Mrs. Dorsey has a formula of subservience which she is accustomed to repeat to her teachers and subordinates: “We must please the business men, otherwise they will not vote the bonds to keep our schools going.” That she has grounds for her fears was shown by the statement of Mr. Edwards, self-appointed financial boss of the school board. The teachers and the public were demanding a fifteen-million-dollar bond issue for new schools; but when the proposition came before the board, it had been changed to nine millions, and Mr. Edwards’ explanation was simple: the heads of the Chamber of Commerce had drawn a line through the fifteen and made it nine! “That’s what we’ll vote just now,” they said; and as a result of those strokes of the pencil, sixty thousand children are now condemned to part-time instruction! If you think this a matter of small importance, let me tell you of one teacher who had a class of incorrigible children. Out of nineteen boys, seventeen confessed to her that they had burglarized houses or stores. The ages of these boys were from thirteen to sixteen, and in the majority of cases their mothers had been compelled by poverty to go to work outside the home. The boys would take the money they stole and go to beach resorts, and spend it all in one night. These boys had had three years of half-day school sessions, and told the teacher that they had started their careers of crime while turned out on the streets instead of being in school. As I finish this book, Mrs. Dorsey issues a bulletin, informing all teachers that the schools are to celebrate a “Chamber of Commerce Week.” It is solemnly ordered that “children of the first five grades write to their father or guardian a letter on some phase of the work of the local Chamber of Commerce, or on the benefits to the city of the activities of that organization”; and teachers of all other grades shall “use the functions, activities, or achievements of the local Chamber of Commerce as suggestions for themes and orations. Pamphlets dealing with the activities of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce will be placed in the mail-boxes. The co-operation of principals and teachers is urged.”