Bureau of Bsuestion 


TheAmericain 
‘ TEACHER 


DECEMBER, 1917 


Strengst Verboten! ©. a a2 


Se Fe 


Manufacturing Americans 


The Soul of the Autocrat 





“A Thing or Two” 


Democracy in Education 
Education for Democracy 





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The American 


Teacher 


Extracts from “Rainbow Promises of Progress 
in Education” 


QUESTIONS OF FUNDAMENTAL 
AND GROWING CONSEQUENCE 
TO AMERICAN EDUCATION 

1. Is freedom of thought, of ques- 
tion, of speech, and of written discus- 
sion growing stronger or weaker in 
American education? 

2. Is educational journalism foster- 
ing untrammeled discussion and the 
spirit of research and experimentation? 

~ * * * 


dations and, national committees, and 
interlocking expectations of educators, 
have brought about a condition where 
freedom of thought, of question, of 
speech and of written discussion has 
been growing weaker and not stronger 
in American education. 

2. It is all a school superintendent’s 
life-to-come is worth for him to come 
out in the open and to criticize, or even 

to fail to apostro- 








WHY IS THE 
PRESENT 
STATE OF ED- 
UCATION MIS- 
CHARA C- 
TERIZED? 


1. Because 
prepare d- 
ness against un- 
favorable criti- 
cism is not yet a 
cardinal principle 
among educators: 
sufficient unto 
each day is the 
evil thereof; in- 
stead of removing 
false impressions 


Editorials 


A Thing or Two 








eee 


CONTENTS 


Manufacturing Americans 


The Soul of the Autocrat 
The Facts in the Case 
The Past’s Impression 
Another Interpretation 
The Teacher and Society 
Educational Bigotry 


A Lesson in Grammar 


phize, a small 
handful of politi- 
cal leaders who 
are quite as not- 
able for educa- 
tional marking 
time and falling 
back as for lead- 
ing. 

3. The other 
side of this is that 
the man who un- 
questionably ac- 
cepts, or silently 
acquiesces, Tre- 
ceives promotion 
and advertise- 
ment. 

4. This is not 














before they have 

taken root too many school men wait 
until misleading impressions become an 
active local menace. 

2. Because few more hazardous occu- 
pations exist in the educational field 
than that of openly criticizing or ques- 
tioning the great foundations or Colum- 
bia University and its Teachers College, 
or others well known in school circles. 

+ * ok *~ * * 
IS AMERICAN EDUCATION 
DEMOCRATIC? 


1. Interlocking directorates of foun- 


news to the edu- 
cational world: the only new thing 
about it is the saying it out loud. 

5. Faculty imposed restrictions and 
self-seeking sycophancy are doing more 
to strangle academic freedom than are 
school and college trustees. 

6. The world safe for democracy of 
which we are all talking ‘in 1917, will 
never exist until there is democracy in 
education: democracy of motive; de- 
mocracy of opportunity; democracy of 
recognition; democracy of discussion, 
and democracy of organization. 





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The American Teacher 








Vol. VI., No. 9 


DECEMBER, 1917 


One Dollar a Year 








Seeking Origins 


OU will have observed that we dis- 
y tinguish between the formal, me- 
chanical thinkers on the one hand, 
and the organic, vital thinkers on the other. 
That we got the notion of those who told us 
that the letter killeth, whereas the spirit 
giveth life. Now nothing separates these 
two types of thinkers more sharply than 
their reaction to social disturbances. The 
machine brain seeks at once to find out 
“Who started it?” Those who see below the 
surface seek the cause of dissatisfaction. 
There are some people who will never learn 
that strikes and revolutions do not originate 
in the minds of agitators ; that they originate 
in the hearts of outraged multitudes. 


Strengst Verboten! 


EN and women nurtured in the stim- 

M ulating atmosphere of democratic 
institutions find this ubiquitous 
inhibitory warning of Prussia extremely ir- 
ritating. It is one of the postulates of our 
civilization that restriction of conduct should 
be avoided so far as possible, and should be 
required only in the interests of the general 
welfare, rather than for the convenience of 
the governing class. So many of the prohi- 
bitions of autocratic countries seem to us 
arbitrary and ill-considered, that we are 
prone to reject prohibition as a principle of 
government even where it may be desirable. 
The sinister effects of the peaceful penetra- 
tion of Prussian Kultur are beginning to 
show themselves in all directions. One of 
the latest and most dangerous manifestations 
of this pernicious principle is the attempt of 
men in authority to prohibit thinking. The 
medieval doctrine that research leads to error 


is being rehabilitated ostensibly for the se- 
curity of the nation, since it has become the 
fashion to proclaim devotion to the body pol- 
itic; but it is in reality an attempt to shield 
incompetence in high places from the aroused 
intelligence of the hitherto submerged. 

Those who are interested in forbidding 
thought are shrewd enough to understand 
the dangers that lurk in the thinking of the 
masses. They are not shrewd enough, how- 
ever, to understand that thought will not be 
suppressed by prohibitions, or even by ad- 
ministrative penalties. 


On Being Human 


N the November number (page 128) we 
| reprinted part of a statement issued by 
seven of the eight associate superin- 
tendents of New York City, protesting 
against a letter sent by City Superintendent 
Maxwell to the president of the board and 
to the governor. This document is remark- 
able in several ways and we wish we could 
analyze its assertions and its implications 
more fully. But the country is at war and 
other pressing matters oblige us to give this 
but a passing note. 

Thruout the statement runs a murmur 
of outraged susceptibilitiés. The superin- 
tendents who protest against their chairman 
publishing matters without consulting them 
are the same superintendents, however, as 
on other occasions take radical steps in the 
way of publicity, in the way of administra- 
tive changes, in the way of modifying pol- 
icies, without ever thinking of consulting 
their “subordinate” colleagues — namely, 
the teachers. 

They dare to protest against the action of 
the chief, but shield themselves behind the 
claim that silence and acquiescence on their 


147 





148 


part would be “ detrimental to the cause of 
education.” Yet these same superintendents 
deny to others the right to protest and to 
criticize, assuming that they alone have at 
heart the cause of education. 

They protest against the chief’s “loose con- 
demnations ” on numerous occasions; they 
do not themselves, however, adopt a raiment 
of sackcloth as penance for their own “ loose 
condemnations ” of teachers and other sub- 
ordinates. 


They declare that they have always sup- 
ported their chief whenever they thought he 
was right! And when they fail to get the 
support of their subordinates, they readily 
assume that the latter are merely perverse. 

When we all awaken to the fact that teach- 
ers and superintendents are as human as 
pupils and principals, we shall perhaps look 
about for a human basis of mutual respect 
and cooperation. Until such time, let autoc- 
racy do her damndest, for she is doomed. 


Abuse of the Flag 


T a meeting held by the Teachers 
A Union on Friday, November 16, to 
consider action on the official discip- 

lining of nine teachers, it was somewhat 
picturesquely stated by one of those who had 
been subjected to the grilling process of the 
“inquisition ” that the educational author- 
ities were “attempting under cover of the 


flag to stab to death the movement for democ- 
racy in education that has been established 
by the Teachers Union.” This may not be 


quite accurate, for the educational author- 
ities have never manifested any particular 
antagonism toward the Teachers Union. But 
it is probably true that after the authorities 
became deeply involved in the inquiry they 
saw a convenient opportunity to suggest to 
the minds of recalcitrant teachers the coup- 
ling of the idea of loyalty to the flag with 
the idea of loyalty to the educational author- 
ities. It is illegal to use the flag for adver- 
tising purposes; it should be considered at 
least improper to use it as camouflage!— 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


On Being Superior 
HILDREN do not understand. We 

older people, with our experience, 

with our maturity—we understand. 

To the extent that we understand we make 
such adjustments as our mutual relations 
demand. We do not ask the children to un- 
derstand, to make concessions for our idio- 
syncrasies, for our absent-mindedness, for 
our old-fashioned ways, for our queer little 
habits, for our temper or for our manner- 
isms. 

No, being older and wiser, we take into 
account the shortcomings and the impulses of 
youth. We understand, and act accordingly. 
Indeed, that is the very substance of our su- 
periority. 

But when we become still older, when we 
become vested with dignity and authority, 
everything is different. Our superiority then 
lies in our refusal to understand. In our 
superiority we insist that the inferior ones 
make all the necessary adjustments in our 
mutual relations. They must concede to our 
laziness—which is but the reward of ad- 
vancing years. They must concede to our 
stubbornness—which is but the natural result 
of our superiority. They must bear the as- 
sault of our temper—which is but the pre- 
rogative of our authority. 

When teachers or parents fail to use their 
superior intelligence in facilitating their in- 
tercourse with children, it is evident that 
there is something lacking—up above. But 
when principals and superintendents fail in 
securing amicable relations with teachers of 
demonstrated ability and character there is 
no means established for challenging their 
authority. Their arrogation of superiority 
is a gratuitous assumption; but there is no 
way provided for making them step down. 
But in a democracy it is still possible to ap- 
peal directly to the public. 


Completed Education 


NE of the causes of the unsatisfactory 
O state of education at the present 
time is to be found no doubt in the 

fact that until quite recently it has been cus- 





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December, 1917 


tomary for educators and for the public 
generally to think of education as something 
that could be “ completed.” If we continue 
to think of education in this way, conditions 
will remain equally unsatisfactory, unless 
they become worse. We are in effect trying 
to teach children with new needs thru the 
instrumentality of teachers who completed 
their education before these children were 
born. We fear to trust the young teachers 
because they lack experience; and the older 
teachers for the most part are in a class 
with that well-known old dog who could learn 
no new tricks. 


Safe Thinking 


HINKING is known to be a dangerous 
T pastime. 

There are some people, however, 
who find the temptation to think irresistible. 
No warning, no horrible example, no threat 
seems to daunt these. They insist upon 
thinking in good times and in bad, in time 
of war as well as in time of peace, inside of 
schools as well as outside. To these we wish 
to give some valuable advice. 

The advice which we are about to give is 
sound. We have not evolved it out of any 
inner consciousnesses, but have induced it by 
the most approved scientific method from 
carefully observed and accurately classified 
first-hand facts. It is not necessary to sub- 
mit the details upon which it is founded; it 
is sufficient to indicate a practical applica- 
tion. 

