established King's college to educate sons of noble birth and prevent the spread of republican ideas. The Revolution of 1776 changed all. In fighting together for national independence the different peoples assimilated and became Americans in the new sense. They not only combined their forces in war, but in peace they combined the enlarged intelligence which the war had brought to them. They realized that education in all its phases and grades must be encouraged, and, so far as practicable, made universal under a democracy in which the rights of opportunity were to be equal,

But while they began to be interested in education it was because they saw that schools would help the individual and so promote virtue and extend religion. It did not occur to them at the first that the safety of the new form of government was associated with the diffusion of learning among all the people. This is not strange, for the suffrage was not universal at the beginning of independent government in America. Therefore, while the desirability of education was recognized, it was understood to be the function of parents to provide it for their children, or of guardians and masters to extend it to their wards and apprentices. When schools were first established they were partnership affairs between people who had children in their care, and for their convenience. They apportioned the expense among themselves; such as had no children were without much concern about the matter.

It was soon seen that many who had children to educate would neglect them in order to avoid the expense of contributing to the support of the school. Aside from this the schools were very indifferent affairs. If they were to be of any account they must have recognition and encouragement from government. It was easily conceived to be a function of government to encourage schools. Encouragement was given by official and legislative declarations in their behalf and then by authorizing townships to use funds derived from excise fees and other sources for the benefit of the schools when not otherwise needed. It was a greater step to attempt

to say that townships should require people, who had children to educate, to maintain schools, and a still greater one to adopt the principle that every child was entitled to at least an elementary education as of right, that this was as much for the safety of the state as for the good of the child, that therefore the state was bound to see that schools were provided for all, and that all the property of all the people should contribute alike to their support. Perhaps it was even a greater step to provide secondary and collegiate, and in many cases professional and technical, training at the public cost. But these great positions were in time firmly

taken.

There was nothing like an educational system in the United States at the beginning of the nineteenth century. At that time there were four or five colleges, here and there a private academy or fitting school, and elementary schools of indifferent character in the cities and the thinly settled In the course of the century a great system of schools has come to cover the land. It is free and flexible, adaptable to local conditions, and yet it possesses most of the elements of a complete and symmetrical system. The parts or grades of this system may perhaps be designated as follows:

towns.

a) Free public elementary schools in reach of every home in the land.

b) Free public high schools, or secondary schools, in every considerable town.

c) Free land grant colleges, with special reference to the agricultural and mechanical arts, in all the states.

d) Free state universities in practically all of the southern states and all the states west of Pennsylvania.

e) Free normal schools, or training schools for teachers, in practically every state.

f) Free schools for defectives, in substantially all of the

states.

g) National academies for training officers for the army and navy.

h) A vast number of private kindergartens, music and art schools, commercial schools, industrial schools, professional schools, denominational colleges, with a half dozen leading and privately endowed universities.

This mighty educational system has developed with the growth of towns and cities and states. It has been shaped by the advancing sagacity of the people. Above all other of American civic institutions, it has been the one most expressive of the popular will and the common purposes. Everywhere it is held in the control of the people, and so far as practicable in the control of local assemblages. While the tendencies of later years have, from necessities, been towards centralization of management, the conspicuous characteristic of the systems has always been the extent to which the elementary and secondary schools are controlled and directed by each community. The inherent and universal disposition in this direction has favored general school laws and yielded to centralized administration only so far as has come to be necessary to life, efficiency and growth. But circumstances have made this necessary to a very considerable extent.

Bearing in mind the historic facts touching the development of the school system, we may proceed to consider the legal organization and authoritative scheme of administration which have arisen therefrom. We will begin with the most elementary and decentralized form of organization and proceed to the more general and concentrated ones, following the steps which have marked the growth of the system in a general way, but with no thought of tracing the particular lines of educational advancement in the several states.

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THE SCHOOL DISTRICT

The "school district" is the oldest and the most primary form of school organization. Indeed, it is the smallest civil division of our political system. It resulted from the natural disposition of neighboring families to associate together for the maintenance of a school. Later it was recognized by

law and given some legal functions and responsibilities. Its territorial extent is no larger than will permit of all the children attending a single school, although it sometimes happens that in sparsely settled country the children have to go several miles to school. It ordinarily accommodates but a few families: districts have had legal existence with but one family in each: many with not more than a half dozen families. It is better adapted to the circumstances of the country than to those of the town or city. A different form has been provided for the considerable towns, and still another for the cities as they have developed. The “district system" is in operation in most of the states, and in such the number of districts extends into the thousands. In New York, for example, there are over eleven thousand and in Illinois over twelve thousand school districts.

The government of the school district is the most simple and democratic that can be imagined. It is controlled by school meetings composed of the resident legal voters. In many of the states women have been constituted legal voters at school meetings. These meetings are held at least annually and as much oftener as may be desired. They may vote needed repairs to the primitive schoolhouse and desirable appliances for the school. They may decide to erect a new schoolhouse. They may elect officers, one or more, commonly called trustees or directors, who must carry out their directions and who are required by law to employ the teacher and have general oversight of the school. Although the law ordinarily gives the trustees free discretion in the appointment of teachers, provided only that a person duly certificated must be appointed, yet it not infrequently happens that the district controls the selection of the teacher through the election of trustees with known preferences.

Much has been said against the district system, and doubtless much that has been said has been justified. At the same time it cannot be denied that the system has had much to commend it. It has suited the conditions of country life:

it has resulted in schools adapted to the thought and wants of farming people: it has done something to educate the people themselves, parents as well as children, in civic spirit and patriotism: and it has afforded a meeting place for the people within comfortable reach of every home. The school has not always been the best, but it has been ordinarily as good as a free and primitive people would sustain or could profit by. It is true that the teachers have generally been young and inexperienced, but they have not yet been trained into mechanical automatons, and as a rule they have been the most promising young people in the world, the ones who, a few years later, have been the makers of opinion and the leaders of action upon a considerable field. Certainly the work has lacked system, continuity and progressiveness, the pupils have commenced at the same place in the book many times and never advanced a great distance, but, on the other hand, the children in the country schools have had the home training and the free, natural life which has developed strong qualities in character and individual initiative in large measure, and so have not suffered seriously, in comparison with the children living in the towns.

The dis

trict system has sufficed well for them and it has otherwise been of much advantage to the people; and with all its shortcomings, or the abuses that are common where it prevails, they are hardly worse than are found under more pretentious systems. Surely the "American District School System" is to be spoken of with respect, for it has exerted a marked influence upon our citizenship, and has given strong and wholesome impulses in all the affairs of the nation.

THE TOWNSHIP SYSTEM

While in the first half of the century the general educa tional purpose seems to have been to make the district system more perfect, the tendency in the latter half has unmistakably been to merge it into a more pretentious organization, covering a larger area, and capable of larger undertakings. The cause of this has been the desire for larger schools,