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Connecticut, of what Barnard did a little later in Rhode Island, of what Horace Mann did in Massachusetts, to draw together the friends of the schools that had grown up and to knit them into an effective service that would benefit the children of these great commonwealths, until we do not have in America to-day a single State without its State leadership, and I wonder if there is anyone here who would question the benefit of that leadership. And yet it had to go through the same kind of a struggle, the same kind of an education campaign to get the people to believe in it as this measure has to go through.

The CHAIRMAN. Is it not true that the people who advocated taxsupported schools in those days were characterized very much as the people are to-day as "Reds" and un-American and all that?

Mr. MORGAN. They were called all the names that a resourceful opposition could think of.

Mr. LowREY. I can remember even when I was a boy some citizens were against free public schools, and claimed it was unjust and unrighteous to tax one man to educate the children of another man.

Mr. MORGAN. Exactly so. Another one of the questions that formed one of the historic battle lines in America was the simple question, Shall high schools be maintained from public taxes? Going back to 1821, when the first high school was established in Boston, there was a period of half a century when high schools came very slowly, then as they came more rapidly in city after city, there was a fight that shook the cities to the very depths of their public interest as to whether there should be a policy of free high schools, and you heard that record of increase in high-school enrollment that was presented here, beginning back in 1880, and in every decade a doubling, until in this decade it has doubled in less than two-thirds of the decade.

I wonder if any one would question the wisdom of the free high school in the development of the country. I wonder if the very interests that opposed the free high school and said it would literally bankrupt the cities, if they could look back now, wouldn't realize that that has been the chief factor in making America the most intelligent and economically the most powerful nation in the entire history of civilization?

Mr. BLACK. Just what effect has it had economically?

Mr. MORGAN. Why, sir; it is perfectly obvious that a person who is a high-school graduate, and who has the knowledge and skill and ability to live well and take care of his health and energy and has the buying power and taste that the high school creates is a better unit around which to build than one who is illiterate or does not have that education.

Mr. BLACK. Transfer them to a barren waste, and that doesn't accomplish much.

Mr. MORGAN. They would make out of the barren waste a garden. Mr. BLACK. That is an assumption.

The CHAIRMAN. The illiterate nations to-day are the most backward and uneconomical, even though the natural wealth is there.

Mr. MORGAN. Why, sir; you can take an encyclopedia of statistics for 40 years, and compare the standing of American education with the standing of education of the other nations of the world, and you will find that is the epoch during which America came into her great

leadership and power in the family of nations, and she could because the foundations were laid in the schools.

Mr. BLACK. No doubt it has had a great contributing force, but to put it all upon education is going far afield. She sent a com

Mr. MORGAN. Take France. What did she do? mittee around the world, and when the committee got back to France to recommend what they should do to save their trade, they said to put art into the French schools, and you know the result that has come in the decades to follow. France has come to be looked upon as the great producer of the fine things in the economic world.

To go on with our story. That question of the high schools settled itself. Everybody is happy about it. Everybody believes it is a good thing for the children and for the nation.

Another question came again at different times in different States, but a battlefield, nevertheless, in different States: Shall children be required to attend school? And what a bitter fight that was. People perfectly sincere thought it contrary to the entire spirit of America and democracy, and yet that battle has been won, and I don't know of anyone to-day who questions the necessity and the right and the justice of requiring that every child shall have some educational opportunity, even though his parents might not have the foresight and the wisdom and the good sense to send him, in certain cases, without being required to do so.

Then another one of those battles concerned the question of the teacher: Shall any one be allowed to teach, as they were in the beginning days, or shall there be set up for the profession of teaching standards for the admission of people to this great vocation? Shall there be created professional schools for them and shall they be required to attend those schools? That struggle is hardly over now. In some of the States they are still trying to decide, as President Morgan pointed out this morning, whether they shall have four years training, or whether they shall have two years, and most of them have a great deal less than two years at the present time.

I think it may help to look at education in that great sweep of its development and realize the things which seemed doubtful at the time have turned out to be the very foundation upon which we have built our prosperity and our progress and our national well being.