The problem is in brief, “ How can think- 
ing be made safe?” Now we are not going 
to dodge the issue by saying, “ Don’t think!” 
We realize that the victims of this habit have 
no choice. We are therefore sympathetically 
inclined and offer the following for what it 
may be worth: To avoid official disapproval 
and disciplinary manipulation, confine your 
thinking to such questions as, How can I make 
myself solid with the administration? How 
can I get promotion without earning it? 
How can I get favors from those higher up? 
What kind of jokes will please my superiors? 


The American Teacher 149 


What political views are acceptable to my 
chief? 

Others will readily suggest themselves to 
a real thinker. We may add that it is par- 
ticularly dangerous to devote any thought to 
questions that have to do with the improve- . 
ment of fundamental service to the children 
and to the public. Such thought indicates 
that your attention is directed to outsiders, 
rather than to those upon whom your bread 
and butter depends. 


Rainbow Promises 


T is curious how we instinctively seize 
I upon those conditions in life which 
further our own desires and give them 
universality. The daily newspapers, with 
their newspaper sense, discovered that some- 
body was attacking the Rockefeller and 
Carnegie foundations, and even in these dog 
days of capitalism found it good “ copy.” So 
they emphasized that phase in speaking of 
the booklet on “ Rainbow Promises of Pro- 
gress in Education,” just issued by the In- 
stitute for Public Service. Our own partic- 
ular bent is toward democracy in education, 
free speech in education, the critical attitude 
in education, and we indulge our desire by 
quoting elsewhere those thoughts which seem 
to us to express a fundamental need in educa- 
tion. Perhaps the newspapers, have become 
jaded with the constant reiteration of de- 
mocracy; their news sense has not reacted. 
We confess to a fresher, less sophisticated 
educational nervous system. 

The Institute for Public Service is courage- 
ously critical, and constructively so. In this 
booklet there is no reluctance to use those de- 
vices of presentation that have been found 
effective in our class rooms. There are pic- 
tures on every page. The style of print is 
varied. The paragraphing is bold; it catches 
the eye. At the top of each page, in black- 
faced italics and boxed in so that it cannot 
escape notice, is some extract from the “ rain- 
bow promises” of the General Education 
Board. Below it, strikingly arranged, are the 
facts—the number of pupils already enjoy- 





150 


ing these advantages, for the most part in 
public schools. And they range into the mil- 
lions. 

Good for you, Dr Allen. We like that. 
The combination of fine educational thought 
and the ability to get it across to a sensation- 
loving public is rare. More power to you. 


Reconstruction: Its Hopes 
and Opportunities 
I.—Greetings to the New Board 


OW we envy you, Ladies and Gentle- 
men! How our gentle souls ache 


for a tithe of your power for good! 
Seven of you will begin anew to mold the 
destinies of eight hundred thousand children 
and twenty thousand teachers. “ Mold the 
destinies ”—trite, isn’t it? but you can and 
will do it. As yet we do not know who you 
are (we cannot hope that we shall be among 
you), nor how receptive you will be, but if 
we, as teachers, who have been for years 
trying to blow breaches in the solid wall of 
conventionalism and official inertia, can now 
(if never before—tho we deny it) become 
instructive, we want the job. We shall not 
pile up new walls for still others to demolish, 
but shall rather (as practiced in the new 
penology) encourage development of will 
such as must make physical and conventional 
barriers a mockery and superfluity. 

Then ’tis done and done. We are to be 
consulting architects whose structures will 
at a touch melt into more and more gorgeous 
palaces. We are to be advisory experts in 
the ways and means of developing the noblest 
in our American: children. 

You will forgive the light tone, Ladies and 
Gentlemen, for we come to you lightheart- 
edly. We are lovers of children and woe the 
day when we blight the souls of our young 
ones with heavy pedanticism. When we be- 
come deep-toned in our discussions of details, 
you will forgive us again, for we have our 
lapses. But always we shall have in mind 
your wonderful opportunity and our mission. 

We face the issue in all its complexity. We 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


try to sense its problems, and to analyze them 
into their elements. In succeeding issues we 
shall deal with them one at a time, and shall 
give you our best thought. If you will ac- 
cept of it, we shall be happy in the service; 
if you do not, we shall suffer no new strange 
sensations, for the réle of a voice crying in 
the wilderness is for us unhappily familiar. 
We know our exits and our entrances, we 
are ever-ready for our cues, but like the old 
stager who has acted in stock companies for 
many a year, we shall never be happy until 
we embrace the Bard of Avon, and can play 
Hamlet. Will you be our “ angel”? 


For the Good of the Service 


COMMISSION on efficiency appointed 
A by President Taft discovered, among 

other things, that in many of the 
government bureaus men and women were 
doing mediocre work or worse in spite of 
having abilities above the average. One of 
the causes of this unfortunate state of affairs 
lay in the failure of bureau heads to adjust 
the work and the personalities in each office 
or division in accordance with the peculiar- 
ities—the strong points and the weak points 
—of the individuals engaged. Recommenda- 
tions included plans for a redistribution of 
considerable numbers of employes of many 
classes and many grades—for the good of the 
service. 

In such redistribution of workers the pre- 
sumption is that the good of the service coin- 
cides with the good of the servants. A per- 
son will work better where he fits better; 
and the work done will be correspondingly 
more satisfactory. In such redistribution it 
may be further presumed that no penalty 
is involved, that there is at any rate no pen- 
alty intended. Adult men and women should 
be able to agree upon a modus vivendi with- 
out thinking ill of one another, without sus- 
pecting motives, without resentment. 

Men and women in a public school sys- 
tem, it seems, are not to be considered as 
adults. They may be shifted as pawns at 
the will or whim of an official, and no ques- 





December, 1917 


tions answered, if indeed any are asked. 
This procedure of transferring teachers 
without warning and without consent “ for 
the good of the service” is a dangerous 
practise. In the first place it is not for the 
good of the service to arouse suspicions and 
resentments unduly. It is not for the good 
of the service to give officials arbitrary pow- 
ers that may be used for private purposes. 
It is not for the good of the service to dis- 
tribute teachers under circumstances that 
arouse the curiosity, the gossip and the dis- 
respect of their pupils and of their col- 
leagues. 

Such procedure, far from being for the 
good of the service, is subversive of discipline 
and undermines good citizenship. The pub- 
lic is entitled to know whether a distribution 
is brought about in good faith for the good 
of the service, or for the satisfaction of per- 
sonal grudges, for the infliction of private 
penalties. The public is entitled to know 
whether the good of the service means the 
improvement of teaching, or the comfort of 
some official. Above all, the public should 
be informed whether the good of the service is 
but an elegant way of evading responsibility 
for the removal of incompetents, or a com- 
mon-sense agreement among professional 
servants—for the good of the service. 


Greeting, Fellow Citizens! 


OVEMBER 6, 1917 will be a glorious 
day in the annals of political eman- 


cipation! Ladies, on behalf of po- 
litical democracy, I greet you ag fellow citi- 
zens. You are now politically free. How 
will you use your freedom? Will you aid the 
cause of the workers who presented you with 
this priceless gift? Will you help keep chil- 
dren from premature old age, from a joyless 
existence by helping to maintain the educa- 
tional law of the State? Will you help hu- 
manize and socialize our government? Will 
you use your gift for the betterment of your 
own condition? 

Remember, fellow citizens, you now com- 
mand respect. You now constitute a political 
power not to be ignored. Your opinions now 
have weight. You no longer need ask as 


The American 


Teacher 151 


favors what should be yours by right. And 
you need no longer fight alone. You can stand 
shoulder to shoulder with men, and fight the 
battles of progress together. In the past you 
have been spectators; you were forced to 
stand aloof. You discussed with your chil- 
dren problems that you were not thought ca- 
pable of solving in cooperation with your 
brothers and fathers. That day is a thing 
of the past in New York State. May it soon 
be a thing of the past in the United States. 

You must at the outset realize the necessity 
of making your fight efficiently. The efficient 
way is the organized way. There is no other 
way. The Teachers Union, a progressive 
militant body that stands for the democrati- 
zation of our schools, the socialization of our 
resources, the protection of the professional 
rights, and the improvement of educational 
standards, asks you to join it and work 
with it. 

In January the Union will cause to be intro- 
duced into the Legislature a bill to readjust 
salaries in accordance with the increased cost 
of living. Organized effort is necessary to 
bring the bill thru successfully. 

The unionized teachers of England helped 
to bring about the introduction of the Fisher 
Bill thru which the teachers will receive $17,- 
000,000 as increased salary. Spain, the most 
backward educational country in Europe, set 
aside 10,000,000 pesetas to raise the salaries 
of teachers. On September 23d, the three 
great teachers associations of Scotland, after 
fifteen years of failure, united into one pow- 
erful organization, because they realized that 
economic betterment can come only thru 
union. Why not profit by these examples? 
Remember that union is not an end, but a 
means to an end, and that end is the libera- 
tion of our teachers thru the democratization 
of our educational system. Will you work to- 
ward that end? 


Loyalties, not Loyalty 


VERY professional educator in this 
country is an intellectual descendant 
of William James, who taught us to 

say “ Memories, not memory.” But old doc- 





152 


trine dies hard: half the teachers in the coun- 
try still justify much of the school procedure 
to the confiding parent, on the plea that this 
work “ trains the memory.” 

But in our heart of hearts—that is, in our 
professional heart of hearts—we know bet- 
ter. Training the memory is useful in cer- 
tain strategic positions, but there is really 
nothing in it. 

In the same way those of us who have sin- 
cerely questioned our souls understand that 
there is no loyalty—but there are many loyal- 
ties. Nevertheless, when we are in need of 
it, we do not hesitate to speak of loyalty as an 
ultimate entity—for the discomfiture of our 
enemies. 

An embezzler has exploited the patriotism 
of his fellow citizens by selling them Liberty 
Bonds, and has absconded with the proceeds. 
His wife, equally patriotic, reveals his where- 
abouts to the officers. She has been disloyal 
to her husband. If she had shared his guilty 
secret and had shielded him, she would have 
been disloyal to the public. A merchant crit- 
icizes the administration of certain public 
contracts: he is disloyal, he is giving aid and 
comfort to the enemy. But if he held his 
peace, even without sharing in the plunder, 
he would have been disloyal to the public. 


A teacher protests against the stupidity or 
the brutality of his principal: he is dubbed 
disloyal. But if he submits to the stupidity 
and brutality of his superiors, he is even 
more disloyal. We must remember that we 
are not beholden to our superiors, to our 
commissioners; we are beholden to the chil- 
dren and to the public. We are, therefore, 
not called upon to be “ loyal ” to our imme- 
diate officials at the expense of the children 
or of the public. 

