Part 10 (2/2)
In his Report for 1852, the Superintendent points with pride to the fact that Separate Schools are not increasing. Indeed, he congratulates himself that the provision in the law allowing them is really a good thing, since it is not very effective in practice but yet acts as a safety valve to prevent violent opposition to the school system. He believed that the Roman Catholics themselves would ultimately see that a policy of isolation of their children would have the effect of cutting them off from many of their natural privileges as Canadian citizens. And had the Separate School Act of 1853 remained unaltered, events would likely have shown Ryerson to be correct in his views. He believed the Act of 1853 was final, and that without any munic.i.p.al machinery for collecting their taxes Separate Schools would never become numerous.
In this he was greatly mistaken, as events proved. In 1854, the Roman Catholic Bishops of Toronto, Kingston and Bytown, drew up a Separate School Bill which they wished should become law. This Bill would have forced all Roman Catholics to support Catholic Separate Schools wherever such were established. It also had other provisions which Ryerson thought objectionable. In 1855 a Separate School Bill, known as the ”Tache Bill,” was introduced into the Legislative Council, and after some amendments adopted by both branches of Parliament. This Act differed from all previous Acts in that its provisions were exclusively for Roman Catholic Separate Schools. It repealed all previous legislation for Separate Schools in so far as Roman Catholics were concerned. It made possible the establishment of a Roman Catholic Separate School in any school section or any ward of a town or city on pet.i.tion of ten Roman Catholic ratepayers and gave them a Separate School Board with their own Superintendent in towns and cities. Such Roman Catholic ratepayers were relieved from all munic.i.p.al rates for Common School purposes, and received for their own school a _pro rata_ share of the Legislative grant if they had an average attendance of 15 pupils. The Act also made possible general Boards of Separate School Trustees in towns and cities and gave all Separate School Boards power to license their own teachers and levy rates for Separate School purposes upon the supporters of those schools. The Act was in principle a distinct gain for the champions of Separate Schools, but it led to no rapid increase in the number of such schools. In 1858, only 94 Separate Schools were in existence with an enrolment of less than 10,000 children, as compared with an enrolment of 284,000 in the Public Schools. The Act of 1855 was really forced upon Upper Canada by the votes of members from Lower Canada, there being a majority of Upper Canada members against the Bill.
It would seem that the Roman Catholics did not gain by the Tache Bill as much as they expected. The following letter written to Dr. Ryerson from Quebec, on June 8th, 1855, by John (afterwards Sir John) A. Macdonald, Attorney-General for Upper Canada, who had charge of the Bill in the a.s.sembly, shows that political exigencies played no small part in school legislation: ”Our Separate School Bill, which, as you know, is now quite harmless, pa.s.sed with the approbation of our friend, Bishop Charbonnel, who, before leaving here, formally thanked the administration for doing justice to his Church. He has got a new light since his return to Toronto, and he now says the Bill won't do. I need not point out to your suggestive mind that in any article written by you on the subject it is politic to press two points on the public attention: 1st, That the Bill will not, as you say, injuriously affect the Common School system. This for the people at large. 2nd, That the Bill is a substantial boon to the Roman Catholics. This to keep them in good humour. You see that if the Bishop makes the Roman Catholics believe that the Bill is no use to them there will be a renewal of an unwholesome agitation which I thought we had allayed.”[95]
[95] See copy of letter in D. H. E., Vol. XII., p. 40.
That Sir John A Macdonald was largely in agreement with Dr. Ryerson on the Separate School question is the opinion of Sir Joseph Pope, his biographer, who says on page 138 of his Memoirs: ”Mr. Macdonald said that he was as desirous as anyone of seeing all children going together to the Common School, and if he could have his own way there would be no Separate School. But we should respect the opinions of others who differed from us, and they had a right to refuse such schools as they could not conscientiously approve of.”
From 1855 to 1863, no important changes took place in the law governing Separate Schools. These schools were increasing very slowly, not so fast as the natural growth of the Roman Catholic population. In 1860, there were only 115 Separate Schools with an enrolment of 14,708 as compared with some 325,000 in the Public Schools. In 1860, Mr.
(afterwards Honourable) R. W. Scott introduced a Bill planned to give Separate Schools additional privileges. Substantially the same Bill was introduced annually by Mr. Scott until 1863, when it pa.s.sed with amendments, some of which were suggested by Dr. Ryerson. As a matter of fact, the Tache Act of 1855, which was suggested partly by the status of Protestant dissentient schools in Lower Canada, had imposed some useless but vexatious restrictions upon Separate School supporters. In 1862, Ryerson proposed to satisfy what he called the reasonable demands of Roman Catholics by making four changes, as follows:--[96]
1st. To allow the formation of Separate Schools in incorporated villages and in towns (the Tache Act allowed a Separate School only in the ward of a town and not a school for the town as a whole); 2nd. To allow a union of two or more Separate Schools; 3rd. To make it unnecessary for a Separate School supporter annually to declare himself such; and 4th. To exempt Separate School trustees from making oath as to the correctness of their school returns.
