Part 6

The provisions of the Law are entitled, _Of the Public Schools_,[26] meaning our Common Schools. To these we must look to ascertain what constitutes a Public School. Only those established in conformity with the Law can be legally such. They may, in fact, be more or less public; yet, if they do not come within the terms of the Law, they do not form part of the beautiful system of our Public Schools,--they are not Public Schools, or, as I prefer to call them, Common Schools. The two terms are used as identical; but the latter is that by which they were earliest known, while it is most suggestive of their comprehensive character. A "common" in law is defined to be "_open ground equally used_ by many persons"; and the same word, when used as an adjective, is defined by lexicographers as "belonging equally to many or to the public," thus asserting Equality.

[26] Revised Statutes, Ch. 23.

If we examine the text of this statute, we shall find nothing to sustain the rule of exclusion which has been set up. The first section provides, that "in every town, containing fifty families or householders, there shall be kept in each year, at the charge of the town, by a teacher or teachers of competent ability and good morals, _one school_ for the instruction of _children_ in Orthography, Reading, Writing, English Grammar, Geography, Arithmetic, and Good Behavior, for the term of six months, or two or more such schools, for terms of time that shall together be equivalent to six months." The second, third, and fourth sections provide for the number of such schools in towns having respectively one hundred, one hundred and fifty, and five hundred families or householders. There is no language recognizing any discrimination of race or color. Thus, in every town, the schools, whether one or more, are "for the instruction of _children_" generally,--not children of any particular class or race or color, but children,--meaning the children of the town where the schools are.

The fifth and sixth sections provide a school, in certain cases, where additional studies are to be pursued, which "shall be kept _for the benefit of all the inhabitants_ of the town." The language here recognizes no discrimination among the children, but seems directly to exclude it.

In conformity with these sections is the peculiar phraseology of the memorable Colonial law of 1647, founding Common Schools, "to the end that learning may not be buried in the graves of our forefathers." This law obliged townships having fifty householders to "forthwith appoint one within their towns to teach _all such children as shall resort to him_ to write and read."[27] Here again there is no discrimination among the children. _All_ are to be taught.

[27] Charters and General Laws of the Colony and Province of Massachusetts Bay, p. 186.

On this legislation the Common Schools of Massachusetts have been reared. The section of the Revised Statutes,[28] and the statute of 1838,[29] appropriating small sums, in the nature of a contribution, from the School Fund, for the support of Common Schools among the Indians, do not interfere with this system. These have the anomalous character of all the legislation concerning the Indians. It does not appear, however, that separate schools are established by law among the Indians, nor that the Indians are in any way excluded from the Common Schools in their neighborhood.

[28] Chap. 23, sec. 68.

[29] Chap. 154.

I conclude, on this head, that there is but one Public School in Massachusetts. This is the Common School, equally free to all the inhabitants. There is nothing establishing an exclusive or separate school for any particular class, rich or poor, Catholic or Protestant, white or black. In the eye of the law there is but _one class_, where all interests, opinions, conditions, and colors commingle in harmony,--excluding none, therefore comprehending all.

* * * * *

EQUALITY UNDER JUDICIAL DECISIONS.

The Courts of Massachusetts, in harmony with the Constitution and the Laws, have never recognized any discrimination founded on race or color, in the administration of the Common Schools, but have constantly declared the equal rights of all the inhabitants.

There are only a few decisions bearing on this subject, but they breathe one spirit. The sentiment of Equality animates them all. In the case of _The Commonwealth_ v. _Dedham_, (16 Mass. R., 146,) while declaring the equal rights of all the inhabitants, in both Grammar and District Schools, the Court said:--

"The schools required by the statute are to be maintained for the benefit of the whole town, _as it is the wise policy of the law to give all the inhabitants equal privileges for the education of their children in the Public Schools_. Nor is it in the power of the majority to deprive the minority of this _privilege_.... Every inhabitant of the town has a right to participate in the benefits of both descriptions of schools; and it is not competent for a town to establish a grammar school for the benefit of one part of the town to the exclusion of the other, although the money raised for the support of schools may be in other respects fairly apportioned."

Here is Equality from beginning to end.

In the case of _Withington_ v. _Eveleth_, (7 Pick. R., 106,) the Court say they "are all satisfied that the power given to towns to determine and define the limits of school districts can be executed only by a geographical division of the town for that purpose." A limitation of the district merely _personal_ was held invalid. This same principle was again recognized in _Perry_ v. _Dover_, (12 Pick. R., 213,) where the Court say, "Towns, in executing the power to form school districts, are bound so to do it as to include _every inhabitant_ in some of the districts. They cannot lawfully omit any, and thus deprive them of _the benefits of our invaluable system of free schools_." Thus at every point the Court has guarded the Equal Rights of all.

