Slavery -- United States; United States -- Politics and government -- 1849-1853
dedication of a schoolhouse in the country, some speaker congratulated
the audience because the governor of the commonwealth had come down
from the executive chair to honor the occasion. “No,” said he, “I have
come up to the occasion to be honored by it.” Within the last year,
$200,000 have been given by individuals to Harvard College. Within a
little longer time than this, the other two colleges in the state have
received, together, a still larger endowment from individuals or the
state.
These measures are part of a great system which we are carrying on for
the elevation of the race. Last year, the voters of Massachusetts, in
their respective towns, voluntarily taxed themselves about a million
of dollars for the support of Common Schools. We have an old law on
the statute book, requiring towns to tax themselves for the support
of public schools; but the people have long since lost sight of this
law in the munificence of their contributions. Massachusetts is now
erecting a reform school for vagrant and exposed children,--so many
of whom come to us from abroad,--which will cost the state more than
a hundred thousand dollars. An unknown individual has given twenty
thousand dollars towards it. We educate all our deaf and dumb and
blind. An appropriation was made by the last legislature to establish
a school for idiots, in imitation of those beautiful institutions
in Paris, in Switzerland, and in Berlin, where the most revolting
and malicious of this deplorable class are tamed into docility, made
lovers of order and neatness, and capable of performing many valuable
services. The future teacher of this school is now abroad, preparing
himself for his work. A few years ago, Mr. Everett, the present
president of Harvard College, then governor of the commonwealth,
spoke the deep _convictions_ of Massachusetts people, when, in a
public address on education, he exhorted the fathers and mothers
of Massachusetts in the following words: “Save,” said he, “save,
spare, scrape, stint, starve, do any thing but steal,” to educate
your children. And Doctor Howe, the noble-hearted director of the
Institution for the Blind, lately uttered the deepest _sentiments_ of
our citizens, when, in speaking of our duties to the blind, the deaf
and dumb, and the idiotic, he said, “The sight of any human being left
to brutish ignorance is always demoralizing to the beholders. There
floats not upon the stream of life a wreck of humanity so utterly
shattered and crippled, but that its signals of distress should
challenge attention and command assistance.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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