarmingly great, that attention to Oe education throughout the country is almost negligible, that our large foreign population constitutes a serious problem for education and for society, that most country children do not have anything like a fair oppor- tunity for education, that in many sections of the country short school terms make effective education all but impos- sible, that a large part of our teachers lack proper education, training and experience—let us recognize all these and many other defects of education too numerous to catalog. 7 They are conditions which cry aloud for reform in tye appealing voices of children deprived of their rights as American citizens. They are undoubted and indubitable facts which cannot be ignored.” Dr. Englis here speaks of “‘the defects of edu- cation too numerous to catalog."’ My serious study of the whole problem suggests one funda- mental difficulty that is not in any catalog, a aandicap that goes back to the beginning, ane erore the beginning of the public school system. in fact, who among you now can say when, or how, our public school system began? The public school is the most essential of all Amer- ican institutions; we all know that; yet, unlike any other great American institution, it did not come into existence with clearly defined distinctive character. No date or event marks its birth. No national document ever bestowed upon it specific principles and purposes. Nor was the basic question of its relation to govern- ment ever fully and finally determined. I mention these things to show that in this country public school education was never rightly honored by a place in any organic act like the Declaration of Independence, or the Constitution; nor was it ever given deserved recognition in any outstanding federal enact- ment. It just grew, in almost haphazard fash- ion, through a kind of vagrant evolution, into what it is today, with only about one- -seventh of the efficiency that our national needs demand. For centuries education was exclusively of, py and for the church. That was yet quite largely the situation throughout Europe at the time of American colonization. The first evidences of change were in Holland and Scotland, and among the Puritans and Hugue- nots of England and France. Those earliest liberals had a vision of universal education, but there remained in their minds the idea of a religious objective. Then, in the eighteenth century, philan- thropy took an interest in education. Next there were charity schools. After that, thank God, came the conception of the American common school, emerging slowly and uncer- tainly, because, as I have shown, it was an organic orphan, and had to shift for itself. As the colonies differed, so did their schools. But gradually American education took on a type of its own, although it was not until 8 three quarters of a century after the birth o! the Republic that the public school, as we now know it, was at all firmly established. No one will deny that it was always the intention to have adequate education in Amer- ica. Private and public declarations of that high purpose are abundant; but the trouble was, and is, that the cause of public education was mever given the sanction and standing, yea, and the security, that could be obtained only through basic recognition of its paramount importance. The truth is that half our national life was lived without a general pub! c school system, and that, during the last half, public schools have been pitifully inadequate, to which failures can be traced most of the national ills that now beset us. At the half-way mark two of our greatest Americans entered the arena to battle for this cause. They were Horace Mann of Massachu- setts and Henry Barnard of Connecticut. To them America owes the highest, grandest, monuments ever erected to her most deserving heroes. Out of their statesmanship and the labors of others of that period came the effort to give public school education the standing it should have had in the beginning. , In 1867, James A. Garfield sponsored legisla- tion to create a Department of Education. Henry Barnard became the Commissioner of Education, but without a place in the Cabinet. Through the influence of the enemies of Demo- cratic Education, the Department of Education was demoted to a mere Bureau, under the Secretary of the Interior, which it has since remained. Henry Barnard resigned. The clock of true progress for America was set back, not days, but decades. The big thing, the fundamental, all important thing to be accompolished for the cause of Democratic Education in America is to give it the recognition, the dignity, the established standing, of a high place in the Cabinet. We are supporting a program to establish a Department of Education, with a Cabinet Secretary at its head. Why A Department Of Education. If there be the slightest doubt as to what a Department of Education would mean to the 9 public school system, that doubt will disappear when you understand the attitude toward it of the enemies of democratic education. In a few minutes I shall discuss the forces, or rather the only organized force, that is opposing the — American public school system. At this point I desire only to show that this opposition by the Roman Catholic hierarchy is aimed chiefly at the idea of a Department of Education. That