The petty mind invested with power or 
authority is very apt to interpret the con- 
duct of his associates with sole reference to 
his own insignificant personality. But self- 
respecting men and women who are true to 
their own ideals will not permit themselves 
to be distracted by the false cries of disloy- 
alty. It is often necessary to oppose not 
only these petty officials, but the highest 
agents of the government. To criticize the 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


government, whether in peace or in war, is 
no evidence of disloyalty. It is sometimes 
the highest loyalty, as it is the most difficult, 
to attack those entrenched in power, those 
nominally representing the public as a whole. 

Let us but be clear in our own minds as 
to where our duty lies. Let us be clear in 
our own minds as to the purpose of our labor 
—whether we are working for the public or 
for the officials, whether we are working for 
the children, or for favors—or for our own 
pockets. We shall make no mistake if, in 
the conflict of the many loyalties we must 
necessarily maintain, we choose to support 
the nation against any faction; if we aban- 
don our officers where the public’s greater 
need demands this; if we repudiate the self- 
appointed guardians of the world’s welfare 
in the interests of the children’s welfare. 

Under certain circumstances we should not 
be dismayed by the assault upon our “ loy- 
alty ”—we should then be proud to be “ dis- 
loyal.” 


* * * 


The people higher up are not afraid that 
democracy will bring forth wild or foolish 
suggestions from those down below. They 
are afraid that those down below will make 
wise suggestions and take things into their 
own hands. 


The Teacher as Public 
Servant 


HE suspension of three teachers in a 

New York City high school on the 
ground that they held views “ sub- 
versive of discipline and which undermine 
good citizenship ” will have the hearty sup- 
port of all who are truly interested in public 
education. Writing from a distance of many 
miles, or from the seclusion of an editorial 
sanctum, it is necessary merely to assume 
that the teachers in question do in fact hold 
the alleged views. There can be no question 
as to the other part of the proposition— 
namely, that the public school cannot tolerate 





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December, 1917 


among their teachers any men or women 
whose work is not a positive and a powerful 
contribution to good citizenship. Without 
this assumption there can be no justification 
whatever for the existence of public schools. 

It occurs to us, however, after not merely 
accepting, but asserting as vigorously as we 
can, the major premise, that there may be 
something more to say on the alleged views, 
and perhaps on the manner of ascertaining 
said pernicious views. 


It occurs to us, further, that there is ur- 
gent need for the definition by some author- 
itative body of the essentials of “ views” 
conducive to discipline and to good citizen- 
ship. We rather suspect that too many peo- 
ple would define citizenship in terms of their 
partisan creeds. We have ourselves certain 
violent prejudices concerning the political 
views of other people, and might be tempted 
in a pinch to question the good citizenship 
of some of them. We acknowledge, to be 
sure, that people may properly differ on po- 
litical and on religious and on philosophical 
questions; we acknowledge even that some 
of the members of the opposition are fairly 
good citizens despite their unsound doctrines. 
We should try to be fair-minded if the respon- 
sibility were thrust upon us of ascertaining 
the orthodoxy of another’s views; but we 
should hate to submit our fortunes to the 
judgment in such matters of certain people 
we know. 

Do the views of these alleged heretics per- 
tain to theories of sovereignty, or to theories 
on the protective tariff? Have they gone 
wrong on the place of revolution as an in- 
strument of human progress, or have they 
declared that there should be no progress at 
all? Have these teachers attacked private 
property, or have they maintained that pub- 
lic office should be administered for private 
gain? Do they believe that the government 
should be conducted for the benefit of all the 
people, or for the benefit of the private organ- 
ization that happens to control the offices? 
Did they denounce profiteering at the ex- 
pense of the public, or did they measure pa- 
triotism by the volume of profits? Are they 
in favor of Prussianization of our schools 
and of all of our institutions, or are they 


The American Teacher 153 


brazenly demanding the extension of de- 
mocracy? Did they acknowledge the su- 
periority of benevolent despotism, or did they 
declare for wider cooperation of human be- 
ings in common affairs? 

These questions could be extended indef- 


initely. It is obvious at any rate that in the 
absence of clearly defined criteria of sound 


“ views ” it must have been a herculean task 
for the responsible officials to determine just 
what relation the views of these teachers 
bore to “good citizenship.” However, we 
may be sure that responsible officials would 
not shirk a task merely because it is hercu- 
lean, or even impossible. 

Incidentally we may observe that there are 
in New York City—of our own knowledge— 
hundreds of men who were former pupils of 
perfectly safe and respectable teachers, but 
who are now members of a powerful organ- 
ization that systematically seeks to exploit 
public office for private gain. Here is a real 
problem for educators. 








Ge American Teacher 





Democracy in Education Education for Demecracy 
Published monthly, except July and August, by 
THE AMERICAN TEACHER COMPANY, INO., 
70 Fifth Avenue, New York City 
GABRIEL R. MASON 
CHARLOTTE E. LEE 
JAY D. LESTER 








BENJAMIN GLASSBERG 

BENJAMIN C. GRUENBERG 

FRANKLIN J. KELLER J. 
SAM SCHMALHAUSEN 


HENRY R. LINVILLE 





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Post Office, at New York, N. Y.; under the Act of March 8, 
1879. 





Manufacturing Americans 


JESS PERLMAN 


OOPOLEY was an Austrian. He came 
to these shores before the war, tell- 
ing himself he was soon going to be 

rich, and in his inner soul aware all the time 
that he was only encouraging himself. And 
he needed courage. There were exactly 
twenty-five American dollars in his hand- 
kerchief: enough to gain him admittance to 
the Promised Land. He knew, being a prac- 
tical man, that without work which would 
add to his income, the twenty-five dollars 
would in a short time be gone. 

But how does one get work in America? 
Had he been a carpenter, or a tailor, or a 
cobbler, he could ask where the rich car- 
penters or tailors or cobblers were, and they 
would employ him. But he was nothing else 
than a strong man, a giant of a young man, 
without a trade. Could he walk in the streets 
and sell his strength, peddle it as so many 
older men were peddling apples, and calicoes, 
and leather wallets? 

How did this well-dressed stranger know 
Poopoley was an Austrian? What a kind 
Providence! To be offered work immediately 
on leaving Ellis Island! Poopoley laughed. 
He had been wilfully deceiving himself with 
golden hopes in which he had no real faith. 
And here his self-deception was itself a de- 
ception. 

From early morning to late at night, he 
plunged a hook into massive crates filled with 
goodness knows what, and with the help of 
two negroes and an Italian, loaded them on 
cart after cart that rumbled away, only to 
be replaced on the worn curb by other trucks. 
And every Saturday night, he came to a win- 
dow, and received a little yellow envelope, 
bearing the legend “ $10.00.” Inside the en- 
velope were five one-dollar bills. It had been 
explained to him. The union, the blackguard 
union, had to be deceived. 

Then came the strike. At the insistent 
urging of the other men, he laid down his 
hook, and for three long weeks he satisfied 
his giant’s hunger with a loaf of bread that 


lasted two days, and a can of salmon that 
lasted three days. Strikebreakers came in, 
pickets were arrested, strikers had their 
heads clubbed, and finally, when money and 
hope were both gone, Poopoley marched into 
his old room, took his hook to the tune of 
“Scab,” and resumed his task of loading 
crates on carts. But the sights he had seen 
were not without their stamp on his outlook. 

Only one of his superiors was cordial to 
him. Mr Schwartz was a spare, energetic 
fellow of about forty. His bald head and 
bone-rimmed spectacles gave him an air of 
intellectuality, and even the usually silent 
shipping clerk used to say when he passed, 
“ There goes a smart man, a very smart man, 
but you can’t tell. Maybe he’s a crook.” 

It was about October when Mr Schwartz 
began to beam like the moon-faced man of 
a certain well-advertised cigar. He even 
shook hands mornings. Indeed, Poopoley was 
quite embarrassed when Mr Schwartz offered 
him his hand one early morning. Poopoley 
took the proffered hand, blushed, and turned 
away. 

One evening, when Poopoley returned to 
his boarding house he found pasted on the 
fence of the empty lot adjoining the house, 
a dozen large pictures of Mr Schwartz, 
among many other similar portraits of other 
rich-looking gentlemen. All the pictures bore 
legends which Poopoley could not read. But 
a fellow-boarder explained them to him: 

“ Politicianers, nobodies, crooks. Fat jobs 
they want, with big money. Everybody votes 
and the biggest crooks, they get elected.” 

He then went on to explain the connotation 
of “ politicianers,” and how only “ citizners ” 
were legally privileged to cast a vote on Elec- 
tion Day. “But, of course, with money— 
well!” 

Poopoley’s heart was scre; then bitter; 
then cynical. 

A few nights before the election, Poopoley 
saw some wondrous red lights, that flared like 
dying beacons, calling folks to mourn. He 


154 





December, 1917 


followed the crowd and listened to a stout 
florid-faced gentleman addressing the by- 
standers in a ridiculously labored German. 
He was saying nothing, and saying it very 
blatantly. Poopoley was sickened at the 
thought that these people listened to such an 
addleheaded orator. The streets were filled, 
so that wagons had to use another street for 
turning. Poopoley thought the big police- 
man standing on the outskirts of the crowd, 
by the saloon, should do something to pre- 
vent such a senseless blocking of traffic. 

Poopoley went on. A few squares west 
he walked, only to see another crowd gath- 
ered around another orator. This time there 
were no red lights. The crowd was more 
quiet, and yet apparently more in earnest. 
He stopped to listen again, to hear more 
empty words, and understand what he could. 
The speaker was delivering his address in 
a slow, even, simple English, so that even 
Poopoley understood a good deal. But what 
is he saying? What are these heavenly words 
—of the rights of poor men? What beauti- 
ful dreams are these—of brotherhood and 
love and peace? Ah, this is what is meant 
by the wonderful American free institutions. 
Poopoley’s eyes and ears, Poopoley’s soul is 
glued on the speaker and on this dreamy-eyed 
crowd of simple, honest folk. It is marvel- 
ous. It is something of the sublime. 

A policeman approaches. He walks over 
to the speaker and interrupts him. There 
are cries and vicious exclamations from the 
crowd. The speaker remounts the platform, 
and bids the crowd disperse. “Our day of 
reckoning will come soon. Not yet. Go 
quietly, my friends.” The crowd goes. 


