result, in 1900, the illiteracy had been reduced to 6 per cent only one-fifth of what it was eighteen years before.

Now, let us see what has been done in our own country, and especially in the Southern States. The conditions in America have been entirely different from those in Europe. The work of popular education is not now, nor likely ever will be, either directly in the hands of the general government or under its close control. The right of State authorities to require the attendance of all children at school was asserted early in the Colonies. Connecticut may claim to have been one of the first States in the world that established the principle. Its code of laws adopted in 1650 contained stringent provisions for compulsory attendance upon schools. In 1810, with the changed conditions resulting from immigration, it was found impossible to enforce the law without important additions, amounting in reality to a set of factory laws, forbidding the employment of children under fourteen years of age who have not attended school for at least three months in the year. As early as 1642, Massachusetts enjoined the selectmen of every town. to see that all parents or guardians or masters taught their children, wards or apprentices so much learning as would enable them to read the English tongue and the capital laws, upon penalty of twenty shillings for each neglect thereof. A factory law similar to that of Connecticut was passed in 1834. Compulsory education must be accompanied by child labor laws to make it successful. All the States and Territories of the United States now have compulsory education in effect except the following: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. The percentages of illiteracy in these States are the greatest of any in the United States.

As has been seen, compulsory educational laws have not been adopted in any of the Southern States except Kentucky and Missouri. Three counties in Tennessee, through legislative enactment, have such laws, but no fair test has yet been given. In Asheville, North Carolina, by popular vote an ordinance was adopted requiring compulsory education. That State has a local option law for cities as to compulsory education. In the South,

great progress has been made in public education, especially during the past twenty years, despite the fact that this section remains, of all the Union, the only section where attendance on public schools between the ages of six and fourteen for a considerable period each year is not compulsory. But how necessary is an even greater effort to secure universal elementary education in the South is shown in the fact that in 1900, 27.9 per cent of all the illiterate white voters in the United States were in the South, while only 14.9 per cent of the white voters of the country were found here. In other words, we had nearly twice the illiterate population among the whites of voting age that our proportion of population justified. Of the total negro male population, 76.2 per cent lives in the South, and 85.5 per cent of the illiterate negroes of voting age live here.

I have no disposition to minimize the progress made in the South in reducing illiteracy. The record, in fact, is encouraging. In the South Atlantic Division the percentages were 46.2 in 1870, 40.3 in 1880, 30.9 in 1890, and 23.9 in 1900. In the South Central Division for the same years the percentages of illiteracy were 44.5 in 1870, 39.5 for 1880, 29.7 for 1890, 22.9 for 1900. The percentage for the United States was 20 for 1870 and 10.7 in 1900. For the North Atlantic Division it had decreased from 7.6 in 1870 to 5.9 in 1900. North Central 9. 3 to 4.2, Western 15 to 6.3. In percentage of illiteracy the South, despite, the reductions made, is still in point of literacy behind all the other sections of the Union, and far behind such countries of Europe as the German Empire, Switzerland, Scotland, Netherlands, England, France, Belgium, Ireland. Only Austria, Hungary, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Russia, Servia, and Roumania, of European countries, make a worse showing.

It is fair, of course, to exclude the negro population and consider only the white population, which in the South is almost entirely native born. It is conceded that the whites of the South constitute a pure branch of the Anglo-Saxon root.. They trace their lineage directly to the early English, Scotch-Irish and German.

In 1870, the percentage of white illiterates ten years and over in the United States was 11.5; in 1880, 9.4; in 1890, 7.7; in 1900,

6.2. In 1870, the percentage in the South Atlantic States was 23.5; in 1880, 19.5; in 1890, 14.5; in 1900, 11.5. In 1870, the percentage in the South Central States, in which group Tennessee is included, was 23.4 per cent; in 1880, 21.6; in 1890, 15.3; and 1900, 11.8 per cent.

In Tennessee the percentage in 1870 was 26.9 per cent, or 3.5 more than the average for this division, and in 1900 the percentage was 14.1 or 2.3 per cent more than the average. In actual number of illiterates, we had of whites ten years of age and over 178,727, and in 1900, 159,086. But of those of voting age the number had actually increased, 37,173 in 1870, 52,418 in 1900. The total white males over ten years of age among the illiterates in this State is 77,275, females 81,811.

As to age periods, ten to fourteen years, the illiterate white males are 12,446; illiterate white females, 9,027; fifteen to twenty years, males, 12,411; females, 8,482; twenty-one years and over, males, 52,418; females, 64, 302. "Mere Man" is evidently not in this generation appreciating the school advantages offered as formerly. The women are crowding the schools. The men will do the voting, but they are not equipping themselves for the elective franchise.

Of the native white population, only four States of the Union in 1900 had a larger illiteracy than our own, those being Alabama, Louisiana, North Carolina and New Mexico. While the native white population showed a percentage of 14.2 illiterates, the foreign white showed a percentage of 9.7.

