Chapter XII. Why Teachers in Our Public Schools Should Not Be Selected from the Ranks of Catholicism.

The Catholic world does not hesitate in declaring that our public schools in this country are “Sinks of Iniquity,” “Schools of Vice,” and “Nurseries of Hell;” then why should the followers of Catholicism be permitted to teach in our public schools?

This is a question that ought to vitally interest every Protestant father and mother in this land, and the time is not far distant until they will become interested, for just as sure as God reigns, the time is not far in the future when Catholicism will endeavor to close up the public schools of this land and establish her nurseries of darkness and superstition in their stead.

If the public schools of this country are not good enough for the children of Catholic parents, it seems to me that the Protestant parents of this country should see to it that their children aretoo good to be taught by Catholic teachers.

Why is it that the Pope does not promulgate one of his “holy bulls” and excommunicate those of his believers who take the money so freely for their services from the public schools of this country?

Oh, no; the Pope and the priestcraft are perfectly willing, so long as Protestants have the power to maintain those schools, that their “jesuitical dupes” shall receive the money that is set aside for these schools. My blood fairly boils with unbounded indignation when I think of the hard, harsh, and ungodly slurs that Catholicism is ever ready to throw at our public school system, and then see blind Protestants help to place a Catholic teacher in one of our schools.

We propose to give facts and figures in this chapter that we hope will open the eyes of drowsy, unconcerned Protestants, and help them and their children to apply the brakes to their downward course, and spike the guns of the Vatican with American manhood.

We hope by the time you are through with this chapter you will be ready to make inquiries as to who is to teach your children in the public schools. Let me ask you, Mr. Protestant, if you ever heard of a Protestant teaching in a Catholic school? Oh, no! But then you will fold your hands and be content to allow your children to be taught by a man or woman who secretly despises the public school system. Shame! Ten thousand times we exclaim you should be ashamed for not asserting your American and God-given privileges of Protestantism gained for you through the blood of your forefathers!

A general system of education, such as affords all alike an opportunity to cultivate and expand the intellect, the poor as well as the rich, is, beyond all question, one of the greatest blessings that any nation can enjoy. Such a system had its birth in America while it was yet comparatively free from the blighting influence of a religio-political corporation whose whole history is one uninterrupted and relentless war upon every system of education which broadens the intellect and causes people to think. In America was born the public free school system, and from the date of its birth, in 1695, to the present, it has been the means of giving to this nation its most renowned statesmen, jurists, patriots, agriculturists, teachers and divines. It is one of the principal agents by which the United States of America has been enabled to advance to the first rank in all things that make a nation great.

But against this most sacred product of American liberty Rome lifts her unholy hands. Against our schools she hurls her worst anathemas. But it is our purpose in this chapter to let the Roman Catholic Church speak for itself. Its language is plain and needs no interpretation. Listen to Rome’s damnable utterances:

“These public schools are devouring fires and pits of destruction. They ought to go back to the devil, from whence they came.”–The Freeman’s Journal.

“If your son or daughter is attending a state school you may be sure that you are violating your duty as Catholic parents and conducting to the everlasting anguish and despair of your child. Take it away. Let it rather never know how to write its name than to become the bound and chained slave of satan.”–The Shepherd of the Valley.

“The common schools of this country are sinks of moral pollution and nurseries of hell.”–Chicago Tablet.

“The public or common school system is a swindle on the people, an outrage on justice, a foul disgrace in matters of morals, and should be abolished forthwith.”–New York Tablet.

“The hideous fetish, called the public school, is only an ugly idol after all.”–Colorado Catholic.

“It will be a glorious day for Roman Catholics in this country when, under the laws of justice and morality, our school system shall be shivered to pieces.”–Catholic Telegraph.

“We hold education to be a function of the church and not of the state, and in our case we do not and will not accept the state as an educator.”–New York Tablet.

They love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. Listen to the snarls of Rome’s “dupes:”

“Unless you suppress the public school system as at present conducted, it will prove the damnation of this country.”–Father Walker.

“I frankly confess that the Catholics stand before the country as the enemies of the public schools.”–_Father Phelan.