* * * * *

The Constitution, the Legislation, and the Judicial Decisions of Massachusetts have now been passed in review. We have seen what is contemplated by the Equality secured by the Constitution,--also what is contemplated by the system of Common Schools, as established by the laws of the Commonwealth and illustrated by decisions of the Supreme Court. The way is now prepared to consider the peculiarities in the present case, and to apply the principle thus recognized in Constitution, Laws, and Judicial Decisions.

* * * * *

SEPARATE SCHOOLS INCONSISTENT WITH EQUALITY.

It is easy to see that the exclusion of colored children from the Public Schools is a constant inconvenience to them and their parents, which white children and white parents are not obliged to bear. Here the facts are plain and unanswerable, showing a palpable violation of Equality. _The black and white are not equal before the law._ I am at a loss to understand how anybody can assert that they are.

Among the regulations of the Primary School Committee is one to this effect. "Scholars to go to the school nearest their residences. Applicants for admission to our schools (with the exception and provision referred to in the preceding rule) are especially entitled to enter the schools nearest to their places of residence." The exception here is "of those for whom special provision has been made" in separate schools,--that is, colored children.

In this rule--without the unfortunate exception--is part of the beauty so conspicuous in our Common Schools. It is the boast of England, that, through the multitude of courts, justice is brought to every man's door. It may also be the boast of our Common Schools, that, through the multitude of schools, education in Boston is brought to every _white_ man's door. But it is not brought to every _black_ man's door. He is obliged to go for it, to travel for it, to walk for it,--often a great distance. The facts in the present case are not so strong as those of other cases within my knowledge. But here the little child, only five years old, is compelled, if attending the nearest African School, to go a distance of two thousand one hundred feet from her home, while the nearest Primary School is only nine hundred feet, and, in doing this, she passes by no less than five different Primary Schools, forming part of our Common Schools, and open to white children, all of which are closed to her. Surely this is not _Equality before the Law_.

Such a fact is sufficient to determine this case. If it be met by the suggestion, that the inconvenience is trivial, and such as the law will not notice, I reply, that it is precisely such as to reveal an existing inequality, and therefore the law cannot fail to notice it. There is a maxim of the illustrious civilian, Dumoulin, a great jurist of France, which teaches that even a trivial fact may give occasion to an important application of the law: "_Modica enim circumstantia facti inducit magnam juris diversitatem._" Also from the best examples of our history we learn that the insignificance of a fact cannot obscure the grandeur of the principle at stake. It was a paltry tax on tea, laid by a Parliament where they were not represented, that aroused our fathers to the struggles of the Revolution. They did not feel the inconvenience of the tax, but they felt its oppression. They went to war for a principle. Let it not be said, then, that in the present case the inconvenience is too slight to justify the appeal I make in behalf of colored children for _Equality before the Law_.

Looking beyond the facts of this case, it is apparent that the inconvenience from the exclusion of colored children is such as to affect seriously the comfort and condition of the African race in Boston. The two Primary Schools open to them are in Belknap Street and Sun Court. I need not add that the whole city is dotted with schools open to white children. Colored parents, anxious for the education of their children, are compelled to live in the neighborhood of the schools, to gather about them,--as in Eastern countries people gather near a fountain or a well. The liberty which belongs to the white man, of choosing his home, is not theirs. Inclination or business or economy may call them to another part of the city; but they are restrained for their children's sake. There is no such restraint upon the white man; for he knows, that, wherever in the city inclination or business or economy may call him, there will be a school open to his children near his door. Surely this is not _Equality before the Law_.

If a colored person, yielding to the necessities of position, removes to a distant part of the city, his children may be compelled daily, at an inconvenience which will not be called trivial, to walk a long distance for the advantages of the school. In our severe winters this cannot be disregarded, in the case of children so tender in years as those of the Primary Schools. There is a peculiar instance of hardship which has come to my knowledge. A respectable colored parent became some time since a resident of East Boston, separated from the mainland by water. Of course there are Common Schools at East Boston, but none open to colored children. This parent was obliged to send his children, three in number, daily across the ferry to the distant African School. The tolls amounted to a sum which formed a severe tax upon a poor man, while the long way to travel was a daily tax upon the time and strength of his children. Every toll paid by this parent, as every step taken by the children, testifies to that inequality which I now arraign.

This is the conduct of a colored parent. He is well deserving of honor for his generous efforts to secure the education of his children. As they grow in knowledge they will rise and call him blessed; but at the same time they will brand as accursed that arbitrary discrimination of color in the Common Schools of Boston which rendered it necessary for their father, out of small means, to make such sacrifices for their education.

