Part 10

It is hardly necessary at this late day to insist that no writer is justified in building his narrative of events on unverified tradition. He must try to penetrate to the truth that lies behind the legend (which in some cases will differ very widely from the legend itself). It is no easy task at best to perform a successful piece of historical research, and the questions on which final agreements have been reached are not numerous. Accordingly, if the law should be so construed as to enforce banishment from the schools of any book which can be proved incorrect in some of its alleged facts without regard to their importance, no textbooks will be left in the schools, for none are impeccable. True, the Cashman law would condemn only for falsifying the history of the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, leaving four other foreign wars in which our country has engaged, and the great Civil War, to be treated without other restraint than that contained in the last clause of section 1, denouncing propaganda in favor of any foreign government. But under that sole provision it might still prove embarrassing for a writer to tell the truth about the Mexican War and possibly the others also, for the term propaganda--as the whole world has learned lately--is a most elastic one. Presumably, the propaganda test applies as well to other phases of history as to the military phases, wherefore an author of a textbook is apt, under a strict construction of this law, to be hauled into court on the charge of propaganda if he should consider it his duty to say a single thing in commendation of any other nation. For, will there not always be found, in any school district, five citizens whose views collide with those of the author; and if so, what is to prevent a case being called? Surely a word in favor of France would be resented by some; a word in favor of Great Britain would be resented by others; a word in favor of Germany would offend still others; and so on through the list. In the present mournful state of general unrest and want of confidence among nations, an author would tread unsafely on any ground outside the “three-mile limit.”

It does not follow from the fact that under the law it is easy to bring cases, that convictions would be equally easy. Presumably the state superintendent has had knowledge of all books now in use in the schools and, in effect if not in form, has approved them. This he would not have done had he considered any of them purveyors of treason or excessively faulty in statement. Moreover, as judge in cases that may arise under this law, the superintendent will be bound to take judicial notice of some things. For example, it is common knowledge that no history text is perfect either on its factual side, in its literary qualities, or in the author’s perspective of events; that few writers display at all times perfect taste, and none perfect judgment, in their criticisms of men and their comments on historical actions and movements; that a given textbook may be valuable, despite minor defects in all of the above points, by reason of its superior arrangement, its psychological adaptation to children’s needs, and the success with which it communicates to them the main features and the spirit of American history. He will also be obliged to rule that the truth is not malicious propaganda and he is bound to maintain an author’s right to liberty of research.

It goes without saying that if a book is palpably and grossly inaccurate; if it gives the child a wholly erroneous view of history; if it is crassly censorious of America’s great men; if it is written in a spirit tending to destroy American ideals; if it tends to make boys and girls ashamed of American character and achievements, not in exceptional instances here and there, but generally; then there would hardly be a question about the duty of getting rid of it with all convenient promptness. But would it not be strange if, with the superintendent and other educational experts on guard, such a book had got itself adopted? On general principles one would expect that only in the rarest cases would this law come into operation; for it ought not to be easy for a thoroughly unworthy book to elude the critical eyes of publishers, editors, school superintendents, teachers, and school boards, to be finally detected and exposed by some school patron or other private citizen. No doubt such cases are possible, but one could hardly conceive them to be of common occurrence. Misgivings are aroused, therefore, by the report that at the legislative hearing Senator Cashman denounced, by name, five well known and widely used textbooks.