“The duty of all loyal, God-fearing Christian men (Roman Catholics) then, I repeat it, is to make common cause against this common foe.”–Father Gleason.

“The public schools have produced nothing but a godless generation of thieves and blackguards.”–Priest Schauer.

“I would as soon administer the sacrament to a dog as to Catholics who send their children to public schools.”–Priest Walker.

“The public school system must be destroyed. It must be done by stopping Bible reading, Psalm singing and eliminating objectionable books.”–Priest Phelan.

“To rescue these little ones out of the grasp of that monster (the public school), of that popular idol, is our work.”–Bishop John Hennessy.

“We can have the United States in ten years. And I want to give you three points for your consideration: The Negroes, the Indians and the public schools.”–Bishop Ireland.

“Emphatically a social plague.”–Archbishop Perche.

“A ripe knowledge of the cathechism, minus Massachusetts education, is preferable to her education, minus the catechism.”–Cardinal Antonelli.

“The common school system of the United States is the worst in the world.”–Cardinal Manning.

“The catechism alone is essential for the education of the people.”–_Cardinal Antonelli._

“We must take part in the elections. Move in solid mass in every state pledged to sustain the integrity of the public schools.”–Cardinal McCloskey.

“The Roman Church alone is endowed with power to educate the young.”–Cardinal McCloskey.

“Education outside of the control of the Roman Catholic Church is a damnable heresy.”–Pius IX.

“Public schools open to all children for the education of the young should be under the control of the Romish Church, and should not be subject to civil power, nor made to conform to the opinions of the ages.”–Pope Pius IX.

“When I see them drag from me the children, the poor little children, and give them an infidel education, it breaks my heart.”–Pope Pius IX.

“It is desirable, therefore, venerable brethren, that in concert with your colleagues in the Episcopate, your efforts and your zeal guard Catholic children from frequenting schools in which their religious instruction is neglected and open danger incurred of spiritual loss. Therefore we vehemently desire, as has already been intimated to you by the propaganda, that in approaching Episcopal meetings you carefully discuss the measure that may best help to attain this end. We wish you also to use earnest efforts that the civil magistrates, who know full well that nothing is more advantageous to the commonwealth than religion should provide, by the enactment of wise laws, that the office of teachings, which is carried on at the expense of the public, including consequently the contributions of Catholics, should contain nothing that stands in the way of their conscience or runs foul of their religion.”–Pope Leo XIII.

We could go on and quote diabolical denunciations of our public schools from hundreds and thousands of Catholic officials, as the followers of Rome make no “bones” of declaring their animosity towards the public schools of this country, and they are only waiting for the time to arrive when they will be able to wipe from the face of the earth every vestige of our public schools, and place in their stead their parochial schools, which are nothing more nor less than “mills of ignorance” and “institutions of superstition.”

An institution of learning is something that is not desired by Catholicism, for whenever you educate you destroy the doctrines of Romanism, as the hosts of Catholicism cannot stand the searchlight of wisdom, for whenever you educate the followers of Catholicism they become disgusted with their dogmas of damnation.

Our public schools are the bulwarks of this government, and all that we are to-day, and all that we may expect to be in the future, has come and must come by and through the public schools, which are the dearest institutions that adorn this country.

There must be no sectarianism, whether political or religious, in our public schools, but there must be truth and duty there. The unchanging and undying maxim of moral rectitude should be taught to every child. It is not enough that a boy or girl should be educated mentally. The safety of our nation, as well as his own usefulness and happiness, demand that they should be trained to habits of truthfulness and develop a fine standard of honor. They should be inspired to form exalted ideals of manhood and womanhood, charity, rectitude and godliness, and made strong in the resolution to defend the truth, which is never found in parochial schools, as the Catholic doctrine always tends to humiliate her followers.

The time has come when the pupils of our public schools must be taught the love of country, and Catholicism does not teach this, but the reverse. The children of this nation must learn to love their native land. To whom shall we look for the inculcation of those patriotic sentiments which should inspire the heart of every American citizen? Not to Catholicism, by any means, but to the three hundred thousand teachers of our public schools.

