Part 27 (1/2)
He was never able to see any force in the reasons for the change of policy; but believed that Mrs Stowe acted conscientiously, although her action was decidedly e to him both at home and abroad[1]
[Footnote 1: _Ibid_, p 252]
CHAPTER XIII
EDUCATION AT PUBLIC EXPENSE
The persistent struggle of the colored people to have their children educated at public expense sho resolved they were to be enlightened In the beginning Negroes had no aspiration to secure such assistance Because the free public schools were first regarded as a system to educate the poor, the friends of the free blacks turned theht reproach thee Moreover, philanthropists dee them into contact with sympathetic persons, who knew their peculiar needs In the course of tima of charity was removed as a result of the developroes concluded that it was not dishonorable to share the benefits of institutions which they were taxed to support[1] Unable then to cope with systems thus maintained for the education of the white youth, the directors of colored schools requested that soroes Co with these petitions boards of education provided for colored schools which were to be partly or wholly supported at public expense But it was not long before the abolitionists saw that they hadout this policy The aenerally inadequate to supply them with the necessary equipment and competent teachers, and in ard the co-education of the races as undesirable
Confronted then with this caste prejudice, one of the hardest struggles of the Negroes and their sympathizers was that for deroes of Balti 500 in taxes annually to support public schools which their children could not attend]
The friends of the colored people in Pennsylvania were a the first to direct the attention of the State to the duty of enlightening the blacks as well as the whites In 1802, 1804, and 1809, respectively, the State passed, in the interest of the poor, acts which although interpreted to exclude Negroes from the benefits therein provided, were construed, nevertheless, by friends of the race as authorizing their education at public expense Convinced of the truth of this contention, officials in different parts of the State began to yield in the next decade At Columbia, Pennsylvania, the names of such colored children as were entitled to the benefits of the law for the education of the poor were taken in 1818 to enable the the sa that the city had established public schools for white children in 1818, applied two years later for the share of the fund to which the children of African descent were entitled by law The request was granted The Comptroller opened in Lombard Street in 1822 a school for children of color, maintained at the expense of the State This furnished a precedent for other such schools which were established in 1833, and 1841[1] Harrisburg had a colored school early in the century, but upon the establishment of the Lancastrian school in that city in the thirties, the colored as well as the white children were required to attend it or pay for their education themselves[2]
[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 379]
[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, p 379]
In 1834 the legislature of Pennsylvania established a systeroes to public education were neither guaranteed nor denied[1] The school law of 1854, however, seems to imply that the benefits of the system had always been understood to extend to colored children[2] This measure provided that the comptrollers and directors of the several school districts of the State could establish within their respective districts separate schools for Negro and mulatto children wherever they could be so located as to accommodate twenty or more pupils Another provision was that wherever such schools should ”be established and kept open four months in the year” the directors and comptrollers should not be compelled to admit colored pupils to any other schools of that district The laas interpreted to mean that wherever such accoroes could attend the other schools Such was the case in the rural districts where a few colored children often found it pleasant and profitable to attend school with their white friends[3] The children of Robert B Purvis, however, were turned away froround that special educational facilities for them had been provided[4] It was not until 1881 that Pennsylvania finally swept away all the distinctions of caste froest of the Laws of Pa_, p 291, sections 1-23]
[Footnote 2: Stroud and Brightly, _Purdon's Digest_, p 1064, section 23]
[Footnote 3: Wickersham, _History of Education in Pa_, p 253]
[Footnote 4: Wigham, _The Antislavery Cause in America_, p 103]
As the colored population of New Jersey was never large, there was not sufficient concentration of such persons in that State to give rise to the problems which at times confronted the benevolent people of Pennsylvania Great as had been the reaction, the Negroes of New Jersey never entirely lost the privilege of attending school hite students The New Jersey Constitution of 1844 provided that the funds for the support of the public schools should be applied for the equal benefit of all the people of that State[1] Considered then entitled to the benefits of this fund, colored pupils were early admitted into the public schools without any social distinction[2]
This does not mean that there were no colored schools in that cotown had their own schools[3] Separate schools were declared illegal by an act of the General assembly in 1881
[Footnote 1: Thorpe, _Federal and State Constitutions_, vol v, p
2604]
[Footnote 2: _Southern Workman_, vol xxxvii, p 390]
[Footnote 3: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 400]
Certain communities of New York provided separate schools for colored pupils rather than admit them to those open to white children On recommendation of the superintendent of schools in 1823 the State adopted the policy of organizing schools exclusively for colored people[1] In places where they already existed, the State could aid the establishment as did the New York Common Council in 1824, when it appropriated a portion of its fund to the support of the African Free Schools[2] In 1841 the New York legislature authorized any district, with the approbation of the school commissioners, to establish a separate school for the colored children in their locality The superintendent's report for 1847 shows that schools for Negroes had been established in fifteen counties in the State, reporting an enrollment of 5000 pupils For the maintenance of these schools the sum of 17,000 had been annually expended Colored pupils were enumerated by the trustees in their annual reports, drew public money for the district in which they resided, and were equally entitled hite children to the benefit of the school fund In the rural districts colored children were generally admitted to the common schools Wherever race prejudice, however, was sufficiently violent to exclude thee school, the trustees were eroes' share of the public money to provide for their education elsewhere At the saroes were to be exempted froe upon the other citizens of the district[3]
[Footnote 1: Randall, _Hist of Common School System of New York_, p
24]
[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, p 48]
[Footnote 3: Randall, _Hist of Common School System of New York_, p
248]
So special appropriations for incorporated villages Such appropriations, the superintendent had observed, excited prejudice and parsies had learned to expend only the special appropriations for the education of the colored pupils, and to use the publicschools for the white children He believed that it rong to argue that Negroes were any es than to cities or rural districts, and that they were, therefore, entitled to every allowance of money to educate them[1]