Public education in the South

Front matter

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Preface

This book is the outgrowth of several years' study of public educational problems in the United States, especially in the South, through courses in the history of education given at Trinity College and the University of North Carolina for teachers and prospective teachers and administrators. In such courses the aim has been to consider the principal problems of administration, support, and supervision of present-day education in the Southern States and to seek an understanding of their meaning in the light of their historical growth. The book is therefore a study of actual educational progress in the South rather than of educational theories ; and the relation between education and economic, social, political, and religious influences is given emphasis.

The book attempts to give the first general survey yet published in a single volume of the growth of public educational organization and practices in those eleven States which formed the Confederacy. The study seeks to trace the development of the democratic principles of education in the South, to explain their apparently slow application or practical acceptance, and to point out from the past certain valuable lessons for the educational problems of the present. The book has been prepared for the purpose of assisting the teacher, the educational administrator, and the public to a more intelligent understanding of the present educational situation in the Southern States and of their respective tasks in meeting it. As far as possible, therefore, the public educational problems of today are set forth in the light of their historical development. Another purpose in mind in the preparation of the volume has been to make accessible to the student and the teacher certain valuable but scattered and more or less inaccessible materials on the educational history of the vi PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THE SOUTH

Southern States. Another volume now in preparation will include valuable documentary and source materials illustrating the evolution of the democratic ideal of education in those States and supplementing the present volume.

The principles of universal education and the equality of educational opportunity have in theory gradually found rather wide acceptance in the South, but their practical application has been surprisingly slow. This appears in the obvious inequality that exists between city children and rural children and is shown in the school term, in buildings and equipment, in teaching skill, in high-school advantages, and in professional supervision and direction now provided for the city and for the rural communities. Eighty per cent of the school population in the South live in rural sections and the other 20 per cent live in towns and cities. That the educational advantages of the 20 per cent are in almost every way superior to those of the 80 per cent is universally accepted by those acquainted with the conditions. In the South the city , child receives nearly 30 per cent more and better education every year than the rural child receives. The rural school usually lacks intelligent direction and oversight and is without unity ; it is often colorless because it has not yet been led to respond to the remarkable social, industrialyl and educational changes which have taken place in recent years.Almprovements have been made in several directions. There is uniformity of improved texts, but most texts in use in the country schools were prepared primarily for the city schools. There is more specific training of teachers now than formerly, but such training is too often colored by the needs and practices of the city schools. The legally prescribed courses of study for the rural schools are often of the cut-and-dried type and in the hands of the usual rural teacher become outlines for dreary drills. There has been an increase in support, and the tendency is toward the professional direction of school work generally; but both in support and administrative direction the rural school is seriously neglected. Moreover, rural conditions are still uninviting and

PREFACE /' vii

unsatisfying, and the result is that the most capable teachers and the best-trained administrators and supervisors are led away from rather than to rural-school work.

For these reasons public education in the rural sections of the South becomes a most insistent and immediately urgent task. During the past dozen years commendable educational advancement has been made, but it has been confined in the main to improvement of the town and city schools. Corresponding progress has not been witnessed in the rural communities, where the principle of cooperation has not been widely and intelligently applied in the solution of common questions and the promotion of common interests. The urban communities have learned to cooperate in education and other undertakings in a manner not yet fully learned or appreciated by the rural and sparsely settled communities. And in large measure here is the explanation of the inadequate provision for the education of the boys and girls who live in rural sections. Happily, however, the South appears now to be entering upon a new era in rural-life development. The amazing economic wealth, the increasingly large programs for road-building, and the movement for improved agricultural practices are full of promise for the educational and social development of the South. And in these interests is the foundation for rural betterment.

Many of the causes of the apparent neglect of public education in the South in recent years are not altogether unlike those which prevented a more wholesome growth of public schools before i860 or those causes which helped to retard progress between 1876 and 1900. Sparsity of population, lingering results of the old plantation system, farm tenancy, poor means of communication, and other factors have always been obstacles in the way of public schools. Prior to i860 they were obstinate, and since that time their influence on schools has been mischievous. Added to these retarding factors were others which had their origin in the war and the period immediately following it. And it was not until the opening years of the present century viii PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THE SOUTH

that the Southern States were sufficiently recovered from the economic and moral evils of that period to set themselves with energy and hopefulness to the great task of educating their children.

The substance of parts of Chapters III, X, and XI appeared first in the South Atlantic Quarterly and the Sewanee Review, and a part of Chapter IV in the High School Journal. They are here included through the courtesy of these publications. Certain portions of the materials dealing with North Carolina are taken from the author's "Public-School Education in North Carolina" (Houghton Mifflin Company, 191 6) and are here used by permission of the publishers.

