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What the county superintendents say.

Crawford County.-Colored schools were well attended, but a decrease in number of schools, on account of not being able to get teachers that could make the required percentage in examination.

Houston County. The colored people manifest a great desire to have their children educated; their schools were kept full and the average attendance was good. The colored children of our county outnumber the whites almost 4 to 1, and all their schools are full to overflowing whenever opened. In some parts of the county the white people are so sparsely settled that it is impossible for them to have schools.

Jasper County.-There is not a child of school age in the county, white or black, but what has a schoolhouse conveniently located and can attend school most any kind of weather.

Mitchell County.—The colored people of our county are very manifest in their interest of education. Many of our colored schools, if allowed, are crowded beyond accommodations.

Oconee County.-By no means tax the whites to educate the blacks. This has made a "skeleton" of what otherwise would have been a corpulent and muscular man-a giant [referring to the school system].

Putnam County.-We should have more money, negro or no negro. Something s necessarily obliged to be done or the whites will not keep up with the darkey.

MARYLAND.

The colored schools of Maryland.-Dr. James L. Bryan, school examiner of Dorchester County, Md., reports as follows: "There is great pleasure and just pride in stating that our colored schools are a credit to our system. When I began my work in this county in 1867 there were no colored schools connected with the public-school system. There were two or three run by friends outside of the State. The school board of that day made a small appropriation to two of those schools, and gradually increased the amount until the new school law of 1872 placed such schools directly under the control of the school board. Since that day these schools have increased from two or three to forty, and the teachers compare favorably with the white teachers, considering the poor advantages they have had to make themselves expert teachers. With two or three exceptions these schools occupy houses belonging to the school authorities, built g nerally for school purposes, and with comfortable furniture, blackboards, etc. One house, in Cambridge, used by colored pupils, cost nearly $2,500; another, in East Newmarket, cost over $1,000.

"There is small but a steady increase in the numbers attending the schools, and the results are quite gratifying.

"It is a great credit to the powers that be that this work has been done so well. It is honorable to the authorities, and should dispel all doubts of fairness in the matter of educating this class of our people."

And the examiner of Harford County says: "In a number of cases we lack suitable houses and furniture for the colored schools: but our greatest drawback in this line is an efficient corps of teachers. I do not hesitate to say that I have more difficulty in securing twenty-two suitable colored teachers than one hundred and fourteen white ones. I anxiously look forward to the day when we may rely upon the colored normal school of this State for our colored teachers. "In many cases, too, it is difficult to secure prompt and regular attendance of colored children. Having satisfied their ambition by enrolling their names at school, the very ones most in need of its benefits are the ones most apt to be absent. Recognizing the large factor they have become in some sections, I see no higher duty the State has to perform than to do what she can to educate this large class of her citizens."

NORTH CAROLINA.

Causes of opposition to negro education.-State Superintendent S. M. Finger, of North Carolina, says: "There is much opposition to public schools in the State, and in the South generally, because of the small amount of the taxes paid by the negroes. The opposition is intensified by the belief, that is more or less prevalent, that education spoils the colored people as laborers, to their own damage and the damage of the white people. It is said that when you 'educate a negro you spoil a field hand.'

"On this point it may be said with truth that the negro's sudden freedom and citizenship, for which he was unprepared, the privileges of education, and all the new experiences he had at and soon after the war, including much bad leadership, completely turned his head, so to speak. Forced labor to him had, during slavery, been his peculiar hardship. În his ignorance he thought the new conditions, and especially the privilege of education, were to relieve him from this curse of labor. The old negroes went earnestly to work to learn to read. They failed, but attributed their failure to lack of early opportunities. But they resolved that they would secure education for their children, and, with this special end in view, the escape from manual labor. The present generation of younger neg oes has been educated too much with this purpose in view, and, because of this wrong idea, it is true that a smattering of education to many of them has caused idleness and laziness. If education is to be given them in any liberal sense by the State they must show a much higher appreciation of it. They must recognize it not as a means of relief from labor, but as a help to suecessful labor.

"Many of their best teachers are striving now, by precept and example, to correct these wrong ideas as to what education is to do for them, and my earnest advice to school committeemen is that they do not employ teachers who are above manual labor. A man or a woman who depends upon the money he can make by teaching a three or four months school per annum and will not apply himself to some useful labor during the balance of the time is not fit to direct the education of children and should not be employed to teach.

"The colored people must not lose sight of the fact that manual labor is the lot of almost all people, white and colored, and that this is now and will be their lot to a larger degree than that of the white people, because of the peculiar conditions and circumstances that surround them. The destiny of the negroes of the United States is in their hands, with the powerful help of the white people as they may show themselves worthy of it. Let them pay their taxes and show that education does not spoil them as laborers, at least to any greater degree than it does the whites, but that it does add to their efficiency as laborers and to their usefulness as moral and upright citizens, and all the help they need that the State can, in her financial condition, reasonably afford will be extended them.

