The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861 Part 28

Ardent antislavery men believed that this segregation in the schools was undemocratic. They a.s.serted that the colored people would never have made such a request had the teachers of the public schools taken the proper interest in them. The Negroes, too, had long since been convinced that the white people would not maintain separate schools with the same equipment which they gave their own. This arrangement, however, continued until 1868. The legislature then pa.s.sed an act declaring that the schools of the State should be open to all persons alike between the ages of four and sixteen, and that no person should be denied instruction in any public school in his school district on account of race or color.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Public Acts of the General a.s.sembly of Conn_., 1868, p.

296.]

In the State of Ma.s.sachusetts the contest was most ardent. Boston opened its first primary school for colored children in 1820. In other towns like Salem and Nantucket, New Bedford and Lowell, where the colored population was also considerable, the same policy was carried out.[1] Some years later, however, both the Negroes and their friends saw the error of their early advocacy of the establishment of special schools to escape the stigma of receiving charity. After the change in the att.i.tude toward the public free schools and the further development of caste in American education, there arose in Ma.s.sachusetts a struggle between leaders determined to restrict the Negroes' privileges to the use of poorly equipped separate schools and those contending for equality in education.

[Footnote 1: _Minority Report_, etc., p. 35.]

Basing their action on the equality of men before the law, the advocates of democratic education held meetings from which went frequent and urgent pet.i.tions to school committees until Negroes were accepted in the public schools in all towns in Ma.s.sachusetts except Boston.[1] Children of African blood were successfully admitted to the New Bedford schools on equality with the white youth in 1838.[2] In 1846 the school committee of that town reported that the colored pupils were regular in their attendance, and as successful in their work as the whites. There were then ninety in all in that system; four in the high school, forty in grammar schools, and the remainder in the primary department, all being scattered in such a way as to have one to four in twenty-one to twenty-eight schools. At Lowell the children of a colored family were not only among the best in the schools but the greatest favorites in the system.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., p. 20, and _Niles Register_, vol. lxvi., p.

320.]

[Footnote 2: _Minority Report_, etc., p. 23.]

[Footnote 3: _Minority Report_, etc., p. 25.]

The consolidation of the colored school of Salem with the others of that city led to no disturbance. Speaking of the democracy of these schools in 1846 Mr. Richard Fletcher said: "The principle of perfect equality is the vital principle of the system. Here all cla.s.ses of the community mingle together. The rich and the poor meet on terms of equality and are prepared by the same instruction to discharge the duties of life. It is the principle of equality cherished in the free schools on which our government and free inst.i.tutions rest. Destroy this principle in the schools and the people would soon cease to be free." At Nantucket, however, some trouble was experienced because of the admission of pupils of color in 1843. Certain patrons criticized the action adversely and withdrew fourteen of their children from the South Grammar School. The system, however, prospered thereafter rather than declined.[1] Many had no trouble in making the change.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., p. 6.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., p. 23.]

These victories having been won in other towns of the State by 1846, it soon became evident that Boston would have to yield. Not only were abolitionists pointing to the ease with which this gain had been made in other towns, but were directing attention to the fact that in these smaller communities Negroes were both learning the fundamentals and advancing through the lower grades into the high school. Boston, which had a larger black population than all other towns in Ma.s.sachusetts combined, had never seen a colored pupil prepared for a secondary inst.i.tution in one of its public schools. It was, therefore, evident to fair-minded persons that in cities of separate systems Negroes would derive practically no benefit from the school tax which they paid.

This agitation for the abolition of caste in the public schools a.s.sumed its most violent form in Boston during the forties. The abolitionists then organized a more strenuous opposition to the caste system. Why Sarah Redmond and the other children of a family paying tax to support the schools of Boston should be turned away from a public school simply because they were persons of color was a problem too difficult for a fair-minded man.[1] The war of words came, however, when in response to a pet.i.tion of Edmund Jackson, H.J.