If the Senator’s historical views, as published in the _Senate Journal_ under date of March 1, 1923, are intended to be made the platform in a campaign to purify the history teaching of our schools, the upshot may prove widely different from what is now anticipated; for among those views, the derivation of which is not indicated, are some which it would be difficult to find expressed in any existing textbook. For example, Senator Cashman holds that our country is indebted to Holland “for town and county representation in a legislature.” Americans have long been taught that, in the picturesque phrase of John Fiske, “self-government _broke out_ in Virginia” in 1619 by reason of the fact that these people were English. We are aware of no investigations which have brought forth evidence compelling the abandonment of that view, though some very extravagant claims have been made for the Dutch influence upon both colonial politics and colonial education. He also holds that “our free public school system came from Prussia.” If by this were meant merely that Prussian influence has been felt in the creation of a system of state supervision of education, and in the strengthening of a school system already in existence, we would gladly concur. But the statement is too sweeping to admit of such an interpretation. Wisconsin Germans ought to be very glad to assign to New England colonies and states the chief influence in giving us the public school system because, in the present state of research, that appears to be where the credit belongs. To all that the Senator says about the selection of immigrants for America, the development in the colonies themselves of a new and vivid love of liberty which found expression in the Declaration of Independence, the stupid tyranny of George III, and the heroic sufferings and achievements of patriots in the Revolution, we utter a hearty Amen; realizing, of course, that his statement is necessarily a crowded summary, cast in oratorical mould, and not designed as a complete exposition of his views. But, in thus concurring we do not yield up our sympathy with the aphorism of Edmund Burke, that in their reaction to tyranny the colonists “are descendants of Englishmen.”

The same reservations might be made with reference to Senator Cashman’s statement on the constitution. And yet a fair interpretation of what he says on that subject compels us to class him with those extreme worshipers of that document who, like the authors of the New York teachers’ test oath, would maintain the constitution, unchanged, at any cost. Speaking of the fathers and their work, he says: “Then they wrote and the states adopted the supreme law of the land, the American constitution, the most sublime public document that ever came forth from the mind and soul of man, establishing a system of government based upon the consent of the governed, with religious liberty protected, inherent rights guaranteed, _to be written in indestructible letters into the pages of the nation’s laws_.” [Editor’s italics.] It is a well known view of the present progressives, as it was of the framers themselves, that, great as was the original constitution, it was still far from being perfect. Also, most progressives now accept in principle the conclusions of Charles A. Beard, the historian whose recent investigations on this point are now well known, that the constitution represents a partial reaction from the democracy of the Revolution, and was designed in part to set limitations upon the popular will. While venerating the constitution, progressives in the main believe that such restrictions as the legislative election of senators, the appointment and life tenure of judges (some would include the mode of electing the president), were intentionally anti-democratic, and that these and other defects which time has revealed ought to be subject to modification whenever the people desire the changes. The mode of amendment having been designed to make changes difficult, or impossible (though in recent years several changes have been adopted), leading progressives have long held that that fundamental article ought to be amended first in order to facilitate other changes. This was Justice John B. Winslow’s opinion, put forth in 1912; it was the burden of an important plank in the La Follette national platform the same year; that doctrine was preached, at least in spirit, by the late President Roosevelt. In short, it is a progressive principle that the constitution must cease to be a fetish--a dead hand upon the present and the future--and must be adjusted, from time to time, to existing social, economic, and political conditions. The document represents, for the time, a mighty triumph of constructive statesmanship, so progressive leaders believe, and it should not be changed “for light or transient causes,” much less revolutionized, but “it was designed for a rural or semi-rural state.” The men who made it “however able could not anticipate or solve the new problems of life and government which have come upon us in the last half century.”[90]

To follow Senator Cashman’s outline of American history into the recent period to the all-engrossing event of the World War and America’s participation therein would be fruitless. Not one of us can conscientiously claim to be an impartial investigator with respect to things which have wrenched our souls. We cannot abdicate our own personalities. In treating the war, all that any historian at present could hope to do would be to state his views with becoming restraint and concede that those views may ultimately prove to be quite wrong. A censorship law of fifty years hence (if our people shall then still adhere to the censorship idea) would be sure to condemn the teaching of what some of us now piously believe with reference to this feature of history; just as a censorship law of today, if it included in its scope the Civil War, would condemn the teaching of some things which nearly one-half the voters of Wisconsin sincerely believed in 1864. “Time is the great sifter and winnower of truth,” and we must consent to leave these matters to the investigators of our grandchildren’s generation. Yet the gravest danger to be feared from the law we are now discussing lies in the psychological probability that every second man’s opinion of a given history will be based not on what the author says about the Revolution, or the Constitution, or the War of 1812, but on what he says about the recent war and the League of Nations. In other words, the reader who is prejudiced against an author on account of his last chapter, which is almost sure to be unsatisfactory to many, will find the first, the middle, and all other chapters reeking with faults, and this even while personally he may be unconscious of having imbibed a prejudice at all.