is what they fear. You will remember that there was but little activity in behalf of the Smith-Towner bill during the Sixty-seventh Congress, because of the pending measure to establish a Department of Public Welfare, with Education only a bureau in it. With respect to that situation, I quote in part a letter, issued on May 4, 1921, by the National Catholic Welfare Council, as follows: “It should further be noted that other measures are now under consideration by the leaders in Congress which may obviate the need of opposition to the Towner Bill Should the McCormic Bill be passed and the Department of Public Welfare be established, the Bureau of Education would simply be’ transferred from the Department of the Interior to the Department of Public Welfare; it would not be erected into a seperate department. In that case, the situation would practically be what it is at present.” In other words, the heirarchy does not oppose legislation that leaves matters as they are, with a poor, powerless, undignified Bureau of Education, instead of a Department of Education which would at once and forever suggest to every American that at last our public schools had been given the recognition and standing that should have been their governmental position from the very beginning. Therefore, I say to you that this part of our program is the all-important part; that there must be no compromise upon this issue. When we have given public schools organic signifi- cance, as the creation of a Department of Education will do, while that belated act alone cannot at once remedy the enervating results of one hundred and thirty-five years of neglected duty, of wasted citizen- ship, it will ease the national conscience and be followed quickly by a new and constantly accelerat- ing educational vigor throughout the Republic. It will mark the beginning of a rising tide of common intelligence, health, and virtue among both the native and adopted sons and daughters of America. Io The Shameful Inadequacy Of Education. The indictment is that ‘‘the defects of educa- tion are too numerous to catalog.’’ How much more impossible is it to catalog the conse- quences of those defects. When we face the results of our inadequate public school system, the situation becomes positively appalling. Each year, there is made for taxation, an apptaisement of our material wealth. An inventory, On as exact and scientific a scale, of the much more vital human values has never been attempted. It happened, however, quite incidently, that the nation was per- mitted to get a glimpse at the menacing after- math of educational inadequacy. When our young manhood was conscripted for service in the great war, they were examined, mentally and physically; tests were made and recorded; the results are known. At least we may look squarely at the terrible truth about our com- posite humanity, and relate its degeneracy directly to the failure of our school system. The census returns had been telling us that there was six per cent illiteracy in America. The army tests revealed that 20.9 per cent of the drafted men were “unable to read and understand newspapers, and write letters home in the English language.” Remember that a majority of those young men were less than a decade removed from their educational days. This evidence is of failure, not remote, but almost immediately related to the civilization-destroying inadequacies of the present public school system. Today, in the United States, there is thirty times as much absolute illiteracy as in Germany and Denmark; there is twelve times as much illiteracy here as in Switzerland; six times as much as in Norway and Sweden; more than three times as much as in England, Scotland and Wales. At the present rate of diminishment, it would take eighty-four years to eliminate illiteracy in this country, taking absolute illiteracy figures, instead of the more depressing army tests. If we accept the latter as a basis, fully five hundred years would elapse before illiteracy were stamped out of our national life. There are in this country 2) aang twenty-five million boys and girls of school age. Were those of university years to be included, It the number would reach above thirty-three million. In 1920, according to census statistics, we had 23,042,637 children between the ages of seven and seventeen. The grade and high schools, then, should be providing the best of educational opportunities for at least that number. In 1920, 4,405,437, a total of nineteen per cent of our children between the ages of seven and seventeen, were not attending any school. At the ages of fourteen and fifteen, 20.1 per cent were not in school. Among those sixteen and seventeen, 57.1 per cent were not in any school. The teachers in the public schools of America number 655,589. Fifty-four per cent of them have not had normal school training. In the rural schools, twenty-three per cent of these teachers have had less than two years of educa- tion above the elementary grades. Thousands have had no training beyond the eighth grade. In the face of such facts, I maintain that no citizen can oppose Democratic Education in America unless he be an un-American enemy of our institutions. Hierarchy Opposing Democratic Education. It is apparent, then, that from every point of view, except that of selfishness, the educational