I am thus brought back to the proposition with which I started, namely, that universal education is in this country a matter of deep national concern. Our experiment of republican institutions is not upon the petty scale of a single municipality or state, but it covers half a continent, and embraces peoples of widely diverse interests and conditions, but who are to remain "one and inseparable." Every condition of our perpetuity and progress as a nation adds emphasis to the remark of Montesquieu, that it is in a republican government that the whole power of education is required. one imperative necessity of this nation is that the public school be planted on every square mile of its peopled territory, and that the instruction imparted therein, be carried to the highest point of efficiency.

The

But what can the general government do to aid in securing this object? In view of the startling fact that the great body of the people that occupy nearly one-half of the national territory, are wholly destitute of the means of education, this inquiry has the deepest significance.

Three plans have been suggested:

1. The government may establish and maintain throughout its territory a national system of education.

2. It may by Congressional legislation enforce the maintenance of a public school system upon every State.

3. It may by conditional appropriations and by a system of general inspection and encouragement through the agency of a National Bureau of Education, induce each State to maintain an efficient school system.

Notwithstanding the cogency of the argument which may be adduced in favor of the first plan suggested, it is, in my judgment, too wide a departure from the settled educational policy of the country, to be seriously entertained. Such a system would doubtless prove highly advantageous in a portion of the country, but it would be very disastrous in those States that have already carried the work of general education to a high point. Besides, all experience shows, and I regard it a law of school progress, that the nearer the responsibility of maintaining schools is brought to those directly benefited by them, the greater the vital power and efficiency of a school system.

These remarks do not apply to the education of the freedmen. On the contrary, I believe it is the sacred and bounden duty of the general government to undertake, for a time, the education of the emancipated millions who through the war have received back their

birthrights of liberty and manhood. Deprived of the uplifting. power of education they can but become idle and dissolute, and sink, if possible, still deeper in degredation and misery. Besides the faith of the nation is solemnly pledged for the protection of these people in all their rights as freemen. But there is no protec tion so secure as the power of self-protection. Until the freedmen have their liberties in their own keeping they are not really free. They are now in a condition of abject ignorance, homeless and landless, subject to the heartless exactions of capital and the helpless victims of class prejudice and persecution. No protection of the government that fails to bring them intelligence, can save them from impending peril. No standing army can so effectually maintain the plighted faith of the government toward these people, as an army of schoolmasters. Let bayonets protect, if need be, the school-house of the freedmen, and they will soon take care of their rights and liberties. They will do more. As free, self-directing, self-supporting laborers, they will bring prosperity again to the South, and make her war-ravaged fields smile with plenty.

To the second plan suggested, there are manifestly serious objections. The imposition of a system of public instruction upon the several States by compulsory legislation, can be justified only on the ground of public necessity in a great national crisis. And I am free to admit that so great is the necessity for the establishment of public schools throughout the South, that even such a measure would be imperatively demanded if no other course to attain the same end, were practicable.

The third plan is clearly in harmony with the settled educational policy of the country. It will neither cripple nor endanger any part of our educational system; and it calls for the assumption of no questionable power by the general government. What is proposed is that the government shall undertake to do efficiently what it has, in the part, always done generously through its munificent grants of land for the encouragement of education.

Instead of unconditional grants of land or appropriations of money, such assistance should be proffered to the several States on condition that they reach a prescribed standard in the maintenance of free schools, and further, that a specified portion of such grants or appropriations be applied to the support of institutions for the professional training of teachers.

The fact that a State could by maintaining an efficient school system, receive from the national government, say from $100,000 to $300,000 annually, would certainly prove a potent influence in

securing such action. I could, if necessary, fortify this statement by referring to experiments of the kind in other countries, and also in several of the States of the Union where State appropriations for school purposes are conditioned on a compliance by the local school authorities with certain stipulations. This policy has uniformly, so far as my information goes, been successful. Communities indifferent to the advantages of free schools, if not prejudiced against them, have, with this assistance to their judgment, come to a wiser conclusion respecting their value. There is no eye-salve so efficacious in removing mental blindness as self-interest, and instances of States permitting the bounties of the government to pass by them have, at least, not been frequent. I am confident that the adoption of the plan suggested would speedily secure a common school system in every State now destitute of such a system, and that it would lift up the schools, as it were bodily, in those States in which they are indifferently sustained. The impetus which it would give to the professional training of teachers throughout the country, would be of incalculable value as a means of elevating and vitalizing school instruction.

