While this law marked one more step in advance, it was hampered by several of the features that in various states continually delayed the establishment of common schools at public expense. In the first place, it was based on the conception of public education as poor relief, rather than universal training for citizenship. It was often viewed with hostility or indifference by the wealthy, who felt that they were paying for that from which they received no benefit, and with pride and scorn by the poor, who refused to be considered objects of charity. Moreover, the sum distributed ($45,000) was totally inadequate for over one hundred thousand children, and every variety of school, private as well as public, was subsidized without distinction. The system lacked a strong central organization, and the commissioners, often appointed by the county judges from the classes most opposed to the arrangement, were notoriously inefficient. The teachers also were generally incompetent, as it was practically impossible to persuade college or academy graduates to undertake the instruction of the poor. Nevertheless, under this apology for a people’s common school, the state went on for a score of years, and there was a steady growth in the literary fund, the appropriations, the length of the school term, and the number of pupils who were willing to take advantage of such opportunities as it afforded. State officials of wide vision, moreover, sought in every way to improve the teaching corps and the defective administration. While the great majority of the school children still attended the denominational, private, and ‘field’ schools (see p. 253), this system of subsidies was educating public opinion for something better. By the close of the first half century of statehood, while Virginia was not yet ready to establish a complete system of public education, we shall later (see pp. 327f.) find that the ground had been prepared for the development of common schools that was spreading throughout the country. [Sidenote: Maryland,] [Sidenote: South Carolina,] [Sidenote: Georgia,] [Sidenote: North Carolina,]