doctrine of Horace Mann should be written into the laws and into the life of this nation. Patriotism demands it, common sense sanctions it, every consideration of individual and nation- al welfare pleads its necessity. Why, then, has this fundamental program not been adopted? It is because of the opposition of one of the oldest and the most powerful special interests in the world today. The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic church stands against America on this issue. The public school, in its every phase, atte and result, is repugnant to the Pope and all his priesthood. After a most thorough and un- biased examination of the forces for and against this program, I can say to you with absolute certainty that, excepting only civic selfishness, the Roman Catholic hierarchy is the one influence that is successfully obstructing adequate public school edu- cation in America. It is pursuing that course be- cause the hierarchy that has both its govern- Iz mental and religious headquarters at Rome is now, always has been, and perhaps always will be, opposed to the public sponsorship of institutions of learning. From its point of view, education is a prerogative of the church. I¢ refuses to accept secular control or to countenance any result that can or may subordinate the recruitive objects of parochialism, ‘Therefore, through its political power, this alien hierarchy says to America: ‘‘You shall not establish an educational system that sets up in that field an exclusive authority higher than that of the church; public schools shall not be legalized into a standing superior to those of the church.’ The hierarchy does not openly, honestly and frankly define its opposition or the objects of that opposition. Instead it resorts to camou- flage. What it really says to you is that our educational program for America would be unconstitutional; that national aid to public schools would violate states’ rights; that such a system as we menos would be attended by bureaucratic and political perversions. What the spokesmen of the Vatican in America really mean is that the further advancement of demo- cratic education within this Republic would be an insurmountable impediment to the papal dream of world wide temporal dominion. It is not possible to find a single intelligent citizen, whatever his or her preferences, who does not understand that the hierarchy is unalterably opposing democratic education in America. Therefore, in order more clearly to .comprehend the causes and effects of that op- position, it will be well at this point squarely to face the fundamental differences between Catholicism and Protestantism. The Vatican For Church And State The hierarchy believes in the closest connec- tion between church and state. We demand, in the name and in the interest of democracy, that they be completely separated. Through- out the centuries this attitude of the Vatican has never changed. It never will. With the hierarchy, and all its priesthood, always the church is the primary consideration. Even today in America, a hundred and thirty-five years after the adoption of our Constitution had made it the basic law of the land that government should not interfere with religion, Ly nor religion with government, neither in the pulpit nor in the press of Catholicism do you ever find country mentioned apart from the church. It is always ‘“‘church and country,” with the ‘‘church’’ coming first. That is their idea, not to have the church auxiliarate the state, but to have civil authority and political power serve the church. I do not criticise those who adhere to that doctrine. I only state the truth as it is, in the conviction, as firmly founded as their opposing belief can possibly be, that no religious organization can even seek, much less attain, temporal character without irreparable injury both to church and state. Church Control Of Education Throughout the domain of education, it is the theory of the hierarchy, as it is their prac- tice, to teach what to think. We desire that the young be taught how to think, that they be encouraged to delve deeper and deeper into all the hidden mines of imformation, in the hope and assurance that the result will be an ever- increasing output of helpful human and divine attainments; that it will bring, at least within the range of possibility, a harmonizing of hu- manity upon the rock of eternal truth; that finally ‘“‘peace on earth, good will to men’’ may become a glorious reality, to atone for the long darkness of misery and strife. Not even in matters of religion does the hierarchy encourage its subjects, either innocent children or habituated adults, to exercise real independence of thought or action. Bible- reading by the laity is discouraged. I have here a flippant and rather offensive reference to this traditional attitude, by the Catholic News, as follows: “We Catholics have no apologies to make for our church's Opposition to private interpretation of the Bible Every Tom, Dick ans Harry isn’t allowed by the United States Government to interpret the Constitution as he sees fit. The U. S. Supreme Court says the Constitution means thus and so. But no minister denounces Uncle Sam because of that fact. And the Constitution of the United States is much easier for the ordinary mortal to interpret than the Bible. If Protestantism had a Supreme Court, there wouldn't be so many varieties of religion among the brethern.”” Catholics regard education as the prerogative of their religion. We believe that the agencies and objects of education should be publicly 14 sponsored and controlled; that the training of the young is the first duty, the most fundamental function, of the state. Here is another statement of it: “The Catholic church ... towers above the ages, above nations, above men, mistress of all the forces of education and morality.”’ Those are the words of Clare Gerald Fenerty, from an address before the Knights of Columbus Dining Club at Philadelphia, as quoted in the Catholic Standard and Times. There is something far beyond the ethical and moral in the Catholic attitude. Just as the hierarchy seeks political influence in order that more recognition and greater benefits may accrue to the church, so does it have an identical motive in demanding church-controlled educa- tion. Here it is, as given expression in the magazine called Ave Maria: “Every Catholic school today means a dozen flourishing parishes thirty years from today.”’ The hierarchy, as a religious organization, demands the temporal right to dominate education, high and low, because that control would facilitate the spread of its own sovereignty in every country affected throughout the world. The assertion of that attitude is tempered only by the measure of its present power to enforce it. The hierarchy in America today does not make an open stand against all non- religious instruction because it does not at this time dare go to battle on that issue. What the hierarchy does seek to accomplish, through camouflage, is the prevention of any further advancement of Beote school education and of any curtailment of the privileges of parochial- ism. With the first opportunity, having re- cruited the necessary prestige and power, the Catholic hierarchy of this country would de- throne democratic education entirely. They would do that here, as certainly as the process is now going on in church-and-state countries. The Monarchist Idea There is another fundamental difference, the most basic of all. Catholicism is built and maintains itself, in all its temporal and re- ligious ramifications, upon the monarchical idea of the individual as subject instead of uy citizen. The doctrine of democracy in its every relation to humanity is exactly the re- verse. It exalts the individual, clothing him and her with all the attributes of sovereignty, culminating in civilization’s greatest glory, her only final, unfailing safeguard, “‘the consent of the governed”’ inal] that pertains to public affairs. Every theory, every condition, every hope, of democracy centers in the development of the individual, the sum total of which shall be social strength, intelligence and morality. Certainly, civilization cannot advance, nor even continue its present influence, tf this nation, the most important of all the universe, shall countenance any departure, socially and governmentally, from the basic principles of the individual as citizen instead of subject. Here is the issue. Public school education is democratic education. The fight against that system is being waged by and for Catholic parochialism, which is the essence of monarchy. Fundamental American Principles On Trial How is it possible for any parochial power to obstruct public schools in America? The answer goes deep—to the very vitals of our institutions. The truth, terrible and terrifying, is that our institutions have not yet been solidly and lastingly established. The basic principles of Americanism are yet on trial. The failure to provide, adequately and democratically, for public school education lies not so much in the strength of the opposition as in our own national weakness. God knows that the cause of education, standing alone, is sufficient to justify a life and death struggle with the hierarchical elements antagonizing its attainments; but this contro- versy involves other fundamentals: Our triumph over parochialism and propaganda must include other and even more fundamental vanquishments. In the present crises we are confronted by conditions, rather than theories. Theoretically, at the very beginning, this nation safeguarded its institutions through the separation of church and state. Actually that was never accomplished. The pioneers who made America had before them the tragic consequences of church control of government. They, at least their immediate ancestors, knew from personal experience the perils and persecutions of religious controversy. 