Over every school house in hamlet and city, in country and town, in the North and in the South, in the East and in the West, the American flag should kiss the morning breeze. Place it where twenty millions of children will see it every day, and learn to love it as the emblem of all that is great and good. It will represent to us and to all the world, in a new and peculiar manner, the great fundamental truth that the bulwark of our liberties is in the education of our people.

The war of the revolution was fought to establish our nationality. Incalculable blood and treasure have been spent to establish and keep our national life intact, and the national policy with relation to our public schools is part and parcel of that all-absorbing determination to secure the perpetuity of the state. Men make better citizens for being educated. The higher the popular intellect is raised the more intelligent and independent will be its vote. The stronger the source of government, the stronger the government. If the “bayonets that think” are the most potent, the “ballots that think” are the most beneficent.

Every victory which our nation has won has been a victory of the public schools and a death knock to Catholicism. They have been the nursery not only of our statesmen, but of our patriots and soldiers. They are an American institution and are destined to live as long as the republic survives. There is no other American institution that American people would sooner fight for and die for than that which secures an educated and intelligent nationality. Let us maintain inviolate our public schools to the end that our nation may ever be the home of liberty, “the land of benedictions.”

In the unbounded universe of God’s domain there are manifold diversities, and yet there is an essential unity that binds the world together; there is a common point where all matter unites.

As there is great freedom and diversity permitted in the unity of nature, so, in our country of religious and political freedom, we must grant the greatest latitude possible to the individual conscience in personal, religious and civil rights consistent with good government. But that there must be a code of morality common to all as the basis of our civilized jurisprudence, in which the rights of all center or unite and are equally protected, every reasonable mind must admit. But where do we get our ideas of what is morally right, and what is morally wrong, as the basis of our common law and jurisprudence? What book or books contain the best code of morals? We answer, the Bible. For the excellency of the morality of the Bible has been admitted by the most distinguished men who have opposed its supernatural revelation, among whom are Gibbon, Byron, Carlyle, Lord Bollingbroke, Napoleon Bonaparte, Goethe and Renan. Thomas Jefferson, speaking of Christ as a teacher, said: “He set forth the sublime ideas of the Supreme Being, aphorisms and precepts of the purest morality.”

Catholicism says: “No Bible shall be taught in the public schools,” but demands that she be allowed to proclaim her dogmas.

Benjamin Franklin, five weeks before his death, said of Christ: “I think His system of morals, and His religion, as He left them, are the best the world ever saw or is likely to see.” The services of the Bible in behalf of human rights and freedom, and in reforming and purifying jurisprudence and politics, have been recognized by many of the most distinguished historians, jurists and statesmen.

As the makers of our laws and the founders of our government have accepted the moral code of the Bible as the basis of our jurisprudence, and have forbidden the union of church and state, and have left every citizen free to “worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience,” so long as he does not interfere with the rights of others or violate the moral code common to all citizens, for the law cannot allow a person to murder or steal, or burn human sacrifices, or be a polygamist, or commit any other public crime, even if the dictates of his conscience should lead him into such a form of religion, because the moral code of the Bible is the basis of our jurisprudence, and it forbids such things.

Therefore, we demand that the “book of books” be kept where the rising generation shall come under its moral teaching without party or sectarian comment, so that all may understand the fundamental principles upon which the science of our common law rests, and thus one of the objects of the order is “to maintain the public school system of the United States and to prevent sectarian interference therewith, and upholding the reading of the Holy Bible therein.”

The argument that the reading of the Bible in the public school should be abolished because it is objectionable to the conscience of some comes only from the Church of Rome, and applies with equal force against the moral code of jurisprudence, because it is objectionable to the conscience of the anarchist, and the conscience of the anarchist is just as sacred and entitled to as much respect, under the law, in this free country of ours as the conscience of any one else.

We have just as much right to take the moral code out of our common jurisprudence as to take the Bible out of our public schools, because the moral code of the Bible is the moral code of our common law.

