the magistrates in every school-less district. All poor children were to be entitled to two years schooling between the ages of seven and fourteen years. The bill was mangled in the Commons and lost in the Lords. In 1816 a select committee was appointed to report on the education of the lower orders. In 1818 it reported on the condition of the country at large. 'The anxiety of the poor for education' was daily increasing, though the opportunities were very bad. The single-school (mostly church-school) districts showed, however, an increasing degree of liberality, and the religious views of the school were not pressed upon the children of parents holding other views, provided that the children were really taught such other views. This committee recommended the universal use of a conscience clause, the establishment of rate-supported, free parochial schools in very poor districts—the principle of the act of 1870—and, in rich districts, the making of grants to aid in the building of schools the maintenance of which would fall upon voluntary subscribers—the principle adopted by Parliament in 1833. Had both these suggestions been accepted in 1818, educational progress in the nineteenth century would have been far more rapid.
In 1820 Mr. Brougham introduced his first education bill. In his speech he fully recognized the labors of the clergy on behalf of education, and he noted the great improvement of the position since 1803. Then only one in every 21 persons in the population was at school, while in 1820 it was one in every 16 persons. This meant, however, that still one fifth of the population was without the means of education. Moreover, London was still 'the worst-educated part of Christendom.' The bill proposed the universal establishment of parochial schools with efficient teachers. Funds were to be found by local rates and by the diversion of old endowments. The religious teaching was to be undenominational. This bill was opposed both by the dissenters and the Roman Catholics, and was abandoned after the second reading.
Thirteen years now passed without legislative effort, but these years saw the growth of a great volume of public opinion. Mr. Brougham's pamphlet entitled 'Observations on the Education of the People,' published in 1825, ran through twenty editions in less than a year, and on all sides the importance of the problem received recognition. The year 1833 produced the first results of the educational renaissance. On Saturday, August 17, the House of Commons voted the sum of £20,000 in aid of private subscriptions for the erection of schoolhouses. The new era of definite state intervention in the education of the people may be said to have opened with this vote. From that date to this an ever-increasing annual vote for education has dignified and justified the statute book.[1]
(To be continued.)
- ↑ Over £10,000,000 was voted by Parliament for Elementary Education in England and Wales for the year 1902-3.
