But although it is comparatively easy to place even liberal provisions in a constitution and to formulate them into law, neither constitutions nor laws enforce themselves. The majority of the leading classes in Pennsylvania were opposed to any scheme of public instruction that would loosen the grip on education already held by the different religious bodies in the State. The University of Pennsylvania was reconstructed and purged of Toryism during the war and the State began by a commendable show of liberality in granting to this and various new denominational colleges and seminaries properties from confiscated and other public lands. The legislature enacted that 60,000 acres of public land should be appropriated and put in fit shape to be sold "for the sole and express purpose of aiding public schools." But the public schools never received any benefit from this appropriation; the revenue, if any, of this domain, according to a time-honored practice in all States not supporting the common school, being quietly appropriated by the various private and denominational schools, which, under the name "college," or whatever higher title could magnify their importance, were always on the watch to replenish their scanty finances.

Indeed, the final provision in the constitution of 1790 was so read for forty years as to evade the obligation to establish a system of schools common to all classes and conditions of the people. Under the provision, "The poor may be taught gratuitously," the practice for many years was simply to provide for the education of the children of the poor in the neighborhood and church schools, thus preventing the original intent of the constitutional provision and forcing the State virtually to subsidize this class of institutions. The original educational heresy that still vitiates the public-school system of England, that common schools are schools for the poor who can not educate their children in the same way as their better-off neighbors, had then full possession of the American mind from Pennsylvania down to the Gulf and out to the borders of Mexico.

But we need not infer from this disheartening record that the faith in universal education as the motive power of an American State was dead or inactive in Pennsylvania. Among the most eminent and powerful advocates of the common school was Dr. Benjamin Rush, of Philadelphia, the friend and colaborer of Dr. Franklin in all that related to the elevation of the people in his State and the true glory of his city. As early as 1786 Dr. Rush addressed to the legislature and citizens of Pennsylvania a practical and comprehensive "plan for establishing public schools." It was, in substance, the same plan that Thomas Jefferson and George Wythe had presented to the legislature of Virginia in 1779. It provided for a State university, subsidized by the State; for four colleges, one for the German population of the Commonwealth, established at convenient localities; and for free schools for every one hundred families, where the children might be schooled in elementary studies in English and German. In support of this plan of free education he wrote these noble words, which will bear publication alongside the Declaration of Independence as a concise and unanswerable statement of the grounds of the public support of universal education: "Let there be free schools established in every township, or in districts consisting of 100 families. In these schools let children be taught to read and write the English and German languages and the use of figures. Such parents as can afford to send their children from home and are disposed to extend their education may remove them from the free school to one of the colleges.

"By this plan the whole State will be tied together by one system of education. The university will, in time, furnish masters for the colleges, and the colleges will furnish masters for the free schools, while the free schools, in their turn, will supply the colleges and the university with scholars, students, and pupils. The same systems of grammar, oratory, and philosophy will be taught in every part of the State, and the literary features of Pennsylvania will thus designate one great and enlightened family.

"But how shall we bear the expense of these literary institutions? I answer, these institutions will lessen our taxes. They will enlighten us in the great business of finance; they will teach us all the modern improvements and advantages of inland navigation. They will defend us from hasty and expensive experiment in government, by unfolding to us the experience and folly of past ages, and thus, instead of adding to our taxes and debts, they will furnish us with the true secret of lessening and discharging both of them. Every member of the community is interested in the propagation of virtue and knowledge in the State. But I will go further and add, it will be true economy in individuals to support public schools. * I conceive the education of our youth in this country to be peculiarly necessary in Pennsylvania, where our citizens are composed of the natives of so many different Kingdoms in Europe. Our schools of learning, by producing one general and uniform system of education, will render the mass of the people more homogeneous, and thereby fit them more easily for uniform and peaceable government.

*

"The only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments. Our country includes family, friends, and property, and should be preferred to them all. Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught at the same time that he must forsake and even forget them when the welfare of his country requires it. He must watch for the State as if its liberties depended upon his vigilance alone, but he must do this in such a manner as not to defraud his creditors or neglect his family.

"To assist in rendering religious, moral, and political instruction more effectual upon the minds of our youth it will be necessary to subject their bodies to physical discipline."

Who can now estimate the consequences of the rejection of these wise and patriotic plans for the education of the whole people presented to Virginia and Pennsylvania, the two most populous and influential American states in the opening decade of the Republic, by Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Rush? Had the ruling class of people in these States honestly adopted and wisely organized and administered this system of public training for American citizenship, their powerful influence at the center of the nation might have prevented the country from drifting through the contentions of seventy-five years into the horrors of a great civil war. One century of effective popular education would have so enlightened the masses of the American people that slavery would have been abolished by some action of the General Government satisfactory to all parties, and American history would have vindicated the prophecies and expectations of the great fathers of the Republic.