We desire the Bible to be kept in the school as the standard of moral truth, as the dictionary is kept there as the standard of words and their definitions. As the unabridged dictionary contains all the words of the English language, so the Bible contains all the truths of Christianity. Every book has a part of the words of the dictionary, so every Christian creed has a part of the truths of the Bible. As there never was a book written that contained all of the words of the dictionary, so there never was a creed written that contained all the truths of the Bible. Therefore, as the dictionary and not the books is the standard for words and their meaning, so the Bible, and not the creeds, is the standard of moral truth. A man can take the words in the dictionary and write a bad book, but that is not the fault of the dictionary, but of the man. A person may take passages of Scripture and misapplied truths and write a bad creed, but that is not the fault of the Bible, but of the creed-maker. But every man who takes the Bible as a whole has a complete standard of moral truths.

It is claimed that the Bible should not be read in the school because there are passages that are not proper to be read before children, or a promiscuous audience, but this is only claimed by Catholicism. Yes, and there are words in the dictionary that it would be just as improper to use and define before children or a promiscuous audience as any passage in the Bible. Therefore, it would be just as reasonable to exclude the dictionary as the Bible from the school room on this hypocritical argument in favor of false modesty.

The man’s conscience that will object to the reading of the Bible in the public school will ultimately object to the moral code of our jurisprudence, and such a conscience is dangerous to our form of government, inimical to the best interests of society and good government, as has been clearly demonstrated in the past. The Mormons claimed the right under our constitution to live in polygamy, as that was their religion and the way they served God according to the “dictates of their own conscience.” But the supreme court decided they could not worship God according to the dictates of their conscience if their worship was a violation of the moral code common to all. Thus all must submit to the moral code irrespective of their individual conscience. So the Bible should be read in the public schools, irrespective of the conscience of any, until the majority of the government of the people, for the people and by the people shall say: “Away with your Bible, away with your Sabbath, away with your Christian jurisprudence, and give us infidel, revolutionary France, or lawless anarchy, or the inquisition of the dark ages!”

Our public school is the mill that is to grind out this standard of morality, knowledge and patriotism common to all. Hence we must have the Bible in it as the standard of morality, and primary principles of literature, science and art, the standard of knowledge, and the American flag and its essential principles as the standard of patriotism. Our American school system is like a great paper mill, into which are cast rags of all kinds and colors, but which lose their special identity and come out white paper, having a common identity. So we want the children of the state, of whatever nationality, color or religion, to pass through this great moral, intellectual and patriotic mill, or transforming process, and thus lose their foreign peculiarities and come out not as Germans, Irish, English, Huns or Poles, but as Americans, having the common identity of morality, knowledge and patriotism that is essential to true American citizenship and good government stamped upon their minds, and when they pass through this mill of purification they then begin to lose confidence in the heathenish doctrines of Catholicism.

In a government where the people are the rulers, intelligence and education are necessary to maintain the nation’s stability. Under this belief, the public school system of the United States was founded.

Following are expressions of prominent Americans on the general subject of popular education:

President Hays: “I am firmly convinced that the subject of popular education deserves the earnest attention of the people of the whole country, with a view to wise and comprehensive action by the government of the United States. The means at the command of the local and state authorities are in many cases wholly inadequate to deal with the question. The magnitude of the evil to be eradicated is not, I apprehend, generally and fully understood.”

President Garfield: “Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither freedom nor justice can be permanently maintained. Its interests are intrusted to the state and to the voluntary action of the people. Whatever help the nation can justly afford should be generously given to aid the states in supporting common schools, but it would be unjust to our people and dangerous to our institutions to apply any portion of the revenue of the nation of the states to the support of sectarian schools. The separation of the church and the state in everything relating to taxation should be absolute.”

Dr. Strong: “Free schools are one of the cornerstones of our government.”

Washington’s Farewell Address: “Promote them as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinions should be enlightened.”

Calhoun: “In proportion as a people are ignorant, stupid, debased, corrupt, exposed to violence within and danger without, the power necessary for a government to possess in order to preserve society against anarchy and destruction becomes greater and greater, and individual liberty, less and less, until the lowest condition is reached, when absolute and despotic power becomes necessary on the part of the government and individual liberty extinct.”

The church of Rome wants to rule by tyranny so that she can force her “dupes” to do her bidding.