16 They saw clearly the fateful truth that religious warfare was always the culminating result whenever and wherever a powerful church left the spiritual field and entered the governmental. They knew that every temporal invasion by a religious organization had invariably left a blood-stained trail of selfishness, cruelty and oppression. Therefore, in founding this Republic, they intended that there should not be, then or ever, any religious interference with government, nor any governmental interference with religion. Somehow, the emphasis came to be placed upon the second, leaving the first more a matter of implication. The Constitution provided for the utmost religious freedom, which was wise and just; it did not however, in specific, iron-clad language, guard against religious license in the field of government. It was no mote, and no less, the intention to do one than the other; but the fact remains that the basic law was left too open, too much subject to abuse, with respect to churchly encroachments upon sovereignty. For generations, little harm re- sulted. Now, suddenly, after half a century of unperceived growth, the un-American power that developed out of the one-sided freedom has arisen to curse and confound our efforts in behalf of democratic education. In other words, we have not yet brought about the separation of church and state in this country. If you want proof, undisputable, unimpeachable proof, it exists inthe fact that today, there is a parochial power that can, and does, say to the electors and legislators of America: ‘“Thus far shall you go, and no farther on this issue of education. Propaganda and propagation through schools, are prerogatives of Pope and _ priest- hood. Public welfare is subordinate to the temporal interests of the hierarchy.” I say to you then,—I say to all America— that the winning of this fight for democratic education involves vastly more than the im- mediate result of such a victory. Standing between us and that achievement is the re- actionary, repulsive principle of church and state, the civilization-destroying, war-engen- dering power of church over state. The very idea, and every influence, of that alignment must be broken and buried beyond resurrection. 17 a ft In and around, above and below, this question is the Vatican attitude fo superhuman, super- national sovereignty. To that extent the cause of democratic education is inseparably linked with the issue of church and state. Both battles must be fought, and won, together. Otherwise all our efforts for an adequate public school system will be transient and futile. The only soil in which free schools can flourish is that of a strictly American sovereignty, tilled by an undivided allegiance, watered by a patriotism that is undiluted and undefiled, with the sunshine of democracy always and forever shining upon it. Its Larger Meaning To Democracy But that is not all. In this crucial struggle for the Horace Mann kind and quantity of public school education, we are fighting a battle bigger even than for the final separation of church and state. Democracy itself, the very life of Constitutional government, is at stake. I do not need to remind you that every great misfortune that comes to humanity is followed, immediately, by monstrous perversions of power. Let democracy’s resistance to evil be weakened by any far-reaching calamity, and in that moment the ever alert forces of reaction will spring upon it, seeking the selfish results of oppression and enslavement. It matters not in what form or in whose name the assault is made. Whether the agency be priestly or political, democracy must pay the price. Today, in the wake of the great war, with its terrible toll of death and debt, again do we hear the voice of imperialism shouting that democracy has failed, that democracy is reced- ing, that its epitaph may now be written, because its end is near. Sometimes that voice is the voice of industrialism. Sometimes it is the voice of ruling caste power; sometimes it is the voice of the Vatican; but whether it be predatory, political or ecclesiastical, always that voice is attuned to the same shrill, snarling key of special interest. My voice is small, but it is an American voice, and so far as it may reach, I would have it carry to America and to all the world the message that democracy is not dead, nor is Constitu- tional government, based on ‘“‘the consent of the governed,’ going to die. NWHumanity, especially our humanity, will—it must—triumph over 18 ‘every obstruction to the great and final accom- ‘plishment of freedom and justice. There can be ‘no freedom, nor justice, if the powers of privilege in any form predominate. Our people them- ‘selves must safeguard their sovereignty and ‘employ it for the common welfare. _ The great issue in this conflict with paroch- ialism, then, is not alone the question of building our composite people into the highest ‘social and political efficiency, nor of that accomplishment plus the safeguarding of our institutions through the actual SH ees of church and state. To the doctrine of democratic ‘education and the principle of a religious freedom that works both ways, must be added the cause of civilization itself. The eternal right of mankind to self-govern- ment is being challenged throughout the world. If the military forces of an alien power were to enter America, we would repel them with the last ounce of our common strength. But it is a more subtle, more effective, more menacing alien invasion that we are facing—an invasion of military un-democratic ideas and ideals—a slow, sure assault upon Constitutional govern- ment. There is but one unfailing defense against every kind of alienism in America; it lies in adequate, democratic, public school education. The Vatican A Government We must face the ugly and menacing fact that the hierarchy seeking the uses and results of propaganda in our schools is not alone a religious, but also a governmental organization. The Vatican itself has a governmental char- acter. At this moment twenty-seven nations have duly accredited diplomatic