Here is a grievance which, independent of any stigma from color, calls for redress. It is an inequality which the Constitution and the Laws of Massachusetts repudiate. But it is not on the ground of inconvenience only that it is odious. And this brings me to the next head.

* * * * *

SEPARATE SCHOOLS ARE IN THE NATURE OF CASTE.

The separation of children in the Schools, on account of race or color, is in the nature of _Caste_, and, on this account, a violation of Equality. The case shows expressly that the child was excluded from the school nearest to her dwelling--the number in the school at the time warranting her admission--"on the sole ground of color." The first Majority Report presented to the School Committee, and mentioned in the statement of facts, presents the grounds of this discrimination with more fulness, saying, "It is one of _races_, not of _colors_ merely. The distinction is one which the All-wise Creator has seen fit to establish; and it is founded deep in the physical, mental, and moral natures of the two races. No legislation, no social customs, can efface this distinction."[30] Words cannot be chosen more apt than these to describe the heathenish relation of Caste.

[30] Report to the Primary School Committee, June 15, 1846, on the Petition of Sundry Colored Persons for the Abolition of the Schools for Colored Children, p. 7.

This term, which has its prototype in Spanish and French, finds its way into English from the Portuguese _casta_, which signifies family, breed, race, and is generally used to designate any hereditary distinction, particularly of race. It is most often employed in India, and it is there that we must go to understand its full force. A recent English writer says, that it is "not only a distinction by birth, but is founded on the doctrine of an essentially distinct origin of the different races, which are thus unalterably separated."[31] This is the very ground of the Boston School Committee.

[31] Roberts on Caste, p. 134.

This word is not now for the first time applied to the distinction between the white and black races. Alexander von Humboldt, speaking of the negroes in Mexico, characterizes them as a caste.[32] Following him, a recent political and juridical writer of France uses the same term to denote not only the distinctions in India, but those of our own country, especially referring to the exclusion of colored children from the Common Schools as among "the humiliating and brutal distinctions" by which their caste is characterized.[33] It is, then, on authority and reason alike that we apply this term to the hereditary distinction on account of color now established in the schools of Boston.

[32] Essai Politique sur le Royaume de la Nouvelle-Espagne, Liv. II. ch. 6.

[33] Charles Comte, Traité de Legislation, Tom. IV. pp. 129, 445.

Boston is set on a hill, and her schools have long been the subject of observation, even in this respect. As far back as the last century, the French Consul here made a report on our "separate" school;[34] and De Tocqueville, in his masterly work, testifies, with evident pain, that the same schools do not receive the children of the African and European.[35] All this is only a reproduction of the Cagots in France, who for generations were put under the ban,--relegated to a corner of the church, as in a "negro pew," and even in the last resting-place, where all are equal, these wretched people were separated by a line of demarcation from the rest.[36] The Cagots are called an "accursed race," and this language may be applied to the African under our laws. Strange that here, under a State Constitution declaring the Equality of all men, we should follow the worst precedents and establish among us a Caste. Seeing the discrimination in this light, we learn to appreciate its true character. In India, Brahmins and Sudras, from generation to generation, were kept apart. If a Sudra presumed to sit upon a Brahmin's carpet, his punishment was banishment. With similar inhumanity here, the black child who goes to sit on the same benches with the white is banished, not indeed from the country, but from the school. In both cases it is the triumph of Caste. But the offence is greater with us, because, unlike the Hindoos, we acknowledge that men are born equal.

[34] Grégoire, De la Littérature des Nègres, p. 177.

[35] Democracy in America, Vol. I. p. 461, Ch. XVIII. § 2.

[36] Michel, Histoire des Races Maudites, Tom. I. p. 3.

So strong is my desire that the Court should feel the enormity of this system, thus legalized, not by the Legislature, but by an inferior local board, that I shall introduce an array of witnesses all testifying to the unchristian character of Caste, as it appears in India, where it is most studied and discussed. As you join in detestation of this foul institution, you will learn to condemn its establishment among our children.

I take these authorities from the work of Mr. Roberts to which I have already referred, "Caste opposed to Christianity," published in London in 1847. Time will not allow me to make comments. I can only quote the testimony and then pass on.

The eminent Bishop Heber, of Calcutta, characterizes Caste in these forcible terms:--

"_It is a system which tends, more than any else the Devil has yet invented, to destroy the feelings of general benevolence, and to make nine tenths of mankind the hopeless slaves of the remainder._"

But this is the very system now in question here. Bishop Wilson, also of Calcutta, the successor of Heber, says:--

"The Gospel recognizes no such distinction as those of Castes, imposed by a heathen usage, bearing in some respects a supposed religious obligation, condemning those in the lower ranks to perpetual abasement, placing an immovable barrier against all general advance and improvement in society, cutting asunder the bonds of human fellowship on the one hand, and preventing those of Christian love on the other. Such distinctions, I say, the Gospel does not recognize. On the contrary, it teaches us that God 'hath made of one blood all the nations of men.'"