■^ Acknowledgments are here made to Professor William K. Boyd of Trinity College (North Carolina), to Professor J. G. deR. Hamilton of the University of North Carolina, and to Professor Stuart G. Noble of Millsaps College (Mississippi) for reading parts of the manuscript, for criticisms concerning the plan of the book, and for other helpful suggestions.

EDGAR W. KNIGHT

Contents

CHAPTER

I. EUROPEAN ANTECEDENTS ....

Periods of educational development in the Southern States — Social and economic conditions in England during colonization in the South — Influences of political conditions and religious changes in England — The force of economic interest in the Southern colonies — The Germans and the Scotch-Irish in the South and their educational influences — Influences of early colonial theories and practices on present conditions — Questions for Discussion and Further Study — Bibliography

Chapter I European Antecedents

Outline of the chapter, i. The principle of universal education has evolved through distinct periods of social, political, and economic development in the South.

2. A knowledge of European antecedents and influences prevaiHng during the period of colonization is necessary if colonial education is to be properly understood.

3. Economic conditions in England during the colonizing period produced unrest and vexatious governmental problems.

4. Political conditions were likewise unsettled and led to strange relations between the rulers on the one hand and Parliament and the people on the other.

5. Religious changes in Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries also greatly influenced American colonial life.

6. In these various changes and conditions are found the principal motives for colonization.

7. Economic interests were powerful in the Southern colonies and economic extremes early developed.

8. As a result the selective idea in education was inevitable in the South in the early times.

9. After 1700, large immigrations of Germans and Scotch-Irish came to the South, where their educational influence was extensive.

10. On the ideals and principles to which the early colonists were devoted, educational theories and practices were to be built up and were to develop and change as the conditions required.

11. Every advance in education has been made on the background of the past, and present-day tasks in education can be understood only through a knowledge of conditions out of which they have evolved.

The growth of the principle of universal education in the Southern States is marked by distinct periods in social, political, and economic development in that region. The first period was that of the transplanting of European traditions and customs, and extended from the date of the earliest settlements to near the middle of the eighteenth century. During that time the colonists were influenced by conditions and practices of the mother countries. The second period extended from about 1750 to the fourth decade of the nineteenth century. It was distinct for its attempts to modify educational practices so as to meet the new conditions which were produced by the Revolution and the political beginnings of a new people. During this period very interesting and influential educational experiments were made. The third period extended from the thirties to the Civil War and was marked by the rapid development of Jeffersonian democracy and the steady growth of belief in the people.

The Civil War and reconstruction constituted another period, which, though brief, was very distinct because of the widespread distress and uncertainty which it produced. The years from 1876 to the close of the century formed still another period, which has become well known for the heroic efforts made during those years to build out of the wreck of the old a new civilization, but on safer and more permanent educational ideals. Finally, the years from 1900 to the present have been significant for the educational revival which awakened the entire South shortly after the opening of the new century. That awakening was rapidly gaining at the outbreak of the World War, which served to draw sharp attention to the weaknesses as well as the strength of public educational enterprises. In the South, as in other sections of the country, the challenge to the public school became clearer and more distinct. As a result of the war public education here as elsewhere in the United States has begun to show promise of wider and safer extension and growth.

Public education in the South is now distinctively American in its essential ideals and character. But the educational customs and practices of the colonial period can be understood only in view of European antecedents and influences. This is true of all the English colonies, but especially true of Virginia and the Carolinas : of Virginia and South Carolina, where the dominating influences were, as in England, especially aristocratic ; and somewhat true of North Carolina, whose earliest settlers were immigrants from Virginia and brought with them some of the educational practices of that colony. The general mental attitude of all these colonies towards education was therefore much like that of the mother country. That attitude is more easily understood by a view of conditions in England at the time these colonies were settled.

The population of England at the close of the sixteenth century has been variously estimated at from three to live millions, made up of two main classes : the self-supporting and independent class and the dependent class. The first group was composed of the nobility, the higher clergy, knights, country gentlemen, lawyers, the lesser clergy, freeholders and farmers, shopkeepers and tradesmen, and artisans and craftsmen. The dependent group was made up of journeymen, apprentices, vagrants, ''thieves and sturdy beggars," whose employment, wages, and migration were determined by some one of the upper classes.