As to the education of the negro, Tennessee ranked 34 out of 50 with a percentage of illiteracy in the colored population of 41.6. Several Southern States make an excellent showing as to the native white illiteracy. Oklahoma's percentage was only 2.5 per cent; Maryland, 4.1 per cent; Missouri, 4.8 per cent; Texas, 6.1 per cent; Mississippi, 8 per cent; Florida, 8.6 per cent. Eliminating the foreign population of Texas, there are only about 95,000 illiterates, or about 41⁄2 per cent.

While not affecting the South materially, except in Louisiana and Texas where the foreign population is considerable, and very illiterate the general question of compulsory education, of course, involves the foreign immigrant and his children, and

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this consideration has no doubt hastened the adoption of compulsory laws in the States of other sections.

In

The percentage of illiterates ten years and over among the foreign population in the United States in 1900 was 12.9. the North Atlantic Division, it was 15.9; the South Atlantic Division, 12.9; the South Central, 22.8; the North Central Division, 9.4; and the Western Division, 8.5 per cent. The Eastern States with the largest percentage of illiterates among the foreign population were: Maine, 19.4; New Hampshire, 20.5; Vermont, 21.4; Massachusetts, 14.6. The largest numbers of illiterate foreigners in any States were in New York, with 258,423, and Pennsylvania, with 191,706. Our system of education is raising them up, as shown by the fact that the percentage of illiteracy among foreign born whites is 11.5, and among native whites of foreign parents, 2.

In cities of 25,000 and upward in the United States, the percentage of illiteracy among the voting population in 1900 was only 4.5 per cent. In the cities of the North Atlantic Division it was 5.8 per cent; in the South Atlantic Division, 3 per cent; in the South Central Division, 3.4 per cent; in the North Central Division, 3.3 per cent; and in the Western Division, 1.7 per cent. It will be seen that in this classification Southern cities make a good comparative showing. The percentage of white illiteracy in the voting population of Tennessee in the cities of 25,000 and over, including Memphis, Nashville, Knoxville and Chattanooga, was only 3 per cent. The percentage of negro illiterates under the same classification was 35.9 per cent. The cities of the East, especially of New England, have suffered in educational excellence by reason of the influx of foreign population.

The greatest illiteracy in cities outside the South is among foreign born whites. This, in 1900, in cities of over 25,000 for those of voting age was 9.8 per cent. The influence of the good educational systems of such cities is shown in the fact that the percentage of illiteracy for native whites of foreign parentage is about the same as for native whites of native parentage, and less than 2 per cent among those of voting age in such cities.

The percentage of illiteracy among the white males in the

North Atlantic Division in 1840 was 2.3 per cent only; in 1900, this had increased to 6.6 per cent. In 1840, the percentage among the white males of voting age in the South Atlantic States was 13.4 per cent, and in the South Central States, 12.7; these, by 1870, had increased to 15 and 15.4 per cent, respectively. They are now (1900), 11.5 and 11.6, respectively. That of the United States as a whole, is 5.9.

A more intensive examination of one State, and a community and section of that State, may illustrate what we have to deal with in the problem of ignorance.

Knox County, Tennessee, the writer's home, has an illiterate population among the native whites of voting age of about 14 per cent. The following East Tennessee counties, some of them adjoining Knox, have percentages of more than 20: Meigs, 20.8; Bledsoe, 21.1; Polk, 21.1; Campbell, 21.2; Marion, 21.5; Union, 21.6; Scott, 21.5; Anderson, 22.4; Morgan, 22.4; Sevier, 22.7; Monroe, 22.8; Hancock, 23.2; Grainger, 23.4; Unicoi, 24.2; Cocke, 24.6; Hawkins, 25.4; Claiborne, 25.6; Johnson, 26.9; Carter, 27.6. Twenty out of the thirty-three counties of East Tennessee have thus in the male whites able to vote over 20 per cent illiterate an aggregate of 13,450. I have not the figures at hand, but if a county like Knox, with the best schools, has 14 per cent of such illiterate population, certainly the other thirteen counties would show averages from 14 to 20 per cent, and swell the aggregate of illiterate voters in this grand division of the State to over 20,000. Certainly the problem of education is not of distant lands.

Do not understand me to assert that this mass of illiterate voters is not in many ways educated. They are shrewd, observant people. They are industrious and thrifty. Their intelligence in many respects is large. Yet, unequipped with ability to read and write, deprived of the illumination of the written word, out of touch with the progress of the world, what a tremendous obstacle must they overcome in the struggle for life! Consider what the economic, political and social upilft of a State would be if this population were by reading able to improve itself. In 1906, a candidate for Governor of Tennessee on an illiteracy platform, and receiving the united