The Common School falls naturally into the same category. Like the others, it must open to all, or its designation is a misnomer and a mockery. It is not a school for whites, or a school for blacks, but a school for all,--in other words, a common school. Much is implied in this term, according to which the school harmonizes with the other institutions already mentioned. It is an inn where children rest on the road to knowledge. It is a public conveyance where children are passengers. It is a theatre where children resort for enduring recreation. Like the others, it assumes to provide for the public; therefore it must be open to all: nor can there be any exclusion, except on grounds equally applicable to the inn, the public conveyance, and the theatre. But the common school has a higher character. Its object is the education of the young; and it is sustained by taxation, to which all contribute. Not only does it hold itself out to the public by its name and its harmony with the other institutions, but it assumes the place of parent to all children within its locality, bound always to exercise a parent’s watchful care and tenderness, which can know no distinction of child. It is easy to see that the separate school, founded on an odious discrimination, and sometimes offered as an equivalent for the common school, is an ill-disguised violation of the principle of Equality, while as a pretended equivalent it is an utter failure, and instead of a parent is only a churlish step-mother. A slight illustration will show how it fails; and here I mention an incident occurring in Washington, but which must repeat itself often on a larger scale, wherever separation is attempted. Colored children, living near what is called the common school, are driven from its doors, and compelled to walk a considerable distance--often troublesome, and in certain conditions of the weather difficult--to attend the separate school. One of these children has suffered from this exposure, and I have myself witnessed the emotion of the parent. This could not have occurred, had the child been received at the common school in the neighborhood. Now it is idle to assert that children compelled to this exceptional journey to and fro are in the enjoyment of Equal Rights. The superadded pedestrianism and its attendant discomfort furnish the measure of Inequality in one of its forms, increased by the weakness or ill-health of the child. What must be the feelings of a colored father or mother daily witnessing this sacrifice to the demon of Caste? This is an illustration merely, but it shows precisely how impossible it is for a separate school to be the equivalent of the common school. And yet it only touches the evil, without exhibiting its proportions. The indignity offered to the colored child is worse than any compulsory exposure; and here not only the child suffers, but the race to which he belongs is degraded, and the whole community is hardened in wrong.