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Show 104 DESPOTISM f habit the power of prejupected. Such is the force _o of i 'norance that these dice, the invli~Clbie st~:;~~ty crccrving the real CatlSC people seem mcapab . P'l'hey arc apparently as of their own degradatiOn. nd arc as ardent in its much attached to sla;~~!ra~ic party, thus regarding support ~s IS the an renee those very mstltuwith a blmd and fa1tal r~~ethe dust. 'l'hc influence, tions wluch crush t 1Cm t com osed of men, poor, however' ?f such a nSafe!o'cious, ~nd headed by ~orne degraded, Igno_r~nt a he aristocracy, may at umes, desperate Catiiimed.of tt ous not to the southern states rove extreme y tsas r . ' ~lone, but to the whole unwn. SECTION V. Education in the Slave-holding States. rovide for all its citizens That the state ough\to p .. mary education which the means of at least t '"~f~~adin and writing, has consists m the kn~wl~dge . m geuer~lly acted upon III come to be a pohtiCa. maxi E en such despotic gov· all civilized commnnitid. Pru:sia have admitted this ernments as Austn~ an . heir olitical code j and most important artiCle mt~ td by ~hose governments rimary instructwn IS provi ~ nse This shows for all the people at the J'Ub!IC ofx~e uality has lately the progress which the Ide d .q most essential d . for equality of knowle ge IS a ma e' d . I equahty f part of political an socm . the ~outhern states o The despotisms cxistmglu~st wholly regardless of the Alnerican Umo~l: are d m of general cducatwn. this important pohllcal uty far as regarus the un· VVe have already seen that so. . rt any instructJon privileged class, the a~c_mpt ~~n~~:~l~~Cd a duty, is de~ to them, so far from ewg IN Al\lEitiCA, 105 nounccd as a crime. There arc also obvious reasons why no general public provision for the edncation of the privileged class has ever been establ ished. rrhc privileged class consists, as we have seen, of an oligarchy of rich planters, and a comparatively large body of persons with little or no property. The rich planters know the value of cduca tJOn , and thmr wealth enables them to secure it for their own children by the employment of private tutors, or by sending them to schools and colleges at the North. The poor whites, bred up in ignorance, have no adequate idea of the value of knowledge, or of the importance of its diffusion. The rich planters have no inclination to tax themselves for the benefit of their poor neighbors. Their wealth education and influence, enables them to control th~ legislation of their respective states; and perhaps they imagine that they shall best secure their own importance and political power, by keepmg the mass of the free population in ignorance. The same stroke of policy which they play off against their slaves, they play off also against their poorer fellow citizens. What has been done in a public way for the advancement of education in the southern states, has consisted almost entirely in the establishment of colleges,- institutions of but little use to the m~ss of the population, and which are almost exclusively frequented by the sons of the rich planters. For thiS purpose money has been liberally appropriated. It is true that in Virginia, South Carolina, and per4 haps in some other of the slave-holding states, a trifling sum is annually appropriated expressly for the education of poor children. But the very form of this appropriation, which extorts from those who wish to avail themselves of it, a humiliating confession of poverty, is an insult to those for whose benefit it is intended. That aid which might be justly demanded as a right, is made to assume the character of a charity. Besides, the amount of these appropriations is so small, and their management is so miserable, that little or no benefit results. |
