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Catechism and

as well as ele

ing the Reformed faith, had become an indispensable part of church organization. But the Dutch state also had concerned itself with the facilities for education. The Reformed Dutch Church was granted the right to examine teachers, enforce subscription to the creed, and, in the case of the elementary schools at least, largely determine the appointments, but the legal support and control of education were vested in the civil authorities. Hence there early arose in New Amsterdam and the villages of New Netherlands a parochial school system and a distribution of control between Church and State prayers of Re- very similar to that in Holland. Besides the ordinary formed Church, elementary branches, these parochial schools of the New Netherlands taught the 'true principles of Christian religion,' and the catechism and prayers of the Reformed Church. Thus the Dutch school differed from those in the Anglican colonies of the South, which stressed secondary education, in being chiefly elementary, although some attempt at conducting a Latin or 'grammar' (see p. 120) school was also made in New Amsterdam from 1652 on. However, after the English took permanent possession of New York (1674), the parochial school of the city was limited to the support of the Reformed Church, and, as a result of its long refusal to adopt the English language, its possible influence toward the realization of universal education was completely But, with Eng-lost. While the Dutch schools of the villages generally tion, replaced retained the joint control and support of the local court by laisses faire and church, with a constantly increasing domination of

mentary branches, taught.

lish occupa

organization.

the former, as a whole the English occupation of New York would seem to have set public education back about a hundred years. At any rate, by the eighteenth

century colonial New York seems to have fallen into the same laissez faire support of education that prevailed in the Southern colonies. The policy of universal education by means of parochial schools no longer existed.

the munici

coördinated.

Sectarian Organization of Schools in Pennsylvania. As a colony, Pennsylvania developed a church school organization, similar to that of the New Netherlands, except that it was carried on in connection with a number of creeds, and that the municipality was seldom a coördinate factor. Pennsylvania was more heterogeneous More sects and in population than New York, as the tolerant attitude pality not of the Quaker government had attracted a large variety of German sects, Swedes, Dutch, English, Welsh, and Scotch and Irish Presbyterians, and each was devoted to its own denominational schools. Early in the eighteenth century all Protestant religious bodies were authorized by statute to conduct schools and to receive bequests and hold land for their support. Even before this the Friends had started the 'Penn Charter School,' Friends, which, while itself a secondary school, soon established elementary schools as branches throughout the city upon various arrangements. In keeping with the conclusions of various 'Yearly Meetings' (1722, 1746, etc.), the Friends also provided elementary, and to some extent secondary, schools in close proximity to all meetinghouses throughout the colony. Similarly, the Lutheran Lutherans, congregations, for example, each set up a school alongside of the church as early as possible. Likewise the Mennonites included in their system the famous schools Mennonites, of Christopher Dock, who in 1750 produced the first elaborate educational treatise in America. There was also some attempt at 'grammar' schools (see p. 120)

and others.

Broader attempts.

or secondary education, especially in the case of the well-known Moravian institutions at Bethlehem, Nazareth, and Lititz, and the Presbyterian Log College at Neshaminy, which became the cradle of Princeton, Washington and Jefferson, Hampden-Sidney, and Union Colleges.

A somewhat broader spirit was manifest in the voluntary 'neighborhood' schools of Western Pennsylvania and elsewhere, in the attempts at universal education of the Connecticut colonists in the Wyoming Valley, and in the 'academy' (see p. 159) set up at Philadelphia through Franklin, to train public men and teachers, and fuse the various nations in a common citizenship. But, as a whole, parochial schools exerted the greatest influence in the colony of Pennsylvania.

Town Schools in Massachusetts.-The third type of colonial school organization appeared first in Massachusetts. As compared with the laissez faire and the parochial methods, governmental activity here prevailed. Accordingly, Massachusetts may be said to have inaugurated the first real system of public education in America. The character of the schools in this colony developed from its peculiar form of society and government. It was democratic, concentrated, and homogeneous, as geneous society compared with the cosmopolitan and sectarian social produced governmental ac- structure in the Middle colonies, or the class distinctions

Democratic

and homo

tivity.

and scattered population of the South. While there were some servants and dependents in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and a distinction was made between 'freemen' and others, there were at no time rival elements that were unable to combine. The settlements were not a mere confederation, but the blending of all elements

into a single organism, where the individuality of each was merged in a new social whole. This condition was a result of the radical ingrained religious conviction that every one was a child of God, capable of becoming a vital and useful member of society, and that the community was obligated to give him training to that end in the home, the church, and the school.

Out of this Calvinistic attitude sprang a spirit of cooperation and helpfulness, a general participation of all townsmen in local government, and the Massachusetts type of school organization. Common schools seem to have been supported in most towns from the first by voluntary or compulsory subscriptions, and before the close of the first quarter of a century there had been established by the colony at large an educational system in which every citizen had a working share. Because of this inclusiveness and unity in matters theological, the schools, while religious and moral, could hardly be considered sectarian. The first educational act of the colony, passed in 1642, was similar to the old English appren- Acts of 1642 ticeship law in its provision for industrial education, and, while it was broadened so as to include some literary elements and a rate to procure materials was established, no school is mentioned in it. But in 1647 each and 1647 town of fifty families was required, under a penalty of £5, to maintain an elementary school (Fig. 22), and every one of a hundred families a (Latin) 'grammar' (Fig. 23) school. These schools might be supported in part by tuition fees, as well as by the town rate, and the obligation seems to have still rested on the parents to see that the children did 'resort' to the school, but the germs of the present common school system in the United States

County schools in Maryland.

Parish schools in South

Carolina.

Georgia financed by parliament.

Democratic

tendencies in North Carolina.

appear in the educational activity of the legislature in colonial Massachusetts. The 'grammar' schools were to prepare boys for Harvard College (Fig. 24), which had been founded in 1636.

Education in the Other Colonies.-In general, the organization of education in the remaining nine colonies can be classed under one of the three types, described above, but there are various modifications and some exceptions to be noted. The laissez faire foundation of schools and colleges during the colonial period, which was evident in Virginia, seems to be characteristic of the four other colonies of the South. But the problems were in every case a little different, and in each there were variations in development. Maryland, for example, while mainly following the same random foundation of schools as Virginia, also seriously endeavored (1696) to support schools in every county by a general colonial South Carolina likewise made an unsuccessful attempt (1722) at establishing a county system of schools, and, a decade before, it undertook to subsidize a school in each parish. Georgia, on the other hand, until the Revolution, had its entire budget, including the items for education, financed by the English parliament. And North Carolina, through a large number of Irish and Scotch Presbyterians, German Protestants, and other immigrants, mostly from Pennsylvania, after 1728 began to break away from the aristocratic policy.

tax.

Moreover, after the permanent occupation (1674) by the English, New York went over to the laissez faire plan (see p. 194). And, although in the remaining 'middle' colonies, New Jersey and Delaware, something was accomplished by the parochial schools of the

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