Poopoley’s heart was a seething pot of emo- 
tions. Rage and hate and love and brother- 
hood stirred and surged within him. He was 
furious. The next moment he was dreaming. 

He suddenly discovers that he is close be- 
hind an officer. He will murder him, he is 
sure. The officer turns his face a little, and 
then walks on. It is the policeman Poopoley 
saw at the meeting with the red lights. Poo- 
poley follows him. The policeman turns a 
corner, and Poopoley watches him tap his 
night-stick on the window of the corner sa- 
loon. In a moment a glass of beer is brought 
him. This is a policeman, an officer of the 
law, thinks Poopoley. 


The American Teacher 


155 


The great event came. Election Day. His 
place of business was closed. But who would 
ever expect to receive a visit from the boss 
himself? Even if it is a holiday. No, he 
must want something. Mr Schwartz brings 
a friend with him, Mr O’Connell. Mr 
Schwartz is very busy and is sorry he must © 
leave O’Connell alone with Poopoley. O’Con- 
nell is a genial Irishman, about forty, who 
has a way of coming right down to the point. 
Of course Poopoley will vote for Mr 
Schwartz, eh? 

“ Ach, I am no citizner,” complains Poo- 
poley. “ Citizners voot. I no voot.” 

O’Connell promises to take care of that, 
and there is a nice new two-dollar bill wait- 
ing fer the right man. The policeman? 
O’Connei! will take care of that. Poopoley 
does not know how to vote? O’Connell will 
take care of that. Conscience? Right? 
O’Connell takes care of that, too. He says 
to Poopoley, “‘ Now, looka here, pal. Ain’t 
yer job worth nothin’ at all to yer?” And 
Mr Schwartz has one more register of his 
popularity with the voting citizens of his 
community. 

Once more Poopoley’s heart was sore; then 
bitter; then cynical... . 

You imagine, dear reader, that this is a 
story of an immigrant and his difficulties. 
No, friend, it is a story of myself and my 
difficulties. I am an American. 

But I am also a teacher. I teach English 
to foreigners in the Evening Elementary 
Schools. A week ago, our principal held a 
conference. He instructed us to emphasize 
the lessons of Americanism. He told us to 
carry home to the foreigners the ideals of our 
glorious American institutions. 

But what am I to do? Poopoley is in my 
class. 


Are You Civilized? 


Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell 
Holmes is once reported to have said that the 
test of being civilized is, that in spite of your 
strongest conviction to the contrary, to have 
a sneaking suspicion that the other fellow may 
be right. 





The System 


ABRAHAM LEFKOWITZ 


—young, enthusiastic, energetic, sen- 

sitive, full of initiative, fertile in ideas. 
She had visions of a glorious pedagogical 
career. Why not? Had she not been grad- 
uated with honor? Had not her sympathetic 
and progressive critic teacher painted her 
future success in glowing colors? Had she 
not won a place at the head of the eligible 
list for elementary school teachers? 

She was assigned to a school located in one 
of the poorest sections. Her heart bled for 
these little children, neglected, underfed and 
ill-clad, who hopefully looked up to her. She 
vowed that she would succeed, that she would 
put a ray of joy into the lives of these poor 
victims of an unfortunate economic system. 
That evening she evolved wonderful plans for 
arousing and sustaining the interest of these 
children. She carefully planned her outlines 
for the following day and retired with vi- 
sions of her success floating before her. 

How she did teach that week! How those 
little children of misfortune greedily de- 
voured her intellectual treat! How they 
hovered about her eager, sympathetic face, 
their eyes gleaming brightly, their young 
faces full of hope and love! Her first week 
left her triumphant. Had she not won the 
love of her little charges? Were they not in- 
terested and enthusiastic? True, they were 
learning slowly but they would improve. 
Victory was in her grasp, but alas, she knew 
not the System. 

The System, which rewards mediocrity and 
worships the triumvirate, Results, Mechanized 
Drill and Unquestioning Obedience, made its 
appearance in the person of its official repre- 
sentative—the principal—in this instance a 
regular fossilized antedeluvian. Horror of 
horrors! What do her astonished eyes be- 
hold? Children (evidently strongly inter- 
ested) leaning forward and spoiling the align- 
ment of the various rows! Questions follow 
the presentation, but no drill. The principal 
is shocked. A lesson without deadly drill! 
What next? Her scowling presence kills the 
joyful look on the faces of the children. (She 


S* was a typical normal school graduate 


wonders if the school room is to be trans- 
formed into an amusement house.) Majesti- 
cally she stalks to the center of the room and 
takes charge. Her snappy, hard-toned ques- 
tions elicit few responses from the frightened 
mites. Stonily she eyes the teacher and says, 
“Do you call this teaching? Look at the re- 
sults!” Exit ogre principal. 

From that day the principal, with that won- 
derful Machiaveilian art that only the System 
can develop, made life a Hell for that teacher 
and her pupils. The teacher came to school 
crushed, worn out, discouraged. Never a 
word of sympathy for her efforts to please 
the whims of her superior, never a kindness, 
never any help. Her work became mediocre, 
her health declined, her class failed in the 
examinations. She realized that her license 
would not be renewed, so the poor, crushed 
and humiliated soul resigned. 

She obtained ancther position in a little 
rural school, remote from the city where her 
visions lay buried. Under the spell of free- 
dom, aided by the invigorating air of the 
country and the sympathy of her rural in- 
spector, her drooping spirits gradually re- 
vived, her joy and hope returned. Once more 
she hummed joyously on her way to school, 
once more she began to dream dreams; once 
more she saw little ones, under the spell of 
her teaching and sympathy, come to life. 
Within a year her marked success attracted 
the attention of her superiors who encouraged 
her in her educational experiments. 

To-day she is the principal of one of the 
leading girls’ schools in the State, and is 
looked upon as a teacher of transcendent abil- 
ity and vision. Her former principal and the 
System are proud of her success. Why not? 
Had they not given that Failure the opportu- 
nity to make good in a new field? 


Stagnation 


Let no man be appointed to a Board of 
Education who thinks that the public schools 
are good enough for his own children or for 
anybody’s children. 


156 





The Soul of 


F we could have a nice little stratified so- 
I ciety where the son carried on the tra- 
dition of the father and where the am- 
bition to rise to a higher class were heretical 
and unpatriotic, there would be all-sufficient 
sanction for the notion that the teacher is a 
hired man. It would be very simple. All 
you would have to do would be to take the 
teacher from your own class, let him pass on 
his ideas to your children, and, if he had the 
temerity to suggest beliefs not in accord with 
his own status in life, why, you would fire 
him. But of course, he would not do it. He 
would not be built that way. 

Unfortunately we teachers are a long way 
from getting out of the hired-man class. We 
are allowed to make a great deal of noise 
about ideals and inspiration and development 
and soul and what not; in fact, we are lead- 
ers of men. But when we try to put across 
a new idea, to break away from the dull, dead, 
routine, we are pretty soon reminded of the 
fact that we are servants of the public. The 
parent says, “‘ That isn’t the way I was taught 
when I was a child,” and that settles it. The 


superintendent and principal say—but you 

know what they say, and that settles you. 
Two years ago there was expressed in these 

pages a teacher’s idea of his job when he said: 


I believe that the boy should have a whole 
man for a teacher and not only that part of 
him that happens to contain a little math- 
ematics, or English, or history, that he should 
partake of the teacher’s politics, science, so- 
ciology, art, yes, even of his religion, but 
that by no means must the teacher impose 
these opinions upon the pupils, he must not 
use his official position to fix ideas. He must 
take his chances with the youngest pupil in 
the class; if he is no wiser than that pupil 
he will have no more influence than the latter 
(and he ought to have no more) ; if he is a 
great and forceful personality he will carry 
nearly everyone with him. 


If I were to adopt this belief and were to 
keep on asserting it, and moreover, were to 
make a systematic effort to spread the idea, 
you would or you would not like it. In the 
first instance you would call it uplifting the 
profession, in the second, propaganda. The 


the Autocrat 


whole case is given away in one of President 
Butler’s annual reports: 


The last thing that many persons want is 
freedom either of speech or of anything else 
unless its exercise happens to accord with - 
their somewhat violent and passionate pre- 
dilections. It must be said, on the other 
hand, that professors of established reputa- 
tion, sound judgment and good sense rarely, 
if ever, find themselves under serious criti- 
cism from any source. Such men and women 
may hold what opinions they please, since 
they are in the habit of expressing them with 
discretion, moderation, good taste and good 
sense. It is the violation of one or another 
of these canons which produces the occasional 
disturbance that is so widely advertised as 
~ assertion of or attack upon academic free- 

om. 


A well organized group of American youth, 
as is to be found at any college or university 
of considerable size, offers almost irresistible 
temptation to the propagandist. It seems to 
the ardent supporter of some new movement 
the most natural thing in the world that he 
should be permitted, in season and out of 
season, to harangue college and university 
students on the subject around which he feels 
that the whole world revolves. Any attempt 
to protect the students or the reputation of a 
given college or university for sobriety and 
sanity of judgment is forthwith attacked as a 
movement toward the suppression of free 
speech. In particular, the agitation in favor 
of what is called prohibition or of what is 
called socialism, are most active and deter- 
mined in seeking to use colleges and univer- 
sities as agencies and instruments of pro- 
paganda. 

There is no good reason why the youth who 
are committed to the care of a college or uni- 
versity should be turned over by that college 
or university to any agitators or propagan- 
dists who may present themselves. 

You see the objection to propaganda: it 
exploits the youth of the land—that is, when 
it happens to be about things that the estab- 
lished authorities do not like, or when it does 
not accord with their somewhat violent and 
passionate predilections. Pity, pray, pity the 
students or the reputation of a given college 
(Columbia, the gem of emotion, say) for 
sobriety and sanity of judgment, especially 
when hit by the agitation in favor of woman 


157 





158 


suffrage (100,000 majority was it?) or in 
favor of “ what is called socialism.” 

What are “established reputation, sound 
judgment and good sense ; discretion, modera- 
tion, good taste”? What do you mean by 
“canons,” professor? Now, be frank, isn’t 
it something you can shoot at the person who 
says things you do not like? You do not like 
woman suffrage, altho the majority of the 
people of New York do. Therefore it violates 
the canon of good taste for one of your pro- 
fessors to urge its merits upon your students. 
Now; Mr. President, if I had a university, 
I should be perfectly willing to hire you to 
teach philosophy and to let you say what you 
like in the classroom. I’d let the people de- 
cide about the sobriety of my university. 
They might put in an overwhelming vote for 
me. Now, supposing they should uphold 
Cattell in that way? Wouldn’t you feel a bit 
foolish? But no, you would simply say that 
teaching had not yet been made safe for 
democracy and that we ought to have another 
war. 