At the accession of James I in 1603 probably half the population of England was made up of this dependent class, which was very largely produced by certain social and economic changes which modified the entire structure of English society before the seventeenth century. One of these modifying influences was the change from the medieval to the modern land and agricultural system. Much of the poverty and vagabondage of the time are often attributed to the hard times resulting from inclosures and sheep-raising and the consequent eviction of numerous tenants who had made a living of tillage, to the destruction of great bands of feudal retainers, and to the dissolution of the monasteries. Chiefly in these changes may be found the explanation of the growth of this dependent class, which came to be such a vexatious governmental problem and of sufficient menace to call for attention from Parliament. The problem was finally solved, as far as legislative enactment could solve it, by legislation which sought to deal with the poor and dependent.

For many years following the Black Death, which produced a scarcity of labor, the wool industry came to be very important. The increase in the price of wool was so rapid that by the beginning of the sixteenth century sheep-raising had become a far more profitable industry than farming, and at the same time it demanded fewer laborers. At first no hardship was worked by this change ; but in the time of Henry VII and Henry VIII many landowners turned their attention to this industry, and the inclosure into sheep pastures of vast areas which had hitherto been used for tillage, furnishing work for many laborers, threw out of employment many people whose livelihoods had hitherto depended on arable farming. The result was that those who had land or money enough to rent and stock it with sheep grew richer, while the poorer people, dispossessed of land and rendered helpless and inefficient under the changed industrial system, were driven out to beg or to steal for a living. Frequently "farmers were got rid of either by fraud or force, or tired out with repeated wrongs into parting with their property," and when other means failed eviction was resorted to. Many evicted farmers were thus reduced to a state of pauperism, and whole families were sent on the road to live a life of vagrancy. As the peasants increased, their economic condition grew more unbearable. There was evidence of much social discontent. The wrongs of the poorer classes found indignant expression in the literature of the period, which was often full of protests against the evils of inclosures and the consequent depopulation of the rural regions.

The large bands of retainers had been a more or less lawless element throughout the period of feudal power. Feudal armies had greatly impoverished many rural regions, especially during the Wars of the Roses. During the peace of the Tudor period numerous retainers, without wages, became marauders under the protection of their lords and stole for a living. A statute was passed against them near the close of the fifteenth century, and as they were dismissed from their masters' protection they became capable vagabonds and rogues.

The problem of unemployment thus became serious. Opportunities for work had been decreased in corporate towns by the exclusive policy pursued by the guilds. Moreover, the kingdom had been subjected to heavy taxation by Henry VIII ; the coinage had been so debased by him that Elizabeth's efforts at reform were not immediate or thorough enough to save the laboring man from its evil consequences ; and the prices of necessary commodities doubled and often trebled without any corresponding advance in wages. Hundreds were thus forced from the means of a livelihood ; the needy increased in great numbers, while the means of relief were constantly lessening. Even the guild and town corporations found it difficult to make provision for their own sick and dependent.

The dissolution of the monasteries also deprived the vagrants of certain sources of comfort and relief. Henry VIII held that these institutions were dangerous to the new regime, and although the monastic authorities might appear tractable and obedient, it was feared that they disapproved of the violent measures which had terminated papal control in England. Many of the monasteries were wealthy and held extensive landed estates which the aristocracy of the kingdom coveted. Moreover, evidences of corruption and of evil living in them, and alleged immoral and irreligious motives, seemed to warrant drastic royal action. Accordingly, in 1536 Parliament suppressed nearly four hundred of those which had an annual income of less than £200, and three years later the larger ones were swept away also and their possessions added to the king's revenues. In a few years monasticism practically disappeared from England, and hundreds of institutions harboring thousands of monks and nuns ceased to exist. The usefulness of the system had already begun to wane, and modern society has provided agencies which perform the social services of monasticism far more effectively than they were ever performed by moiiasteries and convents. Yet, with the dissolution of these institutions, there disappeared many useful means of education and poor relief.

Finally, the Chantries Act of 1547 completed this royal confiscation and spoliation of religious endowments. Most of the guilds and corporations had funds set apart for providing masses for their deceased founders, for chantries, for the comfort and support of their infirm and sick members, and for numerous other charitable purposes. These foundations supported priests, lent money without interest to poor members, apprenticed their children and cared for their widows and orphans, and in numerous other ways provided for the education and protection of the unfortunate. The confiscation of these means of education and charity told disastrously against the poorer classes.

These changes greatly increased the number of wanderers and vagrants and, at the same time, destroyed many sources of relief. Indiscriminate charity had increased the number of idle poor. The "open house," kept alike by barons and the clergy ; the mendicant practices of the friars and other religious orders ; the habits of the wandering scholar and his A B C shooters and of the pious pilgrim who begged his way from shrine to shrine, — all these agencies helped to foster a class of beggars whose profession was far from undignified and whose activities were by no means disgraceful. These beggars were of many kinds. A contemporary account gives two dozen varieties, from the impotent poor to the Abraham man, who, like the fool in " King Lear," feigned lunacy and begged '^ charity for poor Tom" in the hope of awakening the pity of the passers-by.

