Compulsoy Education - Rev. Patrick Francis Quigley 1894

Compulsory Education: The State of Ohio Versus the Rev. Patrick Francis Quigley
by Patrick Francis Quigley 1894 - 598 pages

Introduction:

On the 28th day of April, 1890, a person styling himself a truant officer called on me and demanded a list of the pupils of St. Francis de Sales' School, giving their names, residences, ages, etc. I refused. I was indicted for a violation of the Compulsory Education Law of the State of Ohio, arrested, imprisoned, and criminally prosecuted in the Court of Common Pleas.

The case was carried to the Circuit Court, and thence to the Supreme Court of the State, and a decision rendered on the 10th day of May, A.d. 1892.

A writer in the Educational Review for September, 1892, says:

" This Toledo case was argued and decided on broad constitutional grounds," and "perhaps no decision more important to the future of all compulsory education legislation in this country has ever been rendered by an American court." (Ed. Rev., Henry Holt & Co., I Jew York, Sept.1892.)

As this matter of compulsory education affects every man, woman, and child in the country a report of the most important decision with regard to it ever rendered by any American court must be a matter of very great interest to the American people. That report is now presented to the public. Before proceeding to the consideration of the case itself, it will be well to look a little at the legislation on the subject out of which this case arose.

This legislation has been pushed so quietly that although it has already been slipped into the statutes of twenty-seven States of this Union, the people of those States, while prompt to denounce the law of Ohio, which the agitation in this case has brought to their notice, are often surprised to find that the principle of the law has already been intruded into the legislation of their own State. The mode of procedure is artful, ingenious, plausible, and generally successful. In some places there is an abuse in the matter of truancy. Children run about the streets when they ought to be at school, sometimes because of the neglect, sometimes because of the inability, of parents to control them. There is a great number of people in the country interested in keeping up a full attendance in the schools, some from the best of motives, some from motives of personal interest. The more scholars in school the more need there is of school-buildings, school-furniture, school-supplies, and also school-teachers, and so the legislation is quietly pushed. An apparently innocent and very proper little bill is drafted requiring truant children to attend school. The clause reads, they must attend some school, public or private. It does not seem, therefore, to be in the interest of any particular kind of school. It is simply to keep the children out of the streets; to make them do what the parents generally suppose they are doing—to attend the school to which they have been sent by the parents. The parents, busy at their work, cannot watch the children all day and every day; and it relieves their minds to know that there is a person employed whose special business it is to look after these things and keep the children from loitering by the way or avoiding the school altogether for a part of the day or a whole day or for days together, and thus not only losing the benefit of the school, but, what is much more serious, drifting into bad company and objectionable associations and, possibly, spending the time in a manner more seriously criminal. Every one feels that it would be a good idea to guard against this, and therefore the proposition for a truant law is favorably received, and the law is passed. The people find that without any special care or trouble on their part the children are prevented from straying from the school. The contractors get orders for more buildings ; the furniture-men for more supplies ; the stationers for more books, and more persons receive salaries as teachers. A great number of people is delighted with the new law.

A great many other people are also pleased. To pass this law at all the State has had to begin by practically asserting that it has the right to control the education of all children in the State. It does not alarm parents by distinctly making this assertion in the law; but the assertion is made just as distinctly as if it were put in the plainest possible words, as the people soon began to find out . The mass of the parents are pleased with the law for the reasons stated. Certain others are pleased for other reasons stated. But there is a great power behind all these which is immensely pleased for reasons which it takes very good care not to state—at least, not publicly.

There is a certain kind of people in this country who are professional public-school advocates. Now, we are all public-school advocates in that we are in favor of good and proper schools for the whole general public, for all the people of the country; but these present professional public-school advocates are public-school advocates only in the sense that they are in favor of the public school system as they have got it now organized, and who are bitterly opposed to any other possible public-school system, or any system by which the people may have some other kind of public schools than those which these professionals choose to allow them.

These professional public-school advocates are delighted with the Truant Law because it has given them an opportunity to assert the right of the State to control the education of children in defiance of the wishes of the parents. They state only a little of this principle at first. The first Truant Law is introduced under the title of a law to prevent truancy, and is made as unobjectionable as possible, consistent with saving the vital principle they are seeking to introduce. Then little by little, year by year, the principle is pushed, the Truant Law is expanded, and it finally develops into the complete, full-blown, Compulsory Education Law, wherein the right of the State to have complete control of the whole subject of education is assumed as a fact not to be questioned.