It is an old story. As a writer in The 
Christian Science Monitor points out: 


Sometimes it has its roots in religion or 
theology, as with the case of President Dun- 
ster, of Harvard College, in the colonial per- 
iod of history, or more recently in the con- 
troversy that arose between the “ visitors ” 
and some of the professors of Andover The- 
ological Seminary over the teachings of that 
school with respect to the destiny of man. 
Sometimes it is born of the clash between 
dominant and challenging schools of thought 
in economics, as when formerly Professors 
Summer of Yale, and Perry of Williams Col- 
lege, were in peril of their status owing to 
their teaching of “free trade,” or more re- 
cently when influential alumni and trustees 
of Brown University tried to discipline E 
Benjamin Andrews for daring to be a bime- 
tallist, or when E A Ross of Leland Stan- 
ford, Jr. University, came under the ban 
because of his general radicalism and stric- 
tures on phases of California’s plutocracy. 
Sometime the dispute follows clashes between 
teachers and administrative authorities on 
standards of personal as well as social ethics. 


The whole situation assumes an alarming 
(to the Butlers) aspect simply because the 
leaven is working and revolutionary social 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VL. No. 9 


changes serve as stimulation and encourage- 
ment. The number of teachers who want to 
be men and not phonographs is growing; 
there is the feeling of a class struggle and 
group support. The action of trustees is get- 
ting greater and greater publicity because the 
public is beginning to suspect the type, men 
whose sole interest is the perpetuation of the 
present order, financiers and lawyers predo- 
minantly. Linked to this is a repudiation of 
the whole system of private control of public 
resourees. If our access to such material re- 
sources as coal and wheat and oil must not 
be hedged about by the greed of the profiteer 
who has nothing but his own welfare at heart, 
how about our access to the wells of truth? 
The psychological situation is precisely the 
same. Woman suffrage and socialism and pro- 
hibition are just as much a personal discom- 
fort to President Butler as his inability to 
warm his house would be, for if his autocracy 
must be tempered to the new-born woman 
if his political domination must succumb to 
the newly-liberated workingman, and if he 
cannot get a drink, what will there be left 
in life for him? He would have democracy 
made safe for his particular world, whereas 
the university world is day by day becoming 
more and more unsafe for his autocracy. 
And if the spirit of President Butler sud- 
denly flits to a high school principal who is 
sore beset by a growing liberalism in his 
faculty, the application is just the same. The 
whole trend of organization is towards giv- 
ing teachers greater and ‘greater power in 
determining policy, which policy is that of 
allowing free expression of the free ideas of 
a free people. 

The dictionary says that a propagandist is 
one who propagates with zeal any system, 
doctrine or principle. In the light of com- 
mon usage I should rather say that the prop- 
agandist is one engaged in the persistent 
teaching of a principle which clashes with 
other people’s interests. These interests need 
by no means be conscious; in fact they are 
usually unconscious, or rather subconscious; 
they constitute the instinctive feeling that the 
changes which others wish will in some way 
necessitate an undesirable readjustment on 





December, 1917 


the part of oneself, as was illustrated above 
in the case of President Butler. 

Is propaganda ever justifiable? The word 
itself was originally applied to a society of 
cardinals having supervision over foreign 
missions, founded at Rome in 1622. There 
still exists the College of the Propaganda 
founded by Pope Urban VIII for the educa- 
tion of missionary priests. Practically every 
Protestant Church has its foreign mission- 
aries. So we all believe in propaganda for 
religion. 

If you belong to a political party, you be- 
lieve in it for politics, that is, for your pol- 
itics. 

But propaganda is not confined to politics 
and religion, where truths may to such a 
great extent be subjective, but may exist in 
science, where all truths are supposedly tested 
—objectively. The theory of evolution had a 
hard time getting itself accepted, likewise the 
roundness of the earth. How would any of 
us have liked to be a teacher in the days of 
Columbus and to have scorned those who de- 
nied the flatness of the earth? The propa- 
ganda of to-day may be the accepted truth of 
to-morrow. 

Shaw has said, “ A man is a revolutionist 
about the thing he understands.” It may 
not be possible to reason deductively from 
that proposition and say that one is not a 
revolutionist because he does not understand, 
but you must ask yourself whether or not 
you are teaching the so-called “tried and 
tested truths” because they are tried and 
tested or because you never took the trou- 
ble to analyze them. 

“ What is truth?” Even Pilate, royal gov- 
ernor, clothed with power, disclaimed ability 
to answer that question, and when pressed 
by the multitude to have Jesus crucified on 


the ground that if he did not he would show 
himself unfriendly to Csesar—even Pilate 


first washed his hands. Even the college of 
cardinals, even the president’s cabinet, yea, 
even the board of superintendents may well 
pause after asking, “ What is truth?” And 
well may they all wash their hands before 
crucifying him who has dared to teach what 
he believes to be the truth, tho they there- 
by incur the displeasure of Cesar. For 


The American Teacher 


159 


mightier than Cesar is Demos, and more 
deadly than the imperial sword is the voice 
of the people. 

What then shall we teach? Politics, eco- 
nomics and sex, perhaps. I want the boy to 
know what real government is and to be. 
acquainted with shams that masquerade as 
foreordained principles; if it takes something 
called propaganda to do this, then let there 
be propaganda. I want the boy to know why 
some men earn pennies and others get mil- 
lions, why he will probably be compelled to 
work hard for a pittance while others wallow 
in luxury, and what are some of the proposed 
remedies. If it takes propaganda to do this, 
then I am for propaganda. 

If I am to be an automaton who conveys 
to pupils ideas which have received the O K 
of the well-known taxpayers who support the 
schools (they really do imagine that at 
times), and of an educational hierarchy 
which runs them, then my job of inspirer is 
open to the first able-bodied drill-master that 
wants it ; but if teaching is to be a stimulation 
to thinking and an instilling of the critical 
attitude, then I want to remain to help re- 
alize the hope of America and the world— 
an enlightened humanity. 

HERACLITUS 


Philistine or Genius ? 


Do not make of our children a nation of 
philistines. Why say you make man in your 
own image? Do not make your schools ma- 
chine-shops, turning out on one uniform pat- 
tern so much mediocrity per year. Cultivate 
variability. The tendency towards variability 
is the most precious part of a good education. 
Beware of the philistine with his set, stable 
habits. 

The important principle in education is not 
so much formation of habits as the power of 
their re-formation. The power of breaking up 
habits is by far the more essential factor of 
a good education. It is in this power of 
breaking down habits that we can find the 
key for the unlocking of the otherwise inac- 
cessible stores of sub-conscious reserve en- 
ergy. The cultivation of the power of habit- 
disintegration is what constitutes the proper 
education of man’s genius. 

Boris Smpis 





160 


The Facts in the Case 


HE reason Germany is receiving news 
to the effect that the schools of New 
York are “hotbeds of sedition” is 
that the Board of Education, some superin- 
tendents and principals, a considerable num- 
ber of teachers, and a few newspapers are 
passing thru the same spell of hysteria Eng- 
land passed thru in the early months of the 
war. It is at least up to those of us who are 
not hysterical and therefore may be accused 
of disloyalty, any minute, to try to “calm the 
perturbed spirits” of those into whom the 
devil has entered. There is no better way, 
or cheaper, to do this than to put our arms 
about them gently, sooth their heated brows, 
and say to them softly, “ Now, friends, let 
us get at the facts, and then we can proceed 
more surely! ” 

The facts are very plain to those who want 
to know. Early in the year 1917 the Legis- 
lature of the State of New York passed a 
law which required that the high schools of 
the State should have five periods of physical 
training each week in every year of the course 
of study. The Board of Superintendents of 
New York City wanted to lengthen the school 
day anyway, on account of the fact that the 
course of study is growing harder owing also 
to the fact that we are adding things and cut- 
ting nothing out. Then again, the Gary Plan 
loomed threateningly, and the high school 
principals didn’t like its looks, anyway. 
Thus, there were three reasons which op- 
erated confusingly to give us the longer day. 
The day for high schools now in the City of 
New York is seven hours. 

When school opened in September the 
teachers and the pupils felt the increased 
burden, and they knew it was a condition 
to be reckoned with, both as to extra demand 
on their energy and as to the inroad it made 
on their earning power outside the school. 
Signs of dissatisfaction were observable in 
some of the larger high schools, especially. 
Delegations of pupils tried to obtain recog- 
nition from members of the Board of Educa- 
tion, and also from the Board of Aldermen, 
but without success. 

About that time strikes were started in 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


some of the Gary (elementary) schools, and 
the high school pupils thought they would 
imitate their younger brothers and sisters, 
and a walk out or two resulted, but with no 
signs of permanence or seriousness, except 
in the DeWitt Clinton High School. Bad 
feeling developed there on account of the 
lack of frankness of the school administration 
in dealing with the incipient strikers. 

As the result of the agitation made by the 
pupils and the teachers, always separately, 
the High School Committee of the Board of 
Education finally gave both groups a hear- 
ing, also separately. At these hearings the 
first instance of sedition in the entire his- 
tory of the disturbance found utterance. We 
have referred to it in the November number 
under the title, “ Running the Schools.” Ir- 
ritated by some occurrence at the hearing, 
the Chairman, Mr John Whalen, cried out 
angrily on two occasions, “If you pupils go 
out on strike, I’ll close the school,” and later, 
“T want you to understand that neither the 
pupils nor the teachers will run the schools.” 
The effect was terrific. The pupils and the 
teachers also were overwhelmed with humili- 
ation. Whose schools was Mr Whalen going 
to close? Not his own surely, except in the 
warped imagination of a member of a school 
board that considers the schools his personal 
property, but he would close our schools, the 
schools of the people. 

The next day the Teachers Council of the 
DeWitt Clinton High School called a meeting 
to report the result of the hearing. One 
hundred five teachers out of about one hun- 
dred eighty in the school attended the meet- 
ing. Resolutions of protest in positive but 
dignified terms against the spirit and the 
language used by the Chairman of the High 
School Committee were presented, and finally 
signed by one hundred two of those present. 
The resolutions were sent to the press. 