The same sentiment is echoed by Bishop Corrie, of Madras:--

"Thus Caste sets itself up as a judge of our Saviour himself. His command is, 'Condescend to men of low estate. Esteem others better than yourself.' 'No,' says Caste, 'do not commune with low men: consider yourself of high estimation. Touch not, taste not, handle not.' Thus Caste condemns the Saviour."

Here is the testimony of Rev. Mr. Rhenius, a zealous and successful missionary:--

"I have found Caste, both in theory and practice, to be diametrically opposed to the Gospel, which inculcates love, humility, and union; whereas Caste teaches the contrary. It is a fact, in those entire congregations where Caste is allowed the spirit of the Gospel does not enter; whereas in those from which it is excluded we see the fruits of the Gospel spirit."

Another missionary, Rev. C. Mault, follows in similar strain:--

"Caste must be entirely renounced; for it is a noxious plant, by the side of which the graces cannot grow; for facts demonstrate, that, where it has been allowed, Christianity has never flourished."

So also does the Rev. John McKenny, a Wesleyan missionary:--

"I have been upward of twelve years in India, and have directed much of my attention to the subject of Caste, and am fully of opinion that it is altogether contrary to the nature and principles of the Gospel of Christ, and therefore ought not to be admitted into the Christian Church."

So also the Rev. R.S. Hardy, a Wesleyan missionary, and author of "Notices of the Holy Land":--

"The principle of Caste I consider so much at variance with the spirit of the Gospel as to render impossible, where its authority is acknowledged, the exercise of many of the most beautiful virtues of our holy religion."

So also the Rev. D.J. Gorgerly, of the same Society:--

"I regard the distinction of Caste, both in its principles and operations, as directly opposed to vital godliness, and consequently inadmissible into the Church of Christ."

So also the Rev. W. Bridgnall, of the same Society:--

"I perfectly agree with a writer of respectable authority, in considering the institution of Caste as the most formidable engine that was ever invented for perpetuating the subjugation of men: so that, as a friend of humanity only, I should feel myself bound to protest against and oppose it; but in particular as a Christian, I deem it my obvious and imperative duty wholly to discountenance it, conceiving it to be utterly repugnant to all the principles and the whole spirit of Christianity. He who is prepared to support the system of Caste is, in my judgment, neither a true friend of man nor a consistent follower of Christ."

So also the Rev. S. Allens, of the same Society:--

"During a residence of more than nine years in Ceylon I have had many opportunities of witnessing the influence of Caste on the minds of the natives, and I firmly believe it is altogether opposed to the spirit of Christianity; and it appears to me that its utter and speedy extinction cannot but be desired by every minister of Christ."

So also the Rev. R. Stoup, of the same Society:--

"From my own personal observation, during a four years' residence in Ceylon, I am decidedly of opinion that Caste is directly opposed to the spirit of Christianity, and consequently ought to be discouraged in every possible way."

I conclude these European authorities with the confirmation of Rev. Joseph Roberts, author of the work on Caste:--

"_We must in every place witness against it, and show that even Government itself is nurturing a tremendous evil, that through its heathen managers it is beguiled into a course which obstructs the progress of civilization_, which keeps in repulsion our kindlier feelings, which creates and nurses distinctions the most alien to all the cordialities of life, and which, more than any other thing, makes the distance so immense betwixt the governed and governors."

There is also the testimony of native Hindoos converted to Christianity, who denounce Caste as Jefferson denounced the despotism of Slavery. Listen to the voice of a Hindoo:--

"Caste is the stronghold of that principle of pride which makes a man think of himself more highly than he ought to think. Caste infuses itself into and forms the very essence of pride itself."

Another Hindoo testifies as follows:--

"I therefore regard Caste as opposed to the main scope, principles, and doctrines of Christianity; for either Caste must be admitted to be true and of divine authority, or Christianity must be so admitted. If you admit Caste to be true, the whole fabric of Christianity must come down; for the nature of Caste and its associations destroy the first principles of Christianity. Caste makes distinctions among creatures where God has made none."

Another native expresses himself thus:--

"When God made man, his intention was, not that they should be divided, and hate one another, and show contempt, and think more highly of themselves than others. Caste makes a man think that he is holier than another, and that he has some inherent virtue which another has not. It makes him despise all those that are lower than himself in regard to Caste, which is not the design of God."

Still another native uses this strong language:--