Now, there are certain more important questions that concern the creation of this Department of Education. You, here in this committee, most of you, are business men. You, looking at the activities of the National Government in education, would want to know how to carry on the activities that exist now in the most effective and economical way. I drew up the other day a statement of some of the things that we now do in two different places, just as samples, not as a complete statement of the case, that could be bettered if they were drawn together in one place. Take the Federal Board for Vocational Education and the Bureau of Education, for example. Each of those agencies maintains a separate library. If you want certain facts you have to go over in this direction. If you want certain other facts, you have to go over in another direction, neither one covering the whole field. By drawing those together you could make the same

office go vastly farther and still render a larger service. Take statistics. I had occasion not long ago to want statistics of a certain kind, and I called the Department of Agriculture for the ones they could provide. They said they would get at it, and within two hours I had those statistics by messenger. I called the Federal Board for similar statistics at the same time, and they said they would see about it this is not meant as a criticism-and the next morning they called to say they couldn't send those statistics, that they didn't have a statistical division. Now, there is a statistical bureau in the Bureau of Education, and by the natural unification of those two great activities each would profit from the service which the other has built up. Take the reading and distribution of publications. It is costly to duplicate the processes that go to the handling of this matter, from the printing to the distribution over the country; the things that are handled in the chief clerk's office; then there are various studies in which there is a definite duplication, which the research division will probably tell you something about. It is just plain good business sense to draw those activities together, so that the leaders in those various agencies could have the benefit of each other's experience, could have the inspiration that comes out of associating strong men together, so that they can discuss the policies and plans that they desire to work out.

I wish to present just one other point. In the development of the Journal of the National Educational Association and in seeking to bring the facts to the great body of teachers throughout this Nation we present each month one page of statistical facts, large facts needed to guide the American educational policy, and over the years that we have been working on that project at no time have we been able to get the facts that we wanted, simply because they did not exist, and even the facts that we did have we have gotten, in many cases, so late that they could not be essentially useful in guiding educational policy. Here is a table of the growth of the National Congress of Parents and Teachers, a body that has grown during the period it has been supporting this bill from 189,000 to more than a million and a quarter. The membership in that body this year, which became known on April 15, is now in the printing office going into type to appear in the Journal of the National Education Association, so that we will have that for 1927-28.

The latest table that we could get on enrollment in the American public schools, concerning some 28,000,000 people that are in these schools, is published here and it is for 1925-26.

I wish, Mr. Chairman, that I might insert these sample pages in the record to show something of what the educational facts in a large way mean in interpreting educational needs and in suggesting some of the fields in which research and the gathering of facts is needed. The CHAIRMAN. If there is no objection they will go in the record.

(The matter referred to is as follows:)

Growth of National Congress of Parents and Teachers 1918-1927

[From the Journal of the National Education Association, October, 1927-Prepared by the research divi. sion of the National Education Association]

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Obtain the figures for your State by reading table as follows: In 1918 Alabama had a membership of 504 in the National Congress of Parents and Teachers; in 1920, 556; and so on. The membership for 1927 had increased to 13,026 (column 8). At present, fifty-one hundredths of 1 per cent of the total population of Alabama, or one person in every 1,957, is a member. This gives Alabama a relative ranking of 38. Similarly read figures for other States.

Sources of data: Figures as to population for 1927 from United States Bureau of Census estimates. Those for membership in the National Congress are from statement of treasurer's receipts of the National Congress of Parents and Teachers for the various years concerned. The percentages in column 9 are obtained by dividing the figures of column 8 by those of column 2.

Members of the association will wish to give the figures covering their respective States to the local newspapers. Teachers may well make arithmetic problems from this page for solution in school. Such problems are also good lessons in civics. For example, what is the per cent increase in membership in your State from 1918 to 1927? How much would the membership of your State have to be increased in order to rank first among the States in the percent of population members? What per cent increase would this be?

The five associations having the largest absolute membership in 1927 are: First, California; second, Illinois; third, Ohio; fourth, Michigan; fifth, Missouri. Educational workers wishing to organize parent-teacher associations for their schools may obtain full information from: National Congress of Parents and Teachers, 1201 Sixteenth Street NW., Washington, D. C.

The parent-teacher associations of the Territory of Hawaii have been organized into the first territorial branch and for the year 1926-27 had 1,357 members.

This table is one of a series of carefully planned presentations of facts that are of importance to every teacher and to the Nation as a whole. They deal with large matters that concern everyone. Among the fields that will be covered during 1927-28 are growth in summer school attendance, growth in professional and technical organizations other than teachers, number of graduates of teacher training institutions, growth in State and national education associations, and data covering enrollment in schools and expenditures for them.

Growth of summer school attendance

[From the Journal of the National Education Association, November, 1927-Prepared by the research division of the National Education Association]

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The figures as to number of teachers in 1926-27 are estimates, based upon the latest and most reliable data available; they include teachers, principals, supervisors, and administrative officers.

'The number of institutions in this column is that reported in the Educational Directory for 1927, United States Bureau of Education, Bulletin, 1927, No. 1. All institutions listed in this directory were given two opportunities to report. Of the 662 institutions conducting summer sessions 596 reported, or 90 per cent. A complete report was received from all institutions in 27 States and Territories. The rank of a few States is considerably lowered because some of their institutions failed to report. Such States may be identified by comparing columns 5 and 6.

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