Thereupon, Mr Whalen directed Associate 
Superintendent Tildsley to investigate for 
the purpose of ascertaining the names of the 
teachers who were responsible for the for- 
mulation of the resolutions. Twenty teachers 
were subjected to an inquisition individually. 
One teacher, particularly hesitant about re- 
vealing things he was supposed to know, was 





December, 1917 


detained in the “ star-chamber ” for one two- 
hour session, one three-hour session, and one 
five-hour session. 

The associate superintendent was unsuc- 
cessful in his effort to ascertain the required 
names, because these persons held the crimi- 
nal notion that those who signed were the 
ones who were jointly responsible. The of- 
ficer was deeply angered, and then began 
an inquisition that was worthy of the name. 
You will read about it in other columns, and 
will understand why an angered, disap- 
pointed inquisitor should confuse lack of per- 
sonal loyalty to the school authorities with 
loyalty to the Federal Government. The 
thing can be done; so be careful! 


The Post’s Impression 
OF THE SCHOOL INQUISITION 


T is pleasant to note that there are at last 
I signs of returning sanity in the officials 
of our school system. At least, we have 
Chairman Willcox denying that he and Dr 
Tildsley are about to undertake the task of 
driving Socialism out of the public schools, 
and admitting that Socialists and pacifists 
are not disloyal “ unless they express them- 
selves in disloyal speech or action.” He adds, 
what all Americans ought to be saying, and 
what most of them are forgetting in war- 
time, that “freedom of speech is the right 
of every American citizen.” Plainly, a sober 
second thought has come to him. We could 
not easily think of any better way of spread- 
ing Socialism throughout our school system 
than for Mr Willcox and Dr Tildsley to at- 
tempt to punish, degrade, or dismiss those 
teachers who hold Socialistic views. Some 
nine years ago, long before these war troubles 
came up, The Evening Post went on record 
as to the only rational way to deal with So- 
cialism, in these words: 

We cannot believe that error will permanently 
prevail over truth. We are confident that indi- 
vidualism, in its main features, is the policy which 
has formed and which must preserve our institu- 
tions. But if we conservatives are mistaken, we 
cannot but welcome a discussion which shall open 
our eyes and set us right. Our attitude toward this 
topic, as toward any other which touches the vitals 
of our nation, must be that of readiness to defend 
our faith in open forum, to meet and conquer rea- 
son with reason. 

There is no other safe way. 

Unfortunately, this truth does not seem to 
have penetrated the mind of Dr John L Tild- 
sley. In his quest for disloyalty, he allows 
for no philosophy different from his own. 


The American Teacher 


161 


His doctrine is, “My country, right or 
wrong”; he wants, with the intolerance of 
the bigot, every child moulded to feel as he 
does, and he seeks to deprive every teacher of 
his livelihood who does not see eye to eye 
with him. More than that, he has a reverence 
for authority to delight the very soul of the’ 
Kaiser, and so he has actually preferred 
charges against a teacher because he does not 
conceive it his duty to develop in his pupils 
an “ instinctive respect for the President of 
the United States as such, the Governor of 
the State of New York as such, and other 
Federal, State, and municipal authorities as 
such”! If we had not lost our sense of humor 
in time of war, this charge would be laughed 
out of court. For the accused teacher need 
simply take the accusers into the American 
history class to hear his history colleague 
glorifying George Washington, Samuel 
Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and all the 
heroes of the Revolution who refused an “ in- 
stinctive respect” to constituted authority, 
as did Robert E Lee and Stonewall Jackson 
and the Confederate leaders who are now pro- 
claimed heroes of a united country. 


If that did not suffice, we should suggest 
the placing of Chairman Willcox on the wit- 
ness stand and cross-examining him as to the 
“ instinctive respect” he is going to pay to 
John F Hylan when the latter becomes 
Mayor. Is Mr Willcox going to swallow all 
those burning campaign words of his? We 
shall think very poorly of him if he is. We 
shall look to him to display the highest form 
of patriotism by differentiating between the 
office and the man; between the authority of 
the office and the spirit of the institution it 
represents. We look to him now to rebuke 
the downright Prussianism of Dr Tildsley, 
whose place is not in an American school 
system, but in Berlin, when he asks such ques- 
tions as these, if he is correctly reported: 

Should not a teacher teach absolute loyalty to 
Ss Se of the person who happens to oc- 
cu z 

Son’t you think we should respect the uniform 
as such? 

Is not there a presumption that whatever is is 
right? 

If there was a king in the land and your pupils 
did not respect him, would you not think it your 
duty to instil respect for the king if you had to 
knock it into the boys? 

Dr Tildsley also asked one of the teachers 
whether it would not be best to follow in New 
York the German system of using the schools 
as a means of inculcating so great a respect 
for authority that in a crisis our citizens 
would, like Germans, show a united front to 
the enemy and render unquestioning obedi- 
ence to the Government! We submit that if 





162 


anybody was talking nonsense, Dr Tildsley 
was, for if that is his opinion, the United 
States certainly has no business to be at 
war. The teacher promptly replied that 
loyalty forbade his holding a view so op- 
posed to that of the Administration, which 
has openly called upon the German people to 
abandon their blind obedience to rulers un- 
deserving of such support. To this the 
heresy hunter rejoined that on this point he 
disagreed with Mr Wilson and felt that we 
were at war to defeat the German people 
as well as its rulers. The author of “Alice 
in Wonderland ” alone could have done jus- 
tice to these proceedings. 

The truth is that at the bottom of this 
disloyalty quest is something entirely differ- 
ent. The real purpose is to get rid of cer- 
tain teachers who have been disturbers of 
the peace of the school system for some time. 
They are marked for slaughter, and the re- 
sult will be further dissatisfaction in the 
school system with the powers that control. 
We are well aware, of course, that there are 
difficult disciplinary problems before the 
School Board; that there are many teachers 
who could leave the system for the system’s 
good, who have not the moral authority or 
the stability or the readiness to work in 
harness. But this is no way to go about 
improving the spirit of the teachers; it is 
absolutely the wrong way. A first step 
would be to convince the teachers that they 
are not being governed by arrogant, autoc- 
ratic authorities; that their opinions count 
for something; that they are going to have 
a voice in the development of the school sys- 
tem; that they are at least going to be asked 
for suggestions. Their problem is the most 
difficult one in the teaching world; they must 
be helped by friendly cooperation and not 
by the methods of Bismarck of fifty years 
ago, when he, too, was trying to stamp out 
Socialism by force. If only a class could 
be started in New York to study the ex- 
perience of the world in trying to stifle con- 
science and mould opinions by force, with 
Messrs Willcox, Tildsley, and Postmaster- 
General Burleson and some of our Chicago 
and New York editors as the first pupils! 
a a York Evening Post, November 

, 1917. 


Foundations of Democracy 


NE of the members of the New York 
O Board of Education, Prof Frank- 
lin H Giddings, who voted for the 
suspension of three teachers and the transfer 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


of the other six, is quoted by David Starr 
Jordan in The New York Call of November 
18, as having written (in another connection) 
as follows: 


Our government is based on the agreement, both 
tacit and implied, that the minority shall always 
have the rights of free speech, of free press and 
of free agitation, in order to convert itself, if pos- 
sible, from the minority into a majority. As soon 
as these rights of the minority are denied it will 
inevitably resort to secret meetings, conspiracies, 
and, finally, force. In times of stress it may be 
extremely embarrassing for the majority to be ham- 
pered in quick, decisive action by an obstinate 
minority; but, nevertheless, the recognition of the 
right of the minority is our sole bond of unity. 
For this reason I repeat that any attempt to in- 
terfere with the rights of free speech and free press 
is a blow at the very foundation of our government. 








COMMUNICATIONS 








Another Interpretation: A 


Communication 


To the Editors, THE AMERICAN TEACHER: 


HIGH school principal finds the 
A cerebration of his colleagues—that 
is, of the teachers in his school—a 
source of serious discomfort. His lack of 
educational leadership fails to arouse their 
enthusiastic admiration. His intellectual 
narrowness or inertia wins him the contempt 
of many of the younger men and women. 
He resorts to his official authority to main- 
tain his dignity and demands that the re- 
spect and deference due to his station be con- 
ferred upon his personality. His authority 
is barely sufficient to restrain the more fear- 
less and able of his subordinates; and re- 
spect, like love, will not be compelled. 

It is asserted, with some truth, that the 
school is “ running” efficiently. There is no 
doubt that the records are reliable, that the 
reports are made in due form and on time. 
The students are well instructed—that is to 
say, they “pass” a reasonable proportion 
of examinations, they receive reasonably 
high “ marks,” they retain a reasonable pro- 
portion of what they “learn.” All this may 
be true without reflecting credit upon the 
supervisor, as it is well known that the 
pedagogic administration in the high school 
is in the hands of heads of department, most 
of whom had been selected and trained un- 
der the principal’s predecessors. But in a 





December, 1917 


city that is rapidly becoming the intellectual 
metropolis of the world, in a city that has 
the responsibility for integrating the diver- 
gent thought of dozens of races and national- 
ities, such efficiency presents but a negative 
influence. In a school that draws the most 
alert, the most energetic, the most idealistic 
of the city’s youth, such efficiency is a mock- 
ery. 

Presented with the opportunity to inspire 
and lead the lofty aspirations of this youth, 
the opportunity to direct this vast flow of 
spiritual power to noble social ends, the 
principal seems content to retail standard 
packages of classics, mathematics, language, 
and other academic wares. And when young- 
er teachers, in sympathy with the new day 
and with the dreams of youth, attempt to 
organize the human energy into agencies for 
righteousness and progress, the principal, 
thru sheer fear of what he does not under- 
stand, or thru shortsighted vindictiveness, 
calls upon a higher power for aid. He asks 
the superintendent to discipline the heretics. 

It is conceivable that a superintendent, 
confronted with evidence of maladjustment 
in the faculty of a school, should seek not 
to discover the “blame” for the friction, 
but to discover means for eliminating it. 
But with our invidious and autocratic tradi- 
tions every readjustment carries with it a 
reflection upon one or another of the per- 
sons concerned. Under such circumstances 
the superintendent, in spite of himself, is in 
danger of yielding to the tremendous pres- 
sure of external considerations. For ex- 
ample, the political or religious affiliations 
of this or that person, may be a potent fac- 
tor. Immediately after a bitterly contested 
municipal election, the preponderance of 
partisan votes may have its influence also. 

