Every child born in this great republic is born with the inherent right to be educated. He is born heir to that popular sovereignty which, upon coming of age, he is entitled to exercise. The coming responsibilities rest upon him from his very cradle up. He has an absolute right to such an education as will enable him to properly meet them. His parents who brought him into the world weighted with such responsibility, did it with the implied obligation on their part to give him that education without which his birth would be either a mockery or a crime. As with the parents, so with the state-local, and so with the state-national. If the parents fail in meeting this obligation it becomes a binding obligation upon the state-local, and if the state-local fails the obligation devolves upon the nation. Again, the obligation of every parent in this republic to educate his children so as to enable them in due time to intelligently and wisely exercise the great power of the franchise, implies the obligation on his part to give them, up to that point, _equal_ educational advantages. By a parity of reasoning it logically follows that in case of failure by parent or state-local—whether from inability or other cause—the obligation to secure to all children within its domain not only facilities, but equal facilities, for the attainment of a sufficient education to enable them to cast an intelligent ballot, rests upon the nation. Nor does this obligation cease when such equal facilities are provided. It goes further. It extends, if necessary, to the compulsion of those children to avail themselves of the facilities which the nation provides for their education. That it is the right, then, of every American child to have a rudimentary education, and that it should be equal to that of every other American child, seems clear; and that where, through any cause, that child fails to get such education, it is the duty of the national government to enable him to gain it, seems equally manifest. To what extent, and from what resources, the nation should grant this educational aid to its children, and through what channels and upon what basis the distribution of that aid should be made, are subjects that will now command our attention.