There is a possibility that, as an engine for expelling books now used, the law will become a dead letter, first, because it may prove unexpectedly difficult for a dissatisfied citizen to persuade four others to act with him in making complaint, which however is not probable; second, because of the clamor of those in the district who are not keen for or against the book, but who realize that if it is thrown out all old copies will be worthless and they will have to pay for new books at the opening of the next school year; third, because the first cases brought may go against the complainants and discourage others from multiplying complaints. But, the popular psychology being what it is, there is an equal chance that the law may foster a widespread disposition to attack history books, geography books, civics books, and even readers; that it may keep educational matters in a state of turmoil, engendering much social bitterness due to the clashing of parties and interests over questions raised in the school-book fights. In such controversies teachers would be the first to suffer, because their opinions would be called for at once, which would place them between two fires; and no surer way could be found to degrade the social influence of our schools than by keeping the teachers in a state of perpetual anxiety.

We have reason to think that Senator Cashman, an acknowledged friend and promoter of education, would deeply deplore such a result. If he had anticipated anything of the kind, doubtless he would have refrained from offering his bill. But laws, like children, when they get out of hand, have a way of surprising their progenitors. However, we have the law and must use it to the best ends.

If every one in position of leadership or authority in relation to it--and among those are members of this Society--shall feel a responsibility for guiding discussion into proper channels; if debate on school-book questions shall be kept not merely free but also parliamentary in form and spirit; if we all insist that differences of view must be treated tolerantly; if we can secure from the public toward the arguments and facts in these cases a measure of that openness of mind which characterizes the American juror sworn to try a case fairly on the evidence, it may be possible to mitigate or prevent the evils apprehended.

And if, without discouraging research, the law shall merely enforce through future adoptions the idea that good taste is as obligatory upon the textbook maker as good manners are upon the private individual, one point will have been gained. We trust this may not be won at the expense of a disposition to whittle down the truth to fit a supposed demand, or that it will result in substituting books written by dishonest or spineless persons for those written by men and women of real character and scholarship.

In the midst of the late war the school supervisors of a western state discovered what they believed to be propaganda favorable to one of America’s enemies, and demanded the expulsion of the book from the schools. The superintendent, being a wise and thoughtful man, prepared and printed a page of corrective criticism, which all teachers were asked to paste in the accused book and to teach to the children with the regular text. By that simple device he saved the people of the state many thousands of dollars which would have been paid for an inferior text, if the book had been expelled. If the law shall permit such a handling of the borderline cases, does it not seem that in a time when we are at peace with all nations, we could act with equal calmness, equal justice to authors or publishers, and equal regard for the interests of the people who have to buy school books?

FOOTNOTES:

[1] As the tide of emigration from the northeastern states rose higher, it bore along a goodly number who were not of the old American stock, particularly English and Irish, with some Scotch and Germans. Yet, many of these were natives of the states named and, if foreign born, had enjoyed so long an apprenticeship to the Yankee system of life as to enable them faithfully to represent it.

[2] Of whom England, Ireland, Scotland, and Canada combined furnished 1920, Germany 460, and Norway 340.

[3] _Wisconsin Domesday Book, General Studies_, I. _History of Agriculture in Wisconsin_, chap. 2.

[4] William Dames, _Wie Sieht Es in Wiskonsin Aus_ (Meurs, 1849).

[5] For example, see William Dames, _Wie Sieht Es in Wiskonsin Aus_.