Such has been the history of the law in the State of Ohio; and such, with more or less of variation, has been the case in the twenty-seven States and Territories of this country in which the principle has been already adopted.

They begin by simply forbidding truancy. After awhile they order that children must attend at least eight weeks in the year. Again, after awhile, they raise the amount to ten, to twelve, to sixteen, to twenty, to twenty-four, and last year Massachusetts raised it to thirty weeks in the year. The full public-school term is only about forty weeks. The full possible limit of compulsion as to time in any one year is almost reached already. In the matter of compulsion as to studies they also begin mildly. First, with only three studies—reading, writing, and arithmetic. Ohio already requires reading, writing, arithmetic, grammar, geography, and the effects of alcohol on the human system. The principle is established. The list of studies may be increased at the will of the legislator. Having thus provided for Compulsory Education for nearly the whole of the school year, and for nearly the whole of the possible list of studies, there remained only the question as to how much of the life of a minor must be spent in the public schools. On this point also the advocates of compulsion began cautiously. They at first made attendance obligatory between the age of 8 and 12 years ; then they extended it to 14; then from 7 to 14; then, in some places, they raised it to 16; and already with the aid of the labor unions, who wish to keep minors from competing with them, they are talking of raising it to 18 or 20, and finally to go to the full school age of 21 years. And now they are introducing kindergartens to take the children in at 5 years of age, and talk of taking them at 3. Very little remains now to carry the desired point of taking the children as soon as they may be safely removed from the mother's breast, and caring for them in public-schools until they are old enough to vote ; and from this to making such attendance compulsory is only another step, and as it is only " the first step which costs," and as that and several other steps are already taken, the rest is easy.

It has been shown why those financially and professionally interested are pleased with these proceedings. There is another class which is pleased—those people who are opposed to the Christian Religion. These opponents of Religion are pleased because under this system they can make public-school education compulsory for the whole school year, and make the course of secular studies so extensive and exhausting that no room will be left for any religious instruction, even in private schools, supposing that private schools shall be allowed to exist.

The Socialists are pleased because their doctrine of the entire supremacy of the State is recognized, and already in one great department of action enforced. The principle is established. If the State may take entire control of the business of Education, and conduct it entirely under State management, so may it take control of any and every kind of business, and conduct it entirely under State management, and thus give us the Socialist state in all its theoretical perfection.

The Communists are pleased because the fundamental principle of their doctrine is recognized, and already in one great department of life is applied almost to its last logical development. In the matter of Education there is already furnished at public cost the buildings, the furniture, the teachers, the text-books, and now in Colorado the clothing. One item alone remains—that of food ; but having gone so far, the State, having already begun by providing a luncheon at mid-day, will not halt long at the full demand. Then parents will not be required to either feed, clothe, or educate their children. All they will be needed for is the propagation ; the State will do the rest. There will then be no further need of the family, and consequently no further need of marriage, thereby giving us the ideal Communistic state.

What opposition is there to all this movement ?

There are a great many people in this country who think the whole matter of Compulsory Education quite opposed to the principles of the American Constitution.

Governor Pattison, of Pennsylvania, recently vetoed a Compulsory Education bill in that State, declaring that in his opinion: " Free attendance on free schools most befits a free people." (See pages 326 and 327 of this volume.)

Some of the claims as to Compulsory Education in the Bennett Law were formerly repudiated at the polls by the people of Wisconsin.

In Illinois, after a thorough discussion of the subject, the Compulsory Education Law in that State was repealed. The agitation on this subject of Compulsory Education, violating parental and conscience rights became so general in the United States that, in the recent Presidential election contest, both of the great political parties found it necessary to define their views on the subject.

The Republican party declared as follows: " The ultimate reliance of free popular government is the intelligence of the people and the maintenance of freedom among men. We therefore declare anew our devotion to liberty of thought and conscience, of speech and press, and approve all agencies and instrumentalities which contribute to the education of the children of the land; but, while insisting on the fullest measure of religious liberty, we are opposed to any union of Church and State."