Numerous early attempts made to deal with this condition sought to repress the evil by severe punishments, but no effective relief was afforded until Parliament turned attention to the problem. It soon became recognized as necessary for the more prosperous members of the community to contribute means to care for the dependent members. Collections were made for this purpose, first in the form of charitable and voluntary offerings, but later as compulsory contributions levied by the State, Still later it was found that if the "sturdy" beggars and those able to do so were to be forced to work, some employment had to be found for them. Numerous acts of Parliament in the fifteenth century and throughout the first half of the sixteenth, though well intended, failed to bring relief ; and it was left to the wisdom of Elizabeth to place the whole matter of contributions for poor relief on a satisfactory basis.

The problem wa^ finally dealt with in a series of laws which undertook to provide a stricter punishment for sturdy beggars and to inaugurate a compulsory assessment to aid the deserving poor. This was especially true of legislation between 1572 and 1597, which made more explicit and practicable the directions for controlling the bad condition, for collecting and distributing the funds for poor relief, and for setting the able-bodied vagrants to work. This legislation marked the beginning of the end of the free vagabond life of the period, and the principal features of the earlier acts were incorporated in the law of 1601, which became the real statutory foundation of the poor law and the basis of a national system of poor relief.

For this reason and because of its influence on the practice of the colonists, this law is very significant. Under it definite compulsory contributions were assessed on ratable values for funds to relieve the poor and unfortunate, and overseers of the poor were appointed with several duties. They were to superintend the distribution of relief to the impotent poor, to apprentice the children of the poor and see that trades were properly taught them, to set to work able-bodied vagrants and beggars, and to attend to the general enforcement of the law. While this and similar laws were far from educational in intent, nevertheless they became the basis of the only training given a very large number of children. It should be noted, however, that the enforcement of these acts was put into the hands of local justices who were trained in the interpretation and administration of such legislation.

Political conditions in England prior to and during its early colonizing period should also be noted. During the first forty years of the seventeenth century, when immigration to America began, the claims of the monarchy were perhaps more exorbitant than at any time in English history. For example, it was seditious in subjects to dispute what kings and rulers could do in the height of their power. And not only was this view held by the rulers themselves, but others attributed to them absolute authority, and their powers thus became real in the lives of their subjects. Notable contests between the king and Parliament gave the latter slightly larger participation in the government, though the conflict became increasingly intense and critical. Parliamentary sympathizers relied for their cause more and more on the "ancient rights and liberties of the people." Through the Petition of Right appeal was made by Parliament to the Great Charter and to other declarations of personal liberties ; in 1641 the Grand Remonstrance contained such expressions as "the people," " the rights of the people," " the liberties of subjects," and many rights and privileges were finally incorporated in the Bill of Rights in 1689.

During the contests and while the balance of powers was unsettled, American colonization was progressing and distinct ideas of civil liberty were brought to the new country. For it was not the people of strong royalist spirit who emigrated, but those of the middle and lower classes, who were not on very comfortable terms with the king ; and among these classes of people the views of Parliament were widespread. The same views were very largely held also by the Virginia Company, which played such an important part in influencing the colonists.

Yet unanimity did not exist even among those who left England ; and strong as the predilection was among the founders of America for self-government and representative institutions, the Old-World differences of view were transferred to the colonies and played a part in local struggles there. ^

1 Cheyney, European Background of American History, chap. xiii.

Local government came very close to the average Englishman in the seventeenth century, and as sheriff, justice of the peace, churchwarden, or other official he had a very active part in local affairs. Certain political institutions and customs controlled his actions and influenced his habits and ideas concerning local government.

The sheriff was the historic head of the shire, or county, and had numerous and varied duties. The justices of the peace, the "men of all work," represented the rural gentry and were very influential in English affairs throughout the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. James I said of them, "At London you are like ships in a sea, which show like nothing, but in your country villages you are like ships in a river, which look like great things." From twenty to sixty of these officers were found in each county. The most important duties as a body were performed at the "quarter sessions," regularly held in October, in midwinter, in spring, and in midsummer. Few interests in human life escaped their attention. Up to 1603 nearly three hundred statutes had been enacted in which the justices were given jurisdiction. One of their most important duties was the enforcement of the apprenticeship and poor laws. The churchwardens, whose position and duties were not so ecclesiastical as the name implies, were appointed by the justices annually at their Easter session, were ex-officio overseers of the poor, and were in charge of the relief of the poor. Estimating the costs and levying local assessments for the purpose were among their most important local duties.