NORTH CAROLINA.

The first Southern States which moved in the constitutional recognition of edu 'a tion were North Carolina and Georgia.

North Carolina, with a population of 288,000, in 1776, at the beginning of the Revolution, placed in her constitution the following clause:

"ART. 41. That a school or schools shall be established by the legislature for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters paid by the public as may enable them to instruct at low prices; and all useful learning shall be duly encouraged and promoted in one or more universities."

This was followed by the establishment of the University of North Carolina, in 1789. The State moved with a commendable degree of activity in chartering "seminaries of learning;" Liberty Hall, at Charlotte, being one of the first fruits of State independence.

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TENNESSEE.

Tennessee, the first child of North Carolina, was, until 1790, subject to the constitution and laws of the mother State. In 1796 it was admitted to the Union, with a population of 36,000. The original constitution of Tennessee contained no distinct provision for education, although the following reference is found in the constitution of 1796:

Art. I, Sec. 12. No member of the General Assembly shall be eligible to any office or place of trust, except to the office of a justice of the peace, or a trustee of any literary institution, where the power of appointment to such office or place of trust is vested in their own body.

DELAWARE.

Delaware was the first State to adopt the Federal Constitution in 1787, and in 1790 had a population of 60,000. Its constitution in 1792 provided that "the legislature shall, as soon as conveniently may be, provide by law * * for establishing schools and promoting arts and sciences." But while an act in 1796 proposed "to create a fund sufficient to establish schools," and while this was followed by a series of legislative provisions that ordered the founding and support of schools "for poor children" and "free schools," yet it is only within a few years that this State compelled its people to the duty of local taxation, without which constitutions and statutes are powerless to teach the children. But at an early period the chief city of Delaware, Wilmington, established its present system of public education.

GEORGIA.

The State of Georgia in 1790 contained a population of 82,500, 2,900 of whom were negro slaves. In its constitution of 1777 it asserted that "schools shall be erected in each county, and supported at the general expense of the State," with the power to make liberal appropriations for seminaries of learning. In 1783 the legislature gave 1,000 acres of land to each county for the support of free schools, and in the year following 40,000 acres for the endowment of an academy in each city. The University of Georgia was chartered in 1785. One of the original provisions connected with this establishment was a law that every youth under the age of 16 sent abroad to be educated for three years shall be regarded an alien and deprived of the right to hold any public office in the Commonwealth.

The State at once set about establishing a group of academies, several of which became celebrated in their day, and remain as the secondary department of the present common-school system in the older cities. Of these are the academy of Richmond County, at Augusta, and Chatham Academy, at Savannah. By 1798 six of these seminaries had been established. Thus at an early period the State entered upon its favorite practice of chartering academies of all degrees of efficiency, chiefly denominational.

The head and frout of this early system of academical education in Georgia was the famous Sunbury Academy, located in Liberty County, the seat of the original New England immigration of which we have already given an account. In 1788 it was founded by the confiscation of the property of Tories in the country, $5,000 of which was used to erect the first building. In 1793 Rev. William McWhir, a Presbyterian clergyman, educated at Belfast, Ireland, after a service of ten years at Alexandria, Va., came to Georgia, and for thirty years was the principal of this institution. A historian of Georgia remarks: "This teacher did more than all others to establish a standard of scholarship and habits of study and discipline unusual in that period and among those people." Great numbers of the superior youth of the State owed their schooling to this seminary, and until the civil war the fame of Liberty County, Ga., as a nursery for clergymen, teachers, and men of science was bright, especially through the Gulf region of the South.

In 1783 the establishment of a free school in the town of Washington was the result of a legislative gift of 1,000 acres of land for such an institution in all the counties of the State.

In 1798 the State incorporated in its constitution the following provision:

"The arts and sciences shall be promoted in one or more seminaries of learning; and the legislature shall, as soon as conveniently may be, give such further donations and privileges to those already established as may be necessary to secure the objects of their institution; and it shall be the duty of the general assembly, at their next session, to provide effectual measures for the improvement and permanent security of the funds and endowment of such institutions."

In Georgia, as in Pennsylvania, the experiment was attempted of establishing a scheme of education for the children of the white poor. It failed, as it was foreordained to failure, by the very conditions of American society in every Southern State. Meanwhile the well-to-do people of the better sort, in conformity with the original English method adopted in the Southern States, educated their children in private or denominational seminaries, which, with all their deficiencies, did furnish a fair amount of education and largely contributed to that reputation for industrial enterprise and executive ability which long ago gave to Georgia the proud title, "Empire State of the South."

KENTUCKY.