representatives at the Holy See, seven of them bearing the title and rank of ambassador. And more are to follow. What does all this mean to America? Particularly, what bearing does it have upon this present all-important issue of education? I can tell you what the hierarchy does to education, and out of the mouth of Catholicism itself. Current History, for January, publishes a laudatory article on Mussolini’s regime in Italy, by Arnold S. Cortesi, Rome correspondent of the New York Times, accompanied by pictures of the Premier and the Pope, from which I quote: uy) “The most sweeping reforms of all have, perhaps, been made by the Ministry of Public Instruction. The number of schools has been reduced by suppressing those which became superfluous in towns which have lost population in recent years. The curriculum has been revised in such a way that each” school, in addition to preparing the student for the next grade school, also supplies him with a complete education, should he decide to interrupt his studies at any given moment. Formerly his education was not complete until he had finished his course at a university. Religious education has also been made com- pulsory; not only has the crucifix been ordered to be displayed in all schools, but religious education must also be imparted by teachers who have the approval of the ecclesiastical authorities . . . The reform which has given rise, however, to the greatest con- troversy has been the limitation of the number of students who can receive free education at the expense of the state. Not only has the number been limited, but also the number of students who may attend each school, a minimum of thirty- five for each class having been fixed If there are more applicants than vacancies, the best students are selected through competitive examination, the remainder being left free to attend private schools. The principle underlying this reform has been this: Formerly, when any one could obtain free education, thousands of young men who would have made excellent carpenters, plumbers or manual workers of any kind, obtained degrees in law, medicine, or engineer- ing, and then wasted their whole lives, because, having a university degree, they considered it below their dignity to return to manual labor, while they were, at the same time, unable to obtain employment in their profession, owing to the steady stream of graduates being turned out of the universities each year The state, therefore, has decided that only those students shall obtain free education who, hrough competitive examination, show that they are worth educating, leaving the rest to pay the fees demanded by private schools. This reform, a course, does not apply to elementary schools; indeed, the law making it obligatory for every child to attend elementary school is being applied more strictly than ever before.”’ Of course, what they call ‘‘this reform” does not apply to elementary schools. The hierarchy desires above all else that every elementary pupil shall be taught Catholicism. Therefore it imposes compulsory attendance upon the youngest boys and girls. Also it provides an obligatory religious curriculum for all such pupils. An article printed in the Catholic World, gives a summary of that curriculum for preparatory and all elementary grades. It is too long for insertion here, but its meaning and influences are apparent. Observe, now, how that church controlled education is operating at this moment in Italy. The Number of Free Schools Has Been Reduced Each school has been made complete in itself. In- stead of encouraging high and higher education, 20 he Vatican thus virtually invites every student to end it all whenever a grade is finished. _ Free school attendance has been restricted. Why? _ To discourage the training of young men who might better be ‘‘carpenters and plumbers.”’ | Do I need to ask how, in God’s name, is it ‘possible to peer into the future and determine ‘both the capacity and the career of any boy ‘ever born? Would democratic America tolerate any such civilization-destroying injustice to her Mext generation or continue to countenance any ‘influence that would sponsor such a monstrous ‘perversion of opportunity? No, instead, we de- mand that the advantages of education be universal; that no caste, class or creed be excluded. | Teachers, in Italy, are approved by the ecclesias- tical authorities. Why? In order that the minds of the young shall be bent and biased by and toward Catholicism. It can have no other purpose. That is what church control means. here parochialism is nationalized, which is ‘the ultimate aim of parochialism everywhere. ‘The hierarchy believes in its own exclusive right |to ascendency, why should it not seek here the ‘educational situation that has now come to pass in Italy? And having made parochialism a public policy, why is it not equally logical for them, as they are doing, to employ parochialism for ‘purposes of propaganda? _ Church, parochialism, propaganda, politics—there you have the complete circle of cause and effect in the whole field of this discussion. Through parochial- ism the church accomplishes propaganda, and ‘the two together—ecclesiastically controlled schools, teaching the supremacy of the hier- archy—lead directly, through politics, to tem- poral power. “Ecclesiastical Legislation’’ The