It is conceivable that a superintendent, 
finding internal friction in an important 
school might seize the opportunity to force 
the removal of the principal who has failed 
notoriously as an educational leader. But 
the force majeur of partisan domination of 
the schools is irresistible. Instead of re- 
moving the principal, the heretics are scat- 
tered to the four winds, besmeared with an 
insinuation of “disloyalty” and a number 
of the more aggravating ones are “ sus- 
pended ” pending vague charges. And all 
this as the result of “friendly conferences 
to discover educational ideas,” and the un- 
supported allegations of what was said in 
interviews of which no competent record was 
made. 

This is an interpretation of an incident 
that may mark the beginning of a new revo- 
lution in education. KD 


The American Teacher 


163 


To the Editors, THE AMERICAN TEACHER: 

I have much enjoyed the October number of THE 
AMERICAN But you will not democratize 
the schools while they are run—as now—by the pub- 
lishing houses. Stand for government publication 
at cost of texts in the fundamental subjects, and 
later in as many subjects as is possible! Only thus 
do I see any prospect of getting off the ha yoke 
which has tended to lowering of standards for so - 
many years. So long as American educators (7) 
can tell the stories they do tell of the tricks and 
mode of business of the k-agents, and as long as 
they can tell these stories with a laugh at the funny 
side of the matter, just so long will the schools suffer 
for lack of appreciation as to how democratization 
shall be, Success to every effort for o a 


in! 
of real Scaserney! 


Another Step Toward 
Democracy 


Los ANGELES has learned to tap the ed- 
ucational resources of the teaching force. 
Following is the plan devised for coopera- 
tion between the city superintendent and 
high school teachers: 

1. The council to consist tentatively of 
the superintendent and seven teachers, one 
of whom is to be the president of the High 
School Teachers Association, the other six 
to be teachers named by the president, sub- 
ject to confirmation by the executive com- 
mittee. 

2. The council to meet at stated intervals, 
to be determined by the council itself. 

8. The council may discuss any matter 
relating to high schools or intermediate 
schools concerning which the superintendent 
could properly act or concerning which he 
could address the Board of Education. 

4. Members of the council may take the 
initiative in introducing subjects for con- 
sideration. 

5. Any policies of the superintendent or 
of the Board of Education may be brought 
up in the council for criticism so long as 
the criticism is kept within the proper pro- 
fessional bounds. 

6. The members of the council are not to 
be considered as representatives of partic- 
ular schools or groups of teachers, but are 
to approach all problems from the point of 
view of their relation to the entire school 
system. 

7. The methods by which the council shall 
keep in touch with the members of the as- 
sociation shall be worked out by the execu- 
tive committee of the association cooperat- 
ing with the members of the council. 

8. The superintendent in becoming a 
member of the council is not to be under- 
stood as abrogating any of his authority un- 





164 


der the laws of the State and the rules of 
the Board of Education. 

9.. The members of the council will con- 
sider themselves under obligation to abstain 
from making public matters discussed in the 
council involving the character and fitness 
of individual teachers. 

10. The president in appointing members 
of the council and the executive committee 
in confirming them, will consider only the 
fitness of the persons named to pass upon 
questions concerning high school and inter- 
mediate school matters in an _ intelligent, 
broad-minded and professional spirit. 


The Teacher and Society 


HE lot of the teacher is by no means a 
happy one. A host of social and po- 
litical problems arise that do not 
quite harmonize with the grandfather clauses 
of his mental constitution, leaving him in a 
confused and disordered condition. What 
attitude shall he take toward them? While 
struggling to readjust himself to these new 
circumstances, along come wholly new prob- 
lems, demanding and insisting upon a solu- 
tion, and his confusion of mind becomes worse 
confounded. 

It is frequently asked whether the teacher 
should concern himself with social and po- 
litical problems. Should the sum of the ac- 
tivities of the teacher be confined to getting 
to school on time, with his lessons well pre- 
pared and his plan book properly para- 
graphed? Or should the teacher in addition 
have views on suffrage, government owner- 
ship, and labor? Having views, should he 
express them; or prudently reserve them for 
his wife’s exclusive benefit? Should the 
teacher have an attitude toward war and 
peace? Or should he learn what is the atti- 
tude of the trustees or the Board of Educa- 
tion, and conveniently adopt it for purposes 
of protective coloration? Should the teacher 
in a Northern State condemn the murder of 
strikers, which is so frequently incidental to 
the conduct of our industrial struggles or 
should he confine his indignation to the lynch- 
ing parties of our Southern brothers? 

Is it part of the teacher’s business to insist 
on keeping our democratic war aims demo- 
cratic? Should the teacher attempt to coun- 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


teract the evil effects of the growing blood- 
lust of our aged and retired bankers and col- 
lege presidents, or prevent the fanning of the 
embers of national hatred—a permanent 
bar to universal peace? Should he help 
spread the doctrine so clearly expressed by 
former Premier Asquith, who asks us “to 
banish once and for all from our catalogue 
of maxims the time-worn fallacy that if you 
wish for peace you must make ready for 
war”? Is the teacher concerned in maintain- 
ing the constitutional rights of free speech 
and free press in war time? 

What should the “ good ” teacher do? This 
question cannot be avoided, no matter how 
long we refuse to answer it. Incidents arise 
daily to raise it afresh. No amount of dodg- 
ing will solve the problem. Some universi- 
ties like the University of Pennsylvania, 
Utah, and Columbia, have frankly faced the 
issue. They have said that the “good” 
teacher will leave all social, economic and 
political questions to his “superiors.” The 
school authorities of Cleveland and Chicago 
have more or less recently taken the same 
position. Should this be the teacher’s posi- 
tion? 


Educational Bigotry 


ROFESSOR PAUL SHOREY, of the 
P University of Illinois, holds classical 
views on the teaching of classics, and 

he expounds those views in a worthy manner. 
The Southwestern Ohio Teachers’ Associa- 
tion invited Professor Shorey to address its 
conference in October. After the invitation 
had been accepted some of the Teachers 
feared that he might voice views out of keep- 
ing with the latest word in the New Educa- 
tion, and the committee gave the speaker 
the choice between assuring them that he 
would speak on no controversial topics, 
and assuring them that he would adhere 
very strictly to his announced theme, “ The 
American Language.” Professor Shorey 
accepted neither alternative; he withdrew 
his acceptance. This is a well deserved 
rebuke to those who go about in teachers’ 
clothes seeking safe doctrine and closing the 
avenues to new ideas. It is quite as impor- 





December, 1917 


tant for the teachers of “ new ” subjects and 
the wielders of “new” methods to hear and 
consider the views of the classicist, as it is 
for the latter to attempt to understand the 
meaning of the “new” offerings. In the 
closed mind lies the peril to our education, 
not in unsound doctrine. 
Mob Spirit 

I HAVE been very much distrest, my fel- 

low-citizens, by some of the things that 

have happened recently. The mob spir- 
it is displaying itself here and there in this 
country. I have no sympathy with what 
some men are saying, but I have no sympathy 
with the men that take their punishment into 
their own hands, and I want to say to every 
man who does join such a mob that I do not 
recognize him as worthy of the free institu- 
tions of the United States——PRESIDENT 
WILSON before the American Federation of 
Labor, Buffalo, November 13, 1917. 


The Worker’s Viewpoint 


(From Resolutions adopted at Buffalo Con- 


vention of American Federation of 
Labor, November, 1917) 

The only environment in which free insti- 
tutions can be maintained is generated 
through freedom of expression and press. 
Untrammelled discussion is the only safe pre- 
liminary to determination of policy. A minor- 
ity group, suffering from injustice, can more 
readily secure redress when freedom of speech 
exists. The minority cause of today becomes 
the accepted method of tomorrow. Repres- 
sion never removed any injustice or corrected 
an evil. | 

The public press is the public forum. It 
creates and directs public opinion. Publicity 
calculated to mislead can be counteracted by 
increased publicity for truth. Freedom must 
not be confused with license. 

* * * 


The committee which reported on this ex- 
ecutive council view of the convention said, 
after indorsing these views, “We are in 
accord with these fundamental principles, and 
that especially during the war period there 
should be no restriction of free speech and a 
free press, and that those who abuse and de- 
file these cornerstones of democracy should 
be punished by due process of law and a trial 


by jury. 


The American Teacher 


Exploiting Hysteria 
F sedition is taught in the public schools, 
it is the clear duty of the responsible 
authorities to apply the most drastic 
available means to its extirpation, but the 


teachers who have been suspended or trans- 


ferred from the DeWitt Clinton High School 
in New York appear not te be charged with 
teaching sedition. In the notice of suspen- 
sion Principal [Superintendent] Tildsley 
writes: “I have preferred charges against 
you for holding views which are subversive 
of discipline in the schools and which under- 
mine good citizenship.” In America a man 
is supposed to be free to hold what views 
seem good to him; only their promulgation 
can possibly constitute an offence. More- 
over, the evidence upon which the charge 
of subversive views is based appears to have 
been gathered by Principal Tildsley through 
a personal inquisition in which the suspected 
teachers were forced to reply to a number 
of inquiries of the familiar “ catch-question ” 
type of the crafty and unscrupulous ped- 
agogue. It is impossible to read the press 
reports of the quarrel without forming the 
suspicion that the educational authorities are 
availing themselves of the popular sensitive- 
ness to any charge of sedition in order to 
discipline teachers who have interfered with 
their own bureaucratic designs. It looks as 
if Principal [Superintendent] Tildsley had 
been commissioned to “ get something on” 
teachers antecedently condemned. Only the 
fairest and openest trial can allay this sus- 
picion of crooked dealing. —The New Repub- 
lic, November 24, 1917. 


UNSHACKELED FREEDOM 


No matter whose the lips that would speak, 
they must be free and ungagged. Let us be- 
lieve that the whole of truth can never do 
harm to the whole of virtue; and remember 
that in order to get the whole of truth, you 
must allow every man, right or wrong, freely 
to utter his conscience, and protect him in so 
doing. Entire unshackled freedom for every 
man’s life, no matter what his doctrine—the 
safety of free discussion no matter how wide 
its range. The community which dares not 
protect its humblest and most hated member 
in the free utterance of his opinion, no matter 
how false or hateful, is only a gang of slaves. 
—Wendell Phillips. 


\" 





166 


Cornerstone of Democracy 


I make no cha against any member of the 
teaching staff. I fal lly ‘elie the danger of judg- 
ment based upon false or exaggerated rumors. 
There is much talk about socialism and pacif- 
ism as if they were synonymous with disloyalty. 