There is one other consideration worthy of mention just here. The sparsely settled States of the far West and South need the assistance of the general government in the establishment of systems of education, commensurate with their growing necessity—a fact the government has always recognized. There is not a State west of the Alleghanies that is not greatly indebted to the munificent grants of land made by Congress, for the early establishment of its school system. Nor have common schools alone been aided. Several State Universities are maintained entirely from the proceeds of such grants. It is estimated that if the land grants of Congress for educational purposes had been properly managed, they would now present an aggregate educational fund of about five hundred millions of dollars.

On account of the unfortunate land-holding system of the South and the consequent sparseness of population, it would be difficult to sustain an efficient general school system there, even in times of prosperity. A proper division of landed property is as essential to universal education as it is to democratic institutions. At all events, in the present financial condition of the South the assist ance of the government in establishing public schools is needed, and clearly that assistance will prove the best, which is conditional.

As a means of paying the national debt, I know of no one measure fuller of promise than the increase and diffusion of intelligence

among the mass of the people. The expenditure of five to ten millions of dollars a year for this purpose, would be made good by almost immediate returns to the Post-office and Treasury departments. The unschooled millions of the South write few letters, take few papers, and pay small taxes on incomes. There are no mines in this country so productive of wealth as the mind of the country. Educated labor is the true alchemy that can turn greenbacks into gold.

There is one other agency forming an essential part of the third plan proposed, which I hasten to consider. I allude to a National Bureau of Education, corresponding in many of its features to the National Department of Agriculture. The interests of education would unquestionably be greatly promoted by the organization of such a Bureau at the present time. It would render needed assistance in the establishment of school systems where they do not now exist, and prove a potent means for improving and vitalizing existing systems. I conceive it to be possible for a National Bureau of Education to be so managed as to well-nigh revolutionize school instruction in this country, and this too without its being invested with any official control of the school authorities in the several States. This it could accomplish:

1. By securing greater uniformity and accuracy in school statistics, and so translating and interpreting them that they may be more widely available and reliable as educational tests and measThe present great diversity in the modes of collecting school statistics in the several States, makes it almost impossible to use them for the purpose of comparing the results attained.

ures.

2. By bringing together the results of school systems in different communities, states and nations, and determining their comparative value, not simply by measuring their length and breadth as with a yard-stick, but by separating the pure gold of education from the dross, as in a crucible.

3. By collecting the results of all important experiments in new or special methods of instruction and management, and making them the common property of the school officers and teachers of the country.

4. By diffusing among the people much needed information respecting the school laws of the different States; the various modes of providing and disbursing school funds; the different classes of school officers employed and their relative duties; the qualifications demanded of teachers and the agencies provided for their special training; the best methods of classifying and grading schools; im

proved plans for school-houses, together with modes of heating and ventilation, etc., etc.-information now obtained only by a few persons, and at great expense, but which is of the highest value to all intrusted with the management of schools.

5. By aiding communities and States in the organization of school systems in which oft-exploded errors shall be avoided, and vital agencies and well-tried improvements be included.

6. By the general diffusion of correct ideas respecting the value of education as a quickener of intellectual activities; as a moral renovator; as a multiplier of industry and a consequent producer of wealth; and finally as the strength and shield of free institutions.

It is not possible to measure the influence which the faithful performance of these duties would exert upon the cause of education in this country; and few persons who have not been intrusted with the management of school systems, can fully realize how wide-spread and urgent is the demand for such assistance. Indeed, the very existence of the Association I now address, is of itself cogent proof of a demand for a national channel of communication between the school systems of the different States. Millions of dollars have been thrown away in fruitless experiments or stolid plodding for the want of just such information as a National Bureau could make accessible to the people.

We have a strong confirmation of these views in the potent influence which Horace Mann exerted upon the schools of this country -notwithstanding his official reports had necessarily a limited circulation outside of his own State. Who can measure the influence which he would have exerted at the head of a National Bureau of Education? How great the necessity for such a vital power to flow down from the general government, at the present time, perpermeating and vitalizing all parts of our school system!*

We have also a very forcible illustration of the same position in the powerful influence exerted upon English elementary schools by the National Committee of Council of Education, while James Kay Shuttleworth was its Secretary; and also, subsequently.

But in determining the probable efficiency and value of a National Bureau of Education, there is a fundamental law, running through the entire history of educational progress, which must not be overlooked. Idolatry has never been self-moved to cast its idols to the moles and the bats; nor has benighted Paganism ever lifted itself into the light of a beneficent civilization. The impulse

* Mr. Mann may have originated few measures of educational progress, but he gave wings as well as vital power to the measures and agencies of others