Certain religious changes in Europe became powerful influences in American colonial life also. The Renaissance had affected the religious life of all Western Europe. The part of the Church in the direction of European affairs began to be questioned by the new national rulers ; the right of papal interference became a matter of serious dispute ; a change appeared in the attitude of the laity towards the Church ; and there was rapidly developing a desire in the lay mind for each individual to be free in his religious life instead of being blindly obedient to ecclesiastical authority. A new belief in the importance of the individual appeared in the value which the laity attached to education and in the tendency to leave to secular rather than to ecclesiastical control the education and care of the poor. Moreover, the English Humanists turned their attention to an examination of the Church and its teachings and found a great need for religious reform. Although their efforts were not fruitless, reform did not come directly through them, or as they desired, but through Luther and his teaching, which made powerful appeal, especially to the sentiment of the German people. These changes had their influence in England also.

When England became a colonizing nation, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, there were at least four well-defined religious parties among her people. There were the adherents of the Established Church, with its prayer book, articles of religion, uniformity of service, and the practices and the doctrines of the official state church. Anglicanism was the national church, just as Catholicism was the church of Spain. At the beginning of the seventeenth century Anglicanism had for a generation been the only religious system in authority in England, and it was therefore strongly intrenched through the authority of the law and the sanction of patriotic feeling. A second religious class was the Catholics, who held allegiance to that religious system which claimed the Pope as its earthly head. And from the time Henry VIII attacked the supremacy of the Pope and the practices of the medieval church, they were faithful to Rome in spite of frequent rigorous applications of harsh statutes against them.

Another religious class was the Puritans, who at first protested against certain ceremonies and formulas of Anglicanism, but later turned from these considerations to the more vital and practical question of morals. They believed that the Established Church was drifting toward Catholicism. Still another class was the "Separatists," or ''Independents," to whom the idea of a

EUROPEAN ANTECEDENTS ii

national church was idolatrous, and who believed in the absolute independence of each local congregation.

From 1629 to 1640, during the personal government of Charles I, when there were no sessions of Parliament, the Star Chamber, the High Commission, and the Privy Council were powerful administrative instruments which were in sympathy with Anglicanism. During this time the Puritans and other dissenting sects were greatly oppressed. It was during this period and under this regime that the great Puritan migrations to America were made. In migrating to the New World the Puritans were doubtless somewhat influenced by their unfavorable economic conditions at home, but they turned to America as a place where religious liberty would also be secure. Later on, during the Commonwealth period, when the Puritan regime was so distasteful to them, thousands of Cavaliers emigrated to Virginia, and between 1649 ^^^ 1669 the population of that colony increased from fifteen thousand to twenty-five thousand.

The social, economic, political, and religious conditions described were among those from which many of the early colonists came. In those conditions may be found the incentives which prompted many Englishmen to come to America. But there were other motives for colonization. Throughout the sixteenth century there were frequent complaints of a rapidly increasing population. Class distinctions and unfavorable industrial conditions, working painful hardships on the poor and the less prosperous part of society, persistently called for relief. Crimes were numerous and on the increase in spite of cruel penal legislation. It was a common belief that the surplus population would readily flow to the New World. Free land was also an attraction ; and the discovery of tobacco as a profitable product proved a powerful incentive to immigration to Virginia. Many glowing accounts of the colony reached England and appealed to the various classes : the restless, the impatient, and the adventurous ; those of straitened economic circumstances and of restricted social conditions ; the yeoman, whose children must always remain yeomen ; those who desired land and the position of gentlemen ; and those to whom the avenues of advancement were closed at home, — all these classes saw in Virginia attractive social and economic opportunities.

The force of economic interest was therefore very powerful in the Southern colonies. Economic conditions were likewise very influential in the development of social institutions. The road to wealth and influence lay in agricultural pursuits, where servant labor was essential. In practically all the Southern colonies it was natural that economic extremes should early develop ; side by side with the influential planter class, but in striking contrast to it, there grew up the indentured servant class, which constituted a great part of the population. The servant was bound for a term of from two to seven years to the planter who transported him or who had by contract secured control over him. At the end of his term of indenture he became a freeman. By the middle of the seventeenth century the importation of African slaves was also getting to be a profitable industry, and life in Virginia had assumed the character which it retained for more than a century. There developed, therefore, a distinction between the small landowner and the master of vast estates ; the plantation, more or less isolated, but with its abundant necessities and many luxuries of life, became the social unit and helped to develop the aristocratic spirit.