The Democratic party considered that this declaration did not sufficiently meet the case, and so it more distinctly declared for parental liberty and conscience rights in the following words: "Freedom of education being an essential of civil and religious liberty, as well as a necessity for the development of intelligence, must not be interfered with under any pretext whatever. We are opposed to State interference with parental rights and rights of conscience in the education of children as an infringement of the fundamental Democratic doctrine that the largest individual liberty consistent with the rights of others insures the highest type of American citizenship and the best government."

In conclusion the platform says: " Upon this statement of principles and policy the Democratic party asks the intelligent judgment of the American people. It asks a change of administration and a change of system and a change of methods, thus assuring the maintenance unimpaired of institutions under which the Republic has grown great and powerful."

Mr. Cleveland, the candidate of the Democratic party, responding to this pronouncement, declared in his letter of acceptance as follows :

" The assurance to the people of the utmost individual liberty consistent with peace and good order is a cardinal principle of our government. * * * The same principle requires that.the line between the subjects which are properly within governmental control and those which are more fittingly left to parental regulation should be carefully kept in view. An enforced education, wisely deemed a proper preparation for citizenship, should not involve the impairment of wholesome parental authority, nor do violence to the household conscience. Paternalism in government finds no approval in the creed of Democracy. It is a symptom of misrule, whether it is manifested in an unauthorized gift or by an unwarranted control of personal and family affairs.

"Called for the third time to represent the party of my choice in a contest for the supremacy of Democratic principles, my grateful appreciation of its confidences less than ever effaces the solemn sense of my responsibility.

" IF THE ACTION OF THE CONVENTION YOU REPRESENT SHALL BE INDORSED BY THE SUFFRAGES OF MY COUNTRYMEN, I Will assume the duties of the great office for which I have been nominated, knowing full well its labors and perplexities, and with humble reliance upon the Divine Being, infinite in power to aid, and constant in a watchful care over a favored nation."

- The action of that convention was indorsed by the suffrages of the American people, and by one of the greatest majorities known in our history the principles of the Democratic party were adopted as the policy of the American State.

My action in this case, while not a denial of the right of the State to exercise a certain amount of compulsion in education under certain circumstances, was yet in full accord with the principles thus adopted by the American people. But the Republican Judges of the Supreme Court of the State of Ohio refused to decide in accordance with these principles, and by their rulings in this case refused to recognize those parental rights and rights of conscience guaranteed by the American Constitution and confirmed by the vote of the American people.

The history of the contest, the arguments for the people, and the ruling against liberty by the judges will be found fully set forth in the following report of the case.

An appeal was taken in this case from the adverse decision of the lower courts to the judges of the Supreme Court of Ohio. An appeal still lies to the Supreme Court of the United States at Washington, D.C. An appeal is now taken to the sense of justice of the American reading public.

A question which occupied the attention of the American public during the recent Presidential campaign, and the courts of the State of Ohio for the greater part of two years, and the full and complete answer to it, can be found only by a careful perusal of the following pages, which give the report of what took place in those courts on the consideration of that question.

Briefly stated, my objection was that the whole law was based on the first section of it, which assumed that the State had the right to the entire control of the subject of education to the extent of fixing one general standard of knowledge up to which every parent was bound to educate all his children, regardless of age, sex, or condition in life, and to do it in such way, and at such time and place, and to such extent as the State chose to prescribe ; that all the other sections of the law were merely to give effect to that section one, and that if that section was unconstitutional, all the rest fell with it.

This was my real contention, and a perusal of the arguments of my counsel will show that it was not only stated with sufficient clearness, but that it was stated and restated and urged in apparently every possible manner. My objection was that the law was unconstitutional because of the unwarranted invasion of parental rights as to all people, and that as to some people it was also unconstitutional because of its invasion of conscience rights in religious matters specially guaranteed to them by the constitution of the State of Ohio, and also by the Constitution of the United States.

Every American citizen is profoundly interested in the preservation to him of all his natural rights. This being so, he is likewise profoundly interested in the preservation to all his fellow-citizens of all their natural rights. He is so interested for two reasons : first, because justice requires that what he asks for himself he shall be willing to grant to others; second, his personal interest demands it, because if the provisions of the constitution may be disregarded as to one class to-day because of prejudice or profit, they may be disregarded as to others at other times for the same or other reasons.