Bowditch, and other citizens for the admission of colored people to the public schools in 1844, the majority of the school committee refused the request. Following the opinion of Chandler, their solicitor, they based their action of making distinction in the public schools on the natural distinction of the races, which "no legislature, no social customs, can efface," and which "renders a promiscuous intermingling in the public schools disadvantageous both to them and to the whites."[2] Questioned as to any positive law providing for such discrimination, Chandler gave his opinion that the School Committee of Boston, under the authority perhaps of the City Council, had a legal right to establish and maintain special primary schools for the blacks. He believed, too, that in the exercise of their lawful discretionary power they could exclude white pupils from certain schools and colored pupils from certain other schools when, in their judgment, the best interests of all would thereby be promoted.[3]

[Footnote 1: Wigham, _The Antislavery Cause in America_, p. 103.]

[Footnote 2: _Minority Report_, etc., p. 31.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., p. 30.]

Encouraged by the fact that colored children were indiscriminately admitted to the schools of Salem, Nantucket, New Bedford, and Lowell, in fact, of every city in Ma.s.sachusetts but Boston, the friends of the colored people fearlessly attacked the false legal theories of Solicitor Chandler. The minority of the School Committee argued that schools are the common property of all, and that each and all are legally ent.i.tled without "let or hindrance" to the equal benefits of all advantages they might confer.[1] Any action, therefore, which tended to restrict to any individual or cla.s.s the advantages and benefits designed for all, was an illegal use of authority, and an arbitrary act used for pernicious purposes.[2] Their republican system, the minority believed, conferred civil equality and legal rights upon every citizen, knew neither privileged nor degraded cla.s.ses, made no distinctions, and created no differences between rich and poor, learned and ignorant, or white and black, but extended to all alike its protection and benefits.[3] The minority considered it a merit of the school system that it produced the fusion of all cla.s.ses, promoted the feeling of brotherhood, and the habits of equality. The power of the School Committee, therefore, was limited and constrained by the general spirit of the civil policy and by the letter and spirit of the laws which regulated the system.[4] It was further maintained that to debar the colored youth from these advantages, even if they were a.s.sured the same external results, would be a sore injustice and would serve as the surest means of perpetuating a prejudice which should be deprecated and discountenanced by all intelligent and Christian men.[5]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., p. 3.]

[Footnote 2: _Minority Report_, etc. pp. 4 and 5.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., pp. 3 _et. seq_.]

[Footnote 4: _Ibid_., p. 4.]

[Footnote 5: _Ibid_., p. 5.]

To the sophistry of Chandler, Wendell Phillips also made a logical reply. He a.s.serted that as members of a legal body, the School Committee should have eyes only for such distinctions among their fellow-citizens as the law recognized and pointed out. Phillips believed that they had precedents for the difference of age and s.e.x, for regulation of health, etc., but that when they opened their eyes to the varied complexion, to difference of race, to diversity of creed, to distinctions of caste, they would seek in vain through the laws and inst.i.tutions of Ma.s.sachusetts for any recognition of their prejudice. He deplored the fact that they had attempted to foist into the legal arrangements of the land a principle utterly repugnant to the State const.i.tution, and that what the sovereignty of the const.i.tution dared not attempt a school committee accomplished. To Phillips it seemed cra.s.sly inconsistent to say that races permitted to intermarry should be debarred by Mr. Chandler's "sapient committee"

from educational contact.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Minority Report_, etc., p. 27.]

This agitation continued until 1855 when the opposition had grown too strong to be longer resisted. The legislature of Ma.s.sachusetts then enacted a law providing that in determining the qualifications of a scholar to be admitted to any public school no distinction should be made on account of the race, color, or religious opinion of the applicant. It was further provided that a child excluded from school for any of these reasons might bring suit for damages against the offending town.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Acts and Resolves of the General Court of Ma.s.s_., 1855, ch. 256.]

In other towns of New England, where the black population was considerable, separate schools were established. There was one even in Portland, Maine.[1] Efforts in this direction were made in Vermont and New Hampshire, but because of the scarcity of the colored people these States did not have to resort to such segregation. The Const.i.tution of Vermont was interpreted as extending to Negroes the benefits of the Bill of Rights, making all men free and equal. Persons of color, therefore, were regarded as men ent.i.tled to all the privileges of freemen, among which was that of education at the expense of the State.[2] The framers of the Const.i.tution of New Hampshire were equally liberal in securing this right to the dark race.[3] But when the princ.i.p.al of an academy at Canaan admitted some Negroes to his private inst.i.tution, a mob, as we have observed above, broke up the inst.i.tution by moving the building to a swamp, while the officials of the town offered no resistance. Such a spirit as this accounts for the rise of separate schools in places where the free blacks had the right to attend any inst.i.tution of learning supported by the State.