[6] See J. F. Diederichs, _Diary_. Translated by Emil Baensch. Account of a trip from Milwaukee to Manitowoc.

[7] Those who filed with von Rohr and on the same day (Nov. 5, 1839) took up most of sections 17, 18, 19, and 20. All of these lands were described by the surveyor as “second rate” and all had a heavy forest covering consisting of sugar maple, lynn, birch, alder, black and white oak, ash, elm, ironwood, etc., together with some cedar in the swamps. The land lay on both sides of the creek, along which was some meadow, but the big marsh was farther east.

[8] William F. Whyte, “Settlement of Lebanon,” in Wisconsin Historical Society, _Proceedings_, 1915, 105.

[9] MS. translation by Emil Baensch.

[10] Page 29 in printed German edition.

[11] This farm, located in the town of Greenfield, Milwaukee County, was afterwards divided among Kerler’s three sons. A portion of it, at least, is I believe still in the possession of the family. Louis F. Frank, _Pioneer Jahre_ (Milwaukee, 1911).

[12] Michel Chevalier, _Society, Manners, and Politics in the United States_ (Boston, 1839), chap. x, 112-113, 117, says: “Loading a wagon with a plough, a bed, a barrel of salt meat, the indispensable supply of tea and molasses, a Bible and a wife, and with his axe on his shoulder, the Yankee sets out for the West, without a servant, without an assistant, often without a companion, to build himself a log hut, six hundred miles from his father’s roof, and clear away a spot for a farm in the midst of the boundless forest.... He is incomparable as a pioneer, unequalled as a settler of the wilderness.”

[13] See his _Common Sense_ (Philadelphia, 1791).

[14] See Captain Basil Hall, _Travels in North America in the Years 1827 and 1828_ (Edinburgh, 1829), i, 130.

[15] _American Agriculturist_, i, (1842), 115 ff.

[16] Captain Robert Barclay, _Agricultural Tour in the United States_ ... (London, 1842), 41.

[17] _American Agriculturist_, i, 311.

[18] _Germania_ (translated slightly differently in University of Pennsylvania _Translations and Reprints_), 11.

[19] J. H. von Thünen, _Der Isolierte Staat_ (Berlin, 1875), 103 ff., “Ueber die Lage der Höfe in Mecklenburg.”

[20] In southwestern Wisconsin, about 1870, a respectable German farmer announced to his relatives the marriage of his daughter to a man who had arrived but recently and had the status of a mere laborer. To parry all questions about the suitability of the groom, who was known to be addicted to liquor and other vices, the farmer added: “I’m very willing to give him my daughter, for he is the best ‘grubber’ I’ve ever had on my farm.”

[21] When John Kerler settled near Milwaukee in 1848, he bought a farm on which was no provision for sheltering livestock other than work animals. He built a barn at once, refusing to permit, for a single winter, the cruel American practice of leaving cattle out in the cold. His case is typical.

[22] See the author’s _History of Agriculture in Wisconsin_ (Madison, 1922), _passim_.

[23] Editor’s italics.

[24] An example is in Abram E. Brown, _Legends of Old Bedford_ (Boston, 1892).

[25] Timothy Dwight, _Travels in New England and New York_ (New Haven, Conn., 1821), ii, 459, 462.

[26] Edmund Burke, _On Conciliation_.

[27] The Ohio Company’s grant, 1787, contained a reservation for religion as well as grants for education. Joseph Schafer, _Origin of the System of Land Grants in Aid of Education_, Wisconsin University _Bulletin_, History Series, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Madison, 1902).

[28] See Edward Eggleston, _The Circuit Rider_ and _The Graysons_.

[29] Goodsell, who was one of the founders of Beloit College, removed later to Northfield, Minnesota, and became one of the founders of Carlton College. S. A. Dwinnell, Reedsburg (Wis.) _Free Press_, December 24, 1874.

[30] _Madison City Express_, March 14, March 23, and April 27, 1843. Strong and Hamilton are not reputed to have been total abstainers.