Sentinel of the Blessed Sacrament, a catholic publication, quotes a person whom it calls the Venerable Peter Julian Eymard, as follows: “The Christian, therefore, owes to Canon Law, to the bulls, decrees and decisions of the Holy Roman church, which are but the law, the teaching of the Sovereign Pontiff, a filial obedience beyond all control by the civil authorities, who in this regard are without force or sanction "’ Read that again, because, it expresses, as you and I must learn, the attitude of the hierarchy towards governments the world over. Applied to this nation, it means that when- 21 a 4 ever and wherever the sovereign people of the United States, by constitutionally established processes, through duly elected representatives, enact any statute in conflict with any “bull, decree or decision of the Sovereign Pontiff’’— who is the Pope—that the Catholics of America are ordered by the Vatican to disregard that law. In all such conflicts of legal enactment and papal decree, their allegience 1s to Rome. They are instructed to set against our soverignty a higher and to them, more important, more omnipotent alien sovereignty. Yet we have boasted, and believed, for nearly a century and a half, that the separation of church and state had actually been accomplished in this country. Our Constitution provides for religious free- dom. As one result of that feature of the bill of right, we did not insist exclusively upon church marriage ceremonies; civil marriages were made the law of the land. To Catholicism and all its subjects that law is null and void. To them it is wholly without “‘force or sanc- tion.’’ Time after time has gone forth the papal or priestly decree to ignore it, and today, to them every American child born of a civilly made marriage is illigitimate. This attitude is by no means confined to the marriage statute. It is the same with anything and everything of a legal nature that may come under papal displeasure. The Catholic maga- zine called America, makes this announcement to American followers of the Pope: “Whatever may be affected by public enactment with regard to the rights of men and women before the law, no Catholic is free to admit any legislation which tends to destroy the center of authority in the home.” Why is no Catholic ‘“‘free to admit’’—and of course to abide by—legislative acts of the government of the United States? There is only one answer. It is because his higher allegiance is to a religious hierarchy, not even American in domicile, whose alien decrees can set aside all laws as easily as one law. I say to you that without law and order neither private nor public welfare is possible. When established authority be undermined, then the very foundations of society will crumble. Only our government itself has the right to say that this law or that law is null and void, by repealing it or by establishing its unconstitutionality. 79 | For any law to be ignored, either by priest or | politician, breeds a spirit of lawlessness, a con- tempt for constituted authority which is civili- -zation’s deadliest enemy, against which no mation can long contend and endure. The Supreme Court of the United States is at Washington, and not in Rome. No government can become imperialistic without ultimate disaster to itself and to every and it brings under subjection. That is the verdict of history, to which there has never _been an exception. The imperialism of a church ‘is even worse. When a religion attains and “exercises temporal dominion, castatrophe for all concerned is more swift and sure. That is |what I condemn—not the American Catholic ‘citizen, but the Roman Catholic hierarchy. For centuries education was almost exclusively church controlled. Practically no other educa- tion existed. That was the period of the great religious wars. Religious education and re- ligious warfare were simultaneous. Never in all the annals of mankind was cause and effect more closely related or more clearly defined. _ It made no difference whether it was Cathol- icism or Protestantism that had aggressively or in self defense thus usurped this function of thestate. Always it led directly and inevitably to civil strife and martial conflict. No religious Organization ever has or ever can dominate education without an aftermath of disruptive strife. The degree to which the religious influence prevails in schools will determine, invariably and inevitably, the extent of the resulting disturbance for humanity. I do not for a moment contend that America will ever submit to a degree of church control of education which would lead to the battle field, but I do say, with the tragic experiences of centuries supporting me, that each and every bit of ground gained by and for parochialism in our schools will dilute truth, diminish democracy and feed the flames of destructive controversy exactly in proportion to the extent of that influence. In the last century and a half religious educa- tion has declined. Simultaneously religious wats have disappeared. That is why I attach such paramount importance to this fight for democratic education. ‘‘The national safety, 5 prosperity and happiness’’—and peace—can be safeguarded in no other way. I know that if, throughout the ages, there had been adequate education—public school -education—conducted upon a plane high above propaganda, ninety