[Footnote 1: Adams, _Anti-slavery_, etc., p. 142.]

[Footnote 2: Thorpe, _Federal and State Const.i.tutions_, vol. vi., p.

3762.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., vol. iv., p. 2471.]

The problem of educating the Negroes at public expense was perplexing also to the minds of the people of the West. The question became more and more important in Ohio as the black population in that commonwealth increased. The law of 1825 provided that moneys raised from taxation of half a mill on the dollar should be appropriated to the support of common schools in the respective counties and that these schools should be "open to the youth of every cla.s.s and grade without distinction."[1] Some interpreted this law to include Negroes.

To overcome the objection to the partiality shown by school officials the State pa.s.sed another law in 1829. It excluded colored people from the benefits of the new system, and returned them the amount accruing from the school tax on their property.[2] Thereafter benevolent societies and private a.s.sociations maintained colored schools in Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland, and the southern counties of Ohio.[3]

But no help came from the cities and the State before 1849 when the legislature pa.s.sed a law authorizing the establishment of schools for children of color at public expense.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Laws of Ohio_, vol. xxiii., pp. 37 _et seq_.]

[Footnote 2: Hickok, _The Negro in Ohio_, p. 85.]

[Footnote 3: Simmons, _Men of Mark_, p. 374.]

[Footnote 4: _Laws of Ohio_, vol. liii., pp. 117-118.]

The Negroes of Cincinnati soon discovered that they had not won a great victory. They proceeded at once to elect trustees, organized a system, and employed teachers, relying on the money allotted them by the law on the basis of a per capita division of the school fund received by the Board of Education of Cincinnati. So great was the prejudice that the school officials refused to turn over the required funds on the grounds that the colored trustees were not electors, and therefore could not be office holders qualified to receive and disburse public funds.[1] Under the leadership of John I. Gaines the trustees called indignation meetings, and raised sufficient money to employ Flamen Ball, an attorney, to secure a writ of mandamus. The case was contested by the city officials even in the Supreme Court of the State which decided against the officious whites.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed_., 1871, pp. 371, 372.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., 1871, p. 372.]

Unfortunately it turned out that this decision did not mean very much to the Negroes. There were not many of them in certain settlements and the per capita division of the fund did not secure to them sufficient means to support schools. Even if the funds had been adequate to pay teachers, they had no schoolhouses. Lawyers of that day contended that the Act of 1849 had nothing to do with the construction of buildings.

After a short period of accomplishing practically nothing material, the law was amended so as to transfer the control of such colored schools to the managers of the white system.[1] This was taken as a reflection on the standing of the blacks of the city and tended to make them refuse to cooperate with the white board. On account of the failure of this body to act effectively prior to 1856, the people of color were again given power to elect their own trustees.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Laws of the State of Ohio_, vol. liii., p. 118.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., p. 118.]

During the contest for the control of the colored schools certain Negroes of Cincinnati were endeavoring to make good their claim that their children had a right to attend any school maintained by the city. Acting upon this contention a colored patron sent his son to a public school, which on account of his presence became the center of unusual excitement.[1] Miss Isabella Newhall, the teacher to whom he went, immediately complained to the Board of Education, requesting that he be expelled on account of his race. After "due deliberation"

the Board of Education decided by a vote of fifteen to ten that he would have to withdraw from that school. Thereupon two members of that body, residing in the district of the timorous teacher, resigned.[2]

[Footnote 1: New York _Tribune_, Feb. 19, 1855.]

[Footnote 2: New York _Tribune_, Feb. 19, 1855; and Carlier, _L'Esclavage_, etc., p. 339.]

Thereafter some progress in the development of separate schools in Cincinnati was noted. By 1855 the Board of Education of that city had established four public schools for the instruction of Negro youths.