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History of Public Education in America
America’s original educational tradition was predominantly Christian and lasted from the initial settlement of America until after end of the War Between the States. Our current government school system got its start in the 1830s, most notably in Massachusetts, and was then known as the “common school” system. In 1852, Massachusetts was the first state to enact compulsory attendance laws (Mississippi was the last in 1912).
The impetus for the Common School program—again, the precursor to today’s government school system—was not a failure of the then-predominant educational institutions. In fact, foreign observers visiting the United States were astonished at the high level of literacy in the US.
Instead, the Common School movement was initially mainly a project of utopian socialists and Unitarians. The socialists, as always, saw a government school system that they would control as an instrument for remaking society in their image.
The Unitarians, who were concentrated in the New England area, and especially Boston, wanted to use such a school system to make Unitarianism the de facto established religion of the United States, along with using it as a tool for promoting their notions of social improvement.
Nevertheless, both of these groups were marginal players in American society and would not have been able to get the Common Schools program widely adopted had it not been for the large-scale Irish Catholic immigration to the Northeast United States that began in the 1830s. The mainstream was ultimately sold on the Common School program, coupled with compulsory school attendance laws, as a means of coercively “Protestantizing” children from Catholic families. The Catholics, of course, understood this, which is why a system of Catholic schools was ultimately created.
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"You can’t make Socialists
out of individualists -
children who know how to
think for themselves spoil
the harmony of the
collective society which is coming, where everyone is interdependent."
John Dewey (1859-1952)
considered the "Founder" of public Education in America, signer of the Humanist
Manifesto | John Dewey is considered the founder of public education in America.
He was a socialist and sought to use the public school system to mold our children’s minds for generations to come into becoming obedient little socialist citizens. Dewey was quoted as saying, “You can’t make Socialists out of individualists - children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society which is coming, where everyone is interdependent.”
Since 1852, men like Dewey and Horace Mann, the 'father of progressive education', pushed to impose compulsory public-school education on every child in this country. They have succeeded beyond their wildest imagination. |
| Did you know . . .
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| - There are 55 million elementary and secondary school children in the U.S.
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| - 8 million of those children, 14%, are educated independent of state schools
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| - 6.5 million children attend private schools | |
| - Nearly 2 million children are home schooled |
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Further Reading
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