Beyond the mountains old Virginia had already entered upon that wonderful career of colonization which has made her not only the "Mother of Presidents" but the fruitful mother of States. The western territory, now the great State of Kentucky, was occupied as early as 1775 by a movement of vigorous and adventurons people, largely from the southwestern portion of Virginia. During the war of the Revolution the new territory was the headquarters of the military operations by which the British power that still guarded the back door of the future Republic, the entire country from the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, was held at bay, crippled, and finally destroyed, while Washington, commanding the soldiery of the castern provinces, was defending the great front door of the new America, facing the nations of the world.

But at the close of the war a further immigration of men of large native ability, with an appreciation of the value of popular education far above the average eastern Virginia planter, brought forward the subject of public instruction. Private schools had already been established by the early settlers, and schools whose reputation has survived to the present day were founded by private associations, societies, and the different churches.

But in 1780 the legislature, under the lead of Col. John Todd, appropriated certain lands in Kentucky, confiscated from British subjects, as a foundation for a university in that territory. Twenty thousand acres were thus appropriated and released from public taxation. The teachers in the school were exempted from military duty. The board of trustees included many of the foremost men of the coming Commonwealth. The preamble of the law of Virginia founding the Transylvania Seminary reads thus:

"It is to the interest of the Commonwealth always to encourage and promote every design which may tend to the improvement of the mind and the diffusion of useful knowledge, even among the most remote citizens, where situation in a barbarous neighborhood and a savage intercourse might otherwise render them unfriendly to science."

Under this leadership an academy was established in Lincoln County in 1785, with James Mitchell as principal, at a yearly salary of $100. In 1789 the school was removed to Lexington, and in 1793 was furnished with grounds and a two-story brick building by local subscription. Thus was established the famous Transylvania University, at which through the early years of Kentucky many of the most

celebrated men of the State were educated, and which, after a stormy history of a hundred years, seems at last fully established as a flourishing institution of the higher order under the auspices of the Christian denomination.

There is no recognition of education in the early constitution of Kentucky, and although the State continued to donate generous gifts of land and money to institutions of learning, and schools for elementary instruction were established by churches and private enterprise, it was many years before the common-school idea of Jefferson had scaled the great mountain barrier that separated the original thirteen States from the new Southwest, which, together with Tennessee and Kentucky, now has spread itself toward the far-off shores of the Pacific Ocean.

MARYLAND AND SOUTH CAROLINA.

The States of Maryland and South Carolina, during the memorable twenty-five years that followed the breaking out of the war of Independence, made no demon stration in behalf of universal education that demands attention in this connection. In the year 1800 Maryland had a white population of 247,000 and 125,000 negroes; total, 372,000. South Carolina contained 196,000 white and 150,000 colored people; total, 316,000. Neither of these States placed in its earlier constitutions, both formed in 1776, any recognition of education. Indeed, it was not till the close of the civil war, 1864, that the present elaborate provision was made a part of the fundamental law of Maryland, under which a system of public instruction for both races has been maintained for nearly thirty years.

But indirectly both these States deserve "honorable mention" in the great struggle in the Continental and Confederation Congress that ended with the cession of the entire north west, between the present landmarks of West Virginia and the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, first to the Congress representing the thirteen confederated States and afterwards to the National Government, and in the subsequent dedication of a vast public domain to the education of the whole people west of the Alleghenies.

In the year 1777, at the darkest period of the struggle for Independence, on the proposal of a clause in the Articles of Confederation providing that the cost of the war should be defrayed out of "a common treasury supplied by the several States," the State of Maryland introduced a proposition fraught with the most far-reaching consequences not only to the general welfare but to the establishment of the American common school as the permanent system of universal education for the future Republic. This proposition reads as follows: "The United States in Congress assembled shall have the sole and exclusive right and power to ascertain and fix the western boundary of such States as claimed to the Mississippi or South Sea, and lay out the land beyond the boundary so ascertained into separate and independent States, from time to time, as the numbers and circumstances of the people thereof may require." Even before this, at the Albany Congress in 1754, the original movement for colonial unity, called and greatly influenced by Benjamin Franklin, the same idea had taken form in a proposition that the boundaries of all the present colonies should terminate at the Appalachian Mountains, and the vast wilderness beyond should be open to settlement by "colonies of His Majesty's Protestant subjects."

But to the State of Maryland, which had no personal claim to this unoccupied territory, belongs the honor of presenting this issue in the above-mentioned proposition at the formation of the Confederation, and of standing by it, as the sole condition of her entrance into this league, until by other methods than she proposed, but with even more efficacy, the United States came in absolute possession of the "old Northwest," including the great States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and a portion of Minnesota.

It is not essential to this essay to trace this long and deeply interesting discussion in Congress which, after eight years, resulted in the famous land ordinance of 1785. The most complete account of this is found in the valuable history of the "Old