[96] See D. H. E., Vol. XVII., pp. 192 and 193.
The Scott Bill of 1863[97] as finally adopted by the Legislature, embodied all these provisions and some others of importance. Separate School teachers were to submit to the same examinations and receive the same certificates of qualification as Public School teachers, but all teachers qualified by law in Lower Canada were to be qualified teachers for Separate Schools in Upper Canada. This provision was to allow the teachers of religious orders[98] recognized by law as qualified in Lower Canada to teach in Separate Schools in Upper Canada. The Act also made taxpayers who withdrew their support from Separate Schools liable for their share of debts incurred while Separate School supporters in building or equipping Separate Schools. On the whole, the Scott Bill, while in its unamended form it aroused great opposition in Upper Canada, as finally adopted, tended to bring the Separate Schools into closer harmony with the principles governing Public Schools. The feature of the Bill that aroused most opposition was its being forced upon Upper Canada by votes of Lower Canadian members--there being a majority[99] of ten Upper Canada members against the third reading of the Bill in the a.s.sembly. Such well-known men as John A. Macdonald, John Sandfield Macdonald and Wm. Macdougall supported the Bill, while George Brown, Alexander Mackenzie and Oliver Mowat opposed it.
[97] The Scott Bill, as originally introduced, made any Roman Catholic priest an ex-officio trustee of a Separate School in his parish; made all the property of a Separate School supporter exempt from taxation for Public School purposes, even though some of the property was outside a Separate School district; gave Separate School trustees unlimited power to form union sections; created a separate County Board of Examiners to license Separate School teachers, and gave the Superintendent of Education little or no power to control textbooks, holidays or inspection of Separate Schools.
[98] The Report of the Chief Superintendent for 1871 shows 70 teachers in Separate Schools belonging to religious orders out of a total of 249.
[99] See Journals of Canadian a.s.sembly for 1863.
Ryerson claimed[100] that he agreed to the amended Scott Bill only on the distinct understanding that it was to be a finality in Separate School legislation. He also claimed that the Roman Catholic Bishops of Quebec, Kingston and Toronto accepted the Bill as a final settlement.
But nothing is final in legislation, and Dr. Ryerson ought to have known this. Legislation is as much the result of a process of evolution as any other inst.i.tution of human society, and no three or four men, whether priests or laymen, could speak authoritatively and finally for the thousands of Roman Catholics in Upper Canada.
[100] See D. H. E., Vol. XVII., p. 219.
Separate Schools increased slowly. In 1863 they numbered 115, with 15,000 pupils, the Public Schools having during the same year 45,000 Roman Catholic pupils. In 1864, Separate Schools had increased to 147 with 17,365 pupils. In 1871, the number was 160, with 21,000 pupils.
Almost immediately after the Scott legislation of 1863, an agitation began for further amendments to the Separate School Act. Ryerson made strong objections partly on the ground of the alleged compact of 1863, and partly on the ground that no legislation could possibly make Separate Schools really popular and efficient outside of large towns and cities.
In 1865, the school administration was attacked by James O'Reilly, of Kingston, and, in a memorandum prepared as a reply to these attacks, Ryerson goes into some detail to justify his Separate School policy and reiterates his firm belief that sectarian schools must ever be relatively inefficient. He concludes as follows: ”The fact is that the tendency of the public mind and of the inst.i.tutions of Upper Canada is to confederation and not isolation, to united effort and not divisions.
The efforts to establish and extend Separate Schools, although often energetic and made at great sacrifice, are a struggle against the instincts of Canadian society, against the necessities of a spa.r.s.ely populated country, against the social and political interest of the parents and youth separated from their fellow-citizens. It is not the Separate School law that renders such efforts fitful, feeble and little successful; their paralysis is caused by a higher than human law, the law of circ.u.mstances--the law of nature, and the law of interest.
”If, therefore, the present Separate School law is not to be maintained as a final settlement of the question and if the Legislature finds it necessary to legislate on the Separate School question again, I pray that it will abolish the Separate School law altogether; and to this recommendation I am forced after having long used my best efforts to maintain and give the fullest effect and most liberal application to successive Separate School acts--and after twenty years' experience and superintendence of our Common School system.”[101]
[101] See copy of Memorandum, D. H. E., Vol. XVIII., pp. 304-316.
When the Confederation resolutions adopted at Quebec in 1864 were being discussed in the Canadian a.s.sembly in 1865, an extended debate arose over the clause which secured for the minorities in Upper and Lower Canada the privilege of Separate Schools. Men like George Brown and Alexander Mackenzie, who had opposed the Scott Bill of 1863, defended the minority clause on the ground that it would place Upper Canada in no worse position than she already was in regard to sectarian schools, and that privileges given ought not to be withdrawn. The a.s.sembly were almost unanimous in supporting the Separate School clause which was incorporated into the British North America Act.
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