"The white people must not lose sight of the fact that it is the labor of a country that makes its wealth, and that, therefore, the education and elevation of the children of the laborers is a proper charge upon the property of any country. If we did not have the negroes we would have some other poor people, whose children would have to be educated in the public schools. But, whatever may be said about educating the negroes, we can not afford not to improve our educational facilities, whether we consider our financial condition and progre s or the perpetuation of our civil and religious liberties.

"If it is said that we are too poor, then I reply that the way to get rich is to educate our people intellectually and industrially, so that they may be able successfully to apply labor to the development of our many resources. The history of the world points out this way, and we can not fail if we walk in it. With good schools in the country districts there will be less incentive for the country people to crowd into the cities and towns to educate their children, much of the discontent and restlessness will disappear, and better success will attend their labors."

TENNESSEE.

Reports of Tennessee county superintendents.

Marshall County: Our colored schools are improving very fast. At their institute this year there was an increase of teachers and an increase in interest. All of them seem to be striving for an education, and we have some very bright minds in the colored race.

Me Nairy County: I have held four institutes-three for the whites and one for the colored. They were all well attended. We had some excellent workers at the normal institute at Purdy in June. I have the colored teachers better organized than the whites.

Morgan County: There are only forty-seven colored population, and they are promiscuously scattered along the railroads; hence no colored schools.

Tipton County: There seems nothing at present that promises to discourage the advancement of the public schools in this county further than that there is a growing disposition on the part of the white people of the county, who pay

ninety-five one-hundredths of the taxes, to discontinue the public education of the brother in black," who, notwithstanding the fact that he pays less than five one-hundredths of the taxes of our county, receives more than 50 per cent of the public-school moneys. This, the white people argue, is wrong, and should be remedied; and I heartily agree with them, and join them also, in the further opinion that the negro should bear the burden of his own education. Wayne County: Our colored schools are progressing very well. We have some very good teachers among the colored population of our county. They are creating quite an enthusiasm among their race of people for education.

"We can build our own schoolhouses."-The New York Age (edited by a colored man): Vast sums have been given by philanthropists to sustain such moral, religious, and intellectual work in the Southern States as are usually supplied from. the general tax funds of the State affected and by the charity of the benevolently disposed citizens of such State. The past and the present generations of AfroAmericans have, therefore, been educated to look to the Federal Government for the protection usually afforded to the citizen by the State in which he resides and which does not inhere at all in the Federal authority as one of its conceded rights; and, worse yet, they have been educated to look to others to think and do for them to such an extent that self-reliance has been hampered in its development, so that if we want money for educational, religious, or other laudable purposes, we appeal too often to white men or to the Federal Government, instead of relying upon ourselves for it and working in combination and cooperation to secure it as others do. We can build our own churches and colleges and schoolhouses, and support them, if we would do so, out of the money wasted by us upon unnecessary pleasures and upon downright humbug; and we have got to do it in the not remote future, because the opinion is steadily gaining vantage that we are getting old enough to stand upon our own heels in this matter of self-help.

II.-SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCATION.

OCCUPATIONS OF GRADUATES.

The question is sometimes asked, What does the colored man do after completing a regular course in one of the universities or colleges? In order to answer this question somewhat definitely, a table has been prepared showing upon what lines of business the graduates of 17 institutions reporting this item had ent red. These 17 institutions represent very fairly the work of the colored schools. Howard University is not included in this statement, as a considerable po tion of its graduates are white.

The first thing to attract attention is the large number engaged in teaching, more than one-half being thus employed. As these institutions were mainly founded to supply the demand for competent colored teachers and preachers, they seem to have well accomplished their purpose. The whole number of graduates of these 17 institutions is 1,542. If from this number we subtract 82 deceased, 46 engaged in post-graduate studies, 97 married women, and 74 not reported, of the remaining 1,243 there are 720, or 58 per cent, engaged in teaching, 27 of these being professors in colleges and universities. Of preachers there are 117, or 9 per cent; of lawyers, 116; doctors, 163. Five have their whole time emp'oyed as editors of papers, while others are partly engaged in editing. There are 36 in the United States Government service, employed as clerks in the departments at Washington, as postmasters, as custom-house inspectors, as mailcarriers, etc.

