The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 1 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and PrivateJefferson, Thomas
History
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 1 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private
Jefferson, Thomas
United States -- Politics and government -- 1775-1783; United States -- Politics and government -- 1783-1865
The acts of Assembly concerning the College of William and Mary,
were properly within Mr. Pendleton's portion of our work; but these
related chiefly to its revenue, while its constitution, organization
and scope of science, were derived from its charter. We thought that
on this subject, a systematical plan of general education should be
proposed, and I was requested to undertake it. I accordingly prepared
three bills for the Revisal, proposing three distinct grades of
education, reaching all classes. 1st. Elementary schools, for all
children generally, rich and poor. 2d. Colleges, for a middle degree
of instruction, calculated for the common purposes of life, and such
as would be desirable for all who were in easy circumstances. And, 3d,
an ultimate grade for teaching the sciences generally, and in their
highest degree. The first bill proposed to lay off every county into
Hundreds, or Wards, of a proper size and population for a school, in
which reading, writing, and common arithmetic should be taught; and
that the whole State should be divided into twenty-four districts,
in each of which should be a school for classical learning, grammar,
geography, and the higher branches of numerical arithmetic. The second
bill proposed to amend the constitution of William and Mary college,
to enlarge its sphere of science, and to make it in fact a University.
The third was for the establishment of a library. These bills were not
acted on until the same year, '96, and then only so much of the first
as provided for elementary schools. The College of William and Mary
was an establishment purely of the Church of England; the Visitors
were required to be all of that Church; the Professors to subscribe
its thirty-nine Articles; its Students to learn its Catechism; and one
of its fundamental objects was declared to be, to raise up Ministers
for that church. The religious jealousies, therefore, of all the
dissenters, took alarm lest this might give an ascendancy to the
Anglican sect, and refused acting on that bill. Its local eccentricity,
too, and unhealthy autumnal climate, lessened the general inclination
towards it. And in the Elementary bill, they inserted a provision which
completely defeated it; for they left it to the court of each county to
determine for itself, when this act should be carried into execution,
within their county. One provision of the bill was, that the expenses
of these schools should be borne by the inhabitants of the county,
every one in proportion to his general tax rate. This would throw on
wealth the education of the poor; and the justices, being generally
of the more wealthy class, were unwilling to incur that burden, and
I believe it was not suffered to commence in a single county. I shall
recur again to this subject, towards the close of my story, if I should
have life and resolution enough to reach that term; for I am already
tired of talking about myself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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