Socialism is not disloyalty, it is a 
ment which has much to commend it or anes bee 
ever disa ting it may be in 

it ~~, 


tion; disloyalty un 

itself lo amen or action. F of 
nensht. and speech limited only by the rights of 
others-is the inherent right of every citizen. But 
loyal support of the American vernment in 
thought and word and act is the very cornerstone 
of erican democracy.—President William G. 
Willeox, New York Board of Education. 


San Francisco’s New Plan for Schools 


COMMISSIONER CLAXTON has just com- 
pleted his survey of the San Francisco 
schools. It is interesting to note that the 
report calls for a larger proportion of men 
teachers and principals, a reduction in the 
size of classes, adequate library and class- 
room facilities, especially in the high schools, 
an improvement of teaching methods by 
“more stimulating thought and less mem- 
oriter work,” “more effort in self-reliant 
thinking on the part of pupils,” greater ac- 


VERY URGEN 


Cut this out, sign legibly, and return to 
The American Teacher, 70 Fifth Ave., Room 909 


LOYALTY PLEDGE 


I, the undersigned, a lover of ideas, do here- 
with gladly promise to contribute to the 
American Teacher the sum of $ 

month for 1918. 


My initial contribution is $...... eee 
(Signed) 








This is Ga ones Organ 


° e 
American Federation of Teachers 
(Affiliated with American Federation of Labor) 
OFFICERS OF THE A. F. OF T. 
Cuas. B STILLMAN, President 
1225 Sedgwick St., Chicago, III. 
ETHEL E BEsrs, Vice-President 
$414 S. Paulina St., Chicago 
GO C WILLARD, Recording Secretary 
7218 Cornell Ave., ate 


SN Sec. 
ay 
TECKER, Financia 
1618 Lake Ave., Wilmette, Ill. 
JAMES A MEADE, Treasurer 
2628 Sayre Ave., Chicago 
STEES 


TRU 
Henry R Linville George J Jones 
Anita Bailey Wm. T McCoy 
Lydia J Trowbridge 


The American Teacher 


Vol. VI., No. 9 


curacy in arithmetic, and the inclusion of at 
least one modern language in the curriculum 
of each high school. The pressing need of a 
more careful segregation of defectives is 
also urged. 








, Management, gr, etc., 
ess of August 24, 1912 Tue 


peat, except July and A 
» 1917. State of New = 


ag the >. a 
required bythe ‘A HER, ob 
at New York, N. Y., for April 1 
County of New York, ss. 

Before me, a Notary Public, in and for the State and county 
aforesaid, personally appeared J Edward Mayman, who, having 
been duly sworn according to law, deposes and says that he 
is the Business Manager of Tue American TeacHer, and that 
the following is, to the best of his knowledge and belief, a 
- £ statement of the ownership, management (and if a daily 

per, the circulation), etc., of the aforesaid publication for 
the date shown in the above caption, req y the Act of 
August 24, 1912, embodied in section 443, Postal Laws and 
a a Yi on the reverse of this form, to wit: 
names and addresses of: the publisher, editor, 
eomalen fd and business managers are: Publisher. The 
American Teacher Co., Inc., 70 Fifth Ym New York. Editor- 
in-Chief, Henry R Linville, "70 Fifth Ave., ’ New York. Manag- 
ing Editor, Benj C Gruenberg, 70 Fifth Ave., New York. 
Business Manager, J Edward Mayman, 70 Fifth Ave., New 


York. 
2. That the owners are: The American Teacher Co., Inc., 
70 Fifth Ave., New York. Mark Hoffman, 70 Fifth Ave., 
York. Benj C Gruenberg, 70 Fifth Ave., New York. 
Henry R Linville, 70 Fifth Ave., New York. Gabriel R Mason, 
70 Fifth Ave., New York. J E Mayman, 70 Fifth Ave., New 

8. That the known bondholders, mortgagees, and other se- 
curity holders owning or holding 1 per cent or more of total 
amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities are: None. 

4. That the two paragraphs next above, giving the names 
of the owners, stockholders, and security holders, if any, con- 
tain not only the list of stockholders and security hol ers as 
they appear upon the books of the company also, in cases 
where the stockholder or security holder appears upon the 
books of the company as trustees or in any other fiduciary 
relation, the name of the person or corporation for whom 
such trustee is acting, is given; also that the said two para- 
graphs contain statements embracing affiant’s full knowledge 
and belief as to the circumstances and conditions under which 
stockholders and security holders who do not appear upon the 
books of the company as trustees, hold stock and securities 
in a capacity other than that of a bona fide owner; and this 
affiant has no reason to believe that any other person, associa- 
tion, or corporation has any interest direct or indirect in the 
said stock, bonds, or other securitied than as E° nee Rk, him. 


[Signed] 
usiness Mana 


al ayers to and subscribed before me this 20th day of Sock, 


I a Mary Utley. 


(My commission expires March, 1918.) 


Teachers Wanted 


The Teachers Union of New York is in- 
formed of a vacancy for a kindergarten-pri- 
mary teacher who is a pianist. Salary $35 and 
maintenance. Address, referring to THE AMERI- 
ay. TEACHER, to Supt J Kienzle, Parsippany, 











KINDERGARTEN 


PRI Ww 
iNe¥-CAt sta 


IF you dre a Primary ora 
Rural Teacher you can get 
above magazine, the oldest 
in the world of its kind and 
one of the most helpful in 
your work, 3 mos. for 15c. 


$1 a year. 3.11. SH8UL-ES Co. 














December, 1917 


A Thing or Two 


FATHER GOOSE AGAIN 
A diller a dollar, 
Dear teacher, why holler? 
Be reasonable, neighbor : 
A Board that’s got 
To save a lot 
Must cut the cost of labor. 


ALL OVER THE GLOBE 


Says the illuminating Dr. Frank Crane: It is 
more "hensoeliie to teach school than to make money. 
“We are all honorable men.” 


Nomination for the new Board of Ed.: Ez- 
PROF. CHARLES A. BEARD. 


WILDE WORDS 
Elementary education, says the growingly 
famous and late Oscar W., insists on the 
population of places that no one ever 
wants to go to, and makes one familiar 
with the lives of persons who probably 
never existed. 


A MISUNDERSTANDING 
I did not say the gentleman was pigheaded; I' said he was 
bigoted. I had a cold. KD 


UNREALIZED POSSIBILITY 
Speaking of false prophets, we might un- 
blasphemously paraphrase some well-known 
lines that sing about the gnashing of teeth 
and the Whalon in Babylon. 
But we heroically resist the temptation. 


CURTAIN CALL 


The late lamented Mayor does the Hylan fling with 
the Gary Sisters. Exeunt. 


TEARY GLOBULES 
Says the immortal Dr. Frank Crane (with a 
charming tildsley smile): No profession offers 
such constant inducements to be honest, truthful, 
humane, and intelligent. 
For a complete catalog of the inducements 
a to the firm of Schneer, Mufson, 
Schmalhausen & Co., (suspended). 


Nomination for the new Board of Ed.: PRoF. 
(Still) JOHN DEWEY. 


A GARGLOBE 
Says the omniscient Dr. Frank Crane: It (teach- 
ing) . the kind of work that strengthens and con- 
stantly refreshes life, and not exhausts life, when 
pursued in the —_ spirit. 
Politely we ask: When who are pursued? 


dickory dock 
And the Board-of-Ed clock 
Goes patrio-tick-tock-tick-tock. 


The American Teacher 


167 


THE END OF THE GLOBE 
And the more than radical Dr. Frank Cran 
last line tip. Take off a hat to the teacher. 
And hit him with it 


Send in your nomination for the new Board 
of Ed. 


Who, we inquire, who are the seven willful men? 


We pause for a reply. 
Jess Perlman. 


INSUBORDINATION 


Which are the Superintendents who wrote that 
insubordinate letter to Dr Maxwell? Do you re- 
call how unanimously those same superintendents 
stood behind Henrietta Rodman when she wrote a 
similar letter to the same gentleman? We don’t. 


TO PROF. POMPUS 
PRINCIPAL P.: “ I wouldn’t be seen attending 
a meeting off The Teachers’ Union. Do you 
think I belong to the working class?” 

Don’t worry, Mr Pompus, you need not ex- 
pose yourself to intelligence. Better stick 
with the members of the-——*, and you will 
be safe against inoculation. A. L. 


* Deleted by censor. 


PLUNGING INTO POLITICS 
Dear Miss Teacher wants more pay. 
Our poor starving budget! Shall it 
Give it to her right away? 

You know she has the ballot. 


STUDY OF THE GLOBE 
Says the olympian Dr Frank Crane: There 
are probably fewer immoral, shady, devious, 
or hypocritical persons in the teaching  busi- 
ness than in any other. 
powers Does the teaching business include 


ts, commissioners, etc.? 
(N. “ The question is purely rhetorical.) 


FROM THE GLIB GLOBE 
Says the ultra-modern Dr. Frank Crane: 
teachers are born. 
But the Board of Ed. 
Doth strike on dead. 
Or to quote P. P., The Board successfully em- 
ploys Birth Contvol 


Good 


IF PROOF WERE NEEDED 
There is no use denying it. The public schools 
have not succeeded in poee Poon good citizens. Con- 
sider the “products” of our schools who become 
prominent in machine politics—in Philadelphia, or 
Chicago, say; to say nothing of New York. 


AN ANCIENT PROBLEM 


Even before there were any socialists teachi 1 
the schools of New York City many of the 
grew up and went into Tammany. N 1 oi 





The American Teacher 


A LESSON 
IN GRAMMAR 





Could and Should 


We could give the children 


reading, writing and 
arithmetic, and be done 
with it. 


could give them half a 
day and save millions of 
dollars on buildings. 


could make it so dis- 
agreeable that the chil- 
dren will leave school 
as soon as the law per- 
mits. 


could have stricter dis- 
cipline so that they may 
become more submis- 
sive workers. 


could: insure our re- 
election by stinting on 
school expenditures. 


We should enrich the cur- 


riculum and introduce 
the children to modern 
life. 


should fill .their day 
with joyous and profit- 
able activities. 


should make school so 
interesting. that the 
children will want to 
stay as long as the law 
allows. 


should provide a regi- 
men that will make 
courageous and se! f- 
respecting citizens. 


should make healthy 
an@ skilful men and 
women at any cost. 


oT 


Vol. VI., No. 9