Although in all of the institutions given in the list, without exception, instruction was given in different kinds of industrial work, such as carpentry, tinning, painting, brickmaking, plastering, shoemaking, tailoring, blacksmithing, farming, gardening, etc., and in many of them special attention was given to such instruction; still out of the 1,243 graduates only 12 are farmers, only 1 a carpenter, and 2 mechanics. The painters, tinners, brick-makers, shoemakers, plasterers, tailors, and blacksmiths seem to have graduated from their trades when they left their almu mater. It should not be inferred, however, that their handicraft availed them nothing, for it is frequently stated in the catalogues that those graduates who are engaged in teaching so long as the school term continues immediately enter upon their trades at the close of the term. The evidence of the table, however, is that a full collegiate education tends to draw away the colored student from the class of pursuits mentioned and to lead him into professional work; and as greater opportunities are annually being offered him for medical and legal education the number in these professions is yearly increasing.

Institution.

TABLE 3.-Occupations of graduates of universities and colleges.

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Allen University, South Carolina.

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Atlanta University, Georgia

215

19

Berea College, Kentucky

49

Central Tennessee College, Tennessee.

280

Claflin University. South Carolina

171

Fisk University, Tennessee

158

Knoxville College, Tennessee

83

Livingstone College, North Carolina

41

New Orleans University, Louisiana.

30

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Paul Quinn College. Texas

6

Philander Smith College, Arkansas

5

Roger Williams University, Tennessee

31

7

Rust University, Mississippi.

70

3

3

2

Southern University, Louisiana.

016

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Straight University, Louisiana.

135

4

49

1

2

81

2

Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, Alabama.

64

1

52

1

Wilberforce University, Ohio.

110 13

37

18

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2

10 1

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COLLEGIATE STUDENTS.

The number of universities and colleges for the education of the colored race given in the tables of 1889-90 is 22, with an attendance of 811 students. The number of institutions is the same as reported in 1888-89, but in the number of students there is quite a reduction. This reduction is owing to the fact that students in the preparatory departments have been classed under the list of institutions for secondary instruction. It is well known that in many of the colored universities and colleges there are only a dozen or so of students in the college grade, while there are, perhaps, several hundred in the preparatory and primary grades. To include the latter among university and college students would be misleading.

On this point President Horace Bumstead, of Atlanta University, says: "It is a mistake to suppose that the higher education of the colored people is being overdone. There is a very grave misapprehension on that point among the good people of our land. We have so many institutions in the South that are named universities and colleges that the idea prevails that all the students in these institutions are learning Latin and Greek and the higher mathematics and getting in general the higher education. This is not so. Dr. Haygood a few years ago investigated this matter with some care and arrived at the conclusion that in these institutions with the high-sounding names not over 5 per cent of the pupils are really getting a strictly higher education.' Commissioner Harris thinks there may be as many as 10 per cent, but even that is a very small proportion.

"Take Atlanta University, for instance. We have had this last year about 600 students enrolled, whose names are printed in our catalogue. How many of these are getting the higher education? Just 20 of them are in the college course; 51 more are in the college preparatory course; 71 out of 600 are getting the higher education, and this is probably a larger proportion than can be found in almost any other institution in the South. When one remembers the comparatively small number of the colored people who are in these schools and then considers the small proportion of those in them who are getting the higher education it does not seem as though the thing were being overdone."

In 1888-89 the number of institutions for secondary instruction was 53 and the number of students 11,480; in 1889-90 the number of institutions was 71 and of students 12,420, an increase of about 1,000. This increase is to be accounted for, to some extent, in the same way as the decrease in the number of university and college students, viz, the including college preparatory students in the tables of secondary institutions.

Hence, although there was apparently a decrease in the number of collegiate students, it was only an apparent one; but at the same time the actual number given is so small that it may well serve to stimulate the friends of colored education to renewed efforts in their behalf.

In the number of theological students there was apparently a decrease, but there was an increase of about one-third in the number of both law and medical students.

The value of the grounds and buildings of the 22 universities and colleges, as reported, was over $2,700,000, but only a few of them had any endowment fund, the endowment funds of all of them only aggregating $807,425. Benefactions to the amount of $167,591 were received during the year. Only three of them received any State aid-Southern University, New Orleans, $7.500; Wilberforce University, Ohio, $6,000; and Claflin University, South Carolina, $10,800. The tuition fees received by all of them only aggregated $17,216. Without the aid extended by missionary societies and other benevolent funds they would have labored under great difficulties. The American Missionary Association was one of the largest contributors towards the support of these schools. It gave help to six chartered institutions-Fisk University, Atlanta University, Talladega Ĉollege, Tougaloo University, Straight University, Tillotson Normal Institutewith 2,871 students in all the departments; also to 21 normal and graded schools, with 5,797 students, and to 53 common schools, with 4,727 pupils. The Freedmen's Aid and Southern Education Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church also contributed a large amount towards the education of the colored race, but it is impossible to determine the amount accurately, as the expenditures for institutions of the white race and for ministers' salaries are included in the same accounts with those for colored schools. The whole amount disbursed from the Slater fund from 1883 to 1891, inclusive, was $321,991.

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