[31] The vote stood, for prohibition, 27,519; against, 24,109.

[32] The story was printed in the _Columbian Centinel_, Boston, December, 1789.

[33] See _Diary of Sarah Connell Ayer_ (Portland, Me., 1910), 227.

[34] See _Almon Danforth Hodges and His Neighbors_ (Boston, 1909), 217-218.

[35] “At sun two hours high,” says the _Farmer’s Almanack_, 1815, “the day is finished and away goes men and boys to the bowling alley. Haying, hoeing, plowing, sowing all must give way to sport and toddy. Now this is no way for a farmer. It will do for the city lads to sport and relax in this way, and so there are proper times and seasons for farmers to take pleasure of this sort, for I agree that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”

[36] See _Hodges and His Neighbors_, 94.

[37] J. R. Lowell, _Biglow Papers_.

[38] The death of Goethe occurred on the twenty-second of March. The news must have taken several days in travel.

[39] Prussians were apt to console themselves for the pusillanimity of King Frederick William III by harking back to the really strong if ruthless monarchy of Frederick the Great, familiarly spoken of as _Der Alte Fritz_.

[40] Guy Stanton Ford, _Stein and the Era of Reform in Prussia, 1807-1815_ (Princeton, N. J., 1922), 185.

[41] Victor Cousin, _Report on the State of Public Instruction in Prussia_. Translated by Sarah Austin. London, 1834.

[42] See _Life and Works of Horace Mann_ (Boston, 1891), iii, 346 ff.

[43] Cf. Franklin’s views on the comparative thrift of English and of German laborers, and note his tentative explanation of the difference. _The Complete Works of Benjamin Franklin_ (compiled and edited by John Bigelow, New York and London, 1887), ii, 291 ff. Letter to Peter Collinson, dated Philadelphia, 9 May, 1753.

[44] By writers like Samuel Laing, in his _Notes of a Traveller on the Social and Political State of France, Prussia, Switzerland, Italy, and Other Parts of Europe_ (London, 1854), especially 108-115.

[45] _Life and Works of Horace Mann_ (Boston, 1891), iii, 346 ff. See also _Reminiscences of Carl Schurz_ (New York, 1907), i, 40.

[46] See William Howitt, _Rural and Domestic Life of Germany_ (London, 1842), _passim_. That portion of Carl Schurz’s work (see note 8 _ante_) which describes his boyhood life at Liblar throws much light on the amusements indulged in by the people. There is a delightful account of the Schützenfest, or marksmanship contest, on pages 45-48 and pages 81-83.

[47] Albert Bernhard Faust, _The German Element in the United States_ (Boston, 1909), ii, 472.

[48] _Daily Free Democrat_, December 27, 1850.

[49] _Nordamerika, Wisconsin, Calumet. Winke für Auswanderer_ (edition of 1849), 64.

[50] Bradley and Metcalf.

[51] It was managed by G. and J. Burnham, who had an investment of $10,000.

[52] This was John Braun’s. Best and Company had the largest investment among the German brewers, $7400, but their output was only $11,250. Other German brewers were Weizt, Englehardt, Stolz and Schuder, H. Nunnemacher, and H. Beverung.

[53] If our count is correct, the 1850 census lists as “clerks” fifty-one Germans. Doubtless many of these were serving in American stores.

[54] Or thirty-six, if we omit the teachers, some of whom at least were probably not liberally educated.

[55] The Lutherans included a Fr. Lachner, C. Eisenmeyer, and Ludwig Dulitz; the Evangelical preacher was Christian Holl, and the Methodist, Christian Barth.

[56] The Western Medical Society of Wisconsin, representing the counties of Grant, Iowa, and Lafayette, reported in December, 1850, that out of sixty persons engaged in the practice of medicine in that area, only twelve were entitled to be called “doctor.” _Daily Free Democrat_, January 8, 1850.

[57] “The University and the Germans,” _Daily Wisconsin Banner_, August 23, 1850.