per cent of the miseries and misfortunes that have befallen humanity would have been averted. And, likewise, as we are Christian citizens, seeking the highest harmony and happiness for all humanity, we must unabatingly and un- compromisingly combat every other kind of propaganda in our schools. War is the great curse of mankind. War always has its origin in religion, racial or economic causes. Unless the world again embraces the fatal folly of religious education, church conflict will remain in its grave. To bar parochialism and leave the gates ajar to the teaching of racialism or industrialism, will not insure peace. That blessing will never be seein until education is completely and everlastingly emancipated from every prejudice and every selfishness. Let Americans Get Together This country contains no element that will not be richly and increasingly benefitted by the development of public schools, nor any element that will not be injured, financially, socially, and Spiritually, through a failure to adopt such a program. All that being true, and it is true beyond dispute, every element in America, Protestant and Catholic, should stop fighting each other and unite for the accomplishment of a correct and adequate public school system. There are hierarchies and political systems, of alien character and alien domicile, which would not profit by democratic education in America. They are not of, by, nor for, America. I speak not of them when I voice the hope and prayer that the entire citizenship of the United States may get together and labor together for ie fulfillment of humanity's highest happiness efe. My condemnation has been of the political system of the Roman Catholic church, not of its parish- toners, nor of their religion. It is the hierarchy, not the rank and file of Catholicism, whose attitude I disapprove. 24 There is no feeling of intolerance, nor any hatred, in my soul. I speak not in bitterness, but out of love. I would that America might ‘be at peace. We and the world have seen enough of religious wrangling and warfare. At least in this country there need be no further conflict. I say this to you because Protestant and Catholic have identically the same in- _terests at stake, and should be found fighting shoulder to shoulder for the re-Americanization *of our common Republic. All Americans are men and women whose days upon earth are far too short to be spent in any save the ways of amity and mutual helpfulness. The common enemies of mankind are sufficient to keep us all engaged. Let there be at least one nation within which humanity may attain and enjoy a blessed harmony of heart and mind. . Humbly, and yet confidently, because the combined experience of mankind throughout the ages confirms both its soundness and its necessity, I now make a Christian proposal for the ending of religious and all other disruptive controversies on American soil. Let us establish a court for the settlement of every case of falsehood and fallacy versus truth and rectitude. In that court let every element submit its opposition to the test and verdict of unselfish truth. It would take time to establish such a court, but once it was in operation there would be no delay nor any injustice in its judgments. A generation would be required to impanel the jury. That jury would be the electorate of the whole country, not one of whom would be permitted to serve until his or her complete competence had been attested by a training in which neither bias nor selfishness had had a _ part. Once the common mind of such a jury had been emancipated from every influence of prejudice and propaganda, its decisions would _ be divinely just. There would come out of it anew kind of jurisprudence, so generally ac- cepted that within a few decades all our human- ity might live in harmony. I propose, then, that all of us, Catholic and Protestant, submit our differences to democratic education; that is, a public school system in which the mind of each and every student shall not be bent and biased by any propaganda,— industrial, economic, political, or religious. Truth would come out of such a system—‘‘the ° 25 whole truth and nothing but the truth.” Factionalism and strife would disappear, be- cause there would be no half truth and perverted truth to give them abortive birth. After all, education is but the means to an end. In a higher sense, democracy is but the means to an end. In the highest sense, civilization itself is but the means to an end. That end is the triumph of truth, God’s truth and man’s truth, out of which alone can come the Heavenly blessing of a harmonized humanity here on earth. America Must Leap Tae Way. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The public school problem in America : outlining fully the policies and the program of the Knights of Ku Klux Klan toward the public school system Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1924-01-01 Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Internet Archive, crediting Duke University Libraries Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived https://archive.org/details/publicschoolprob00evan Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hiram Wesley Evans Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Knights of the Ku Klux Klan Hiram Wesley Evans KKK Politics (KKK) Public Education