No subject could be of more interest to American citizens to-day than that of foreign immigration to America. Every section of the country has felt, to some degree, the demoralizing effect of the free admission of aliens, unsuited morally and mentally for participating in a government of the people.

The consensus of opinion among all classes of good citizens is that some restrictive measures should be adopted, and this can be effected only by popular agitation and demand.

Read what some prominent men of the country have said on the subject:

Hon. Wm. E. Chandler: “We should prepare ourselves with wisdom and vigor to enforce completely such laws of exclusion as we have adopted. We should throw our strongest force into a stricter administration of those laws so that no man and no family shall pass through the Ellis Island doors, or into any seaport, or across the Canadian or Mexican borders, who is a pauper or likely to become such. One method of stricter administration should be the requirement that all immigrants before leaving their own countries shall obtain consular certificates abroad, showing their right to enter the United States.”

Hon. Henry Cabot Lodge: “You ask me for a few words on the subject of immigration. My opinion has been stated at length, both in speeches in Congress and in review articles, but I am very glad to restate it in the briefest possible form. I think that immigration to this country is increasing too fast on one hand and deteriorating on the other. We are ready to welcome every honest immigrant who comes to make a home and become an American citizen, but I believe that the present immigration ought to be sifted and restricted much more than it is, both as a protection to the quality of our citizenship and to the rates of wages to our workingmen.”

Hon. Robert P. Porter, Superintendent of Census: “The unrestricted admission of the diseased, half-fed swarms of helpless humanity from the purlieus of Southern European cities is the dangerous phase of immigration. If continued, it will prove a curse and blight to American citizenship and American institutions. There was a time in our history when the better class of foreign immigrants and our own population was able to swallow up the less desirable class, but it takes no great discernment now to see the congested spots here and there on our body politic. In this lies the danger. Such a change in the character of immigration as herein shown cannot have taken place without materially affecting the entire immigration problem, and the sooner our statesmen get to the bottom of the present condition of affairs, the better for the republic.”

Rev. Josiah Strong, D.D.: “It is immigration which has fed fat the liquor power, and there is a liquor vote. Immigration furnishes most of the victims of Mormonism, and there is a Mormon vote. Immigration is the strength of the Catholic Church, and there is a Catholic vote. Immigration is the mother and nurse of American anarchy, and there is to be an anarchist vote. Immigration tends strongly to the cities and gives to them their political complexion, and there is no more serious menace to our civilization than our rabble-ruled cities.”

Samuel Gompers, President American Federation of Labor: “It almost grieves me even to recommend the slightest restriction to the full and free immigration of anyone who desires to escape from the iniquitous conditions from which he may suffer, but the progress of our civilization is hanging in the balance, and intelligent and brave men should not be afraid to express themselves to secure us against results which may be appalling. Unrestricted immigration injures the people of our country and does no good to the people of other countries. It injures all.”

A.S. Draper: “I would hang the flag in every school room, and I would spend an occasional hour in singing our best patriotic songs, in declaiming the masterpieces of our national oratory, and rehearsing the proud story of our national life.”

Francis Marion: “Men will always fight for their government according to their sense of its value. To value it right, they must understand it. This they cannot do without education.”

Winship: “The public school is the one force, is the only force, that can unify all classes and conditions of society. Here we have the children of the nation in their entirety, and we can, if we will, teach them in the schools so much of the grandeur of our possession, of the heroic in our history, of the brilliant in our prosperity, of the fascinating in our traditions, that the fathers of the future will be willing to vote for and die, if necessary, for the American idea; that the mothers of the future will teach their sons to develop our resources by industry, to honor the active duties of private and public system, because it lies at the foundation of our national existence.”

Where does the vicious element which is found in this country come from, and to what church does it belong? Ah, 98 per cent of those whom we call anarchists can trace their origin from foreign countries, and they are always identified with the Roman Catholic Church.

Wherever you find a national disturbance, and wherever you find the spirit of anarchy in this country, you will find a spot where Roman Catholicism exists, as her teachings are anarchistic, as she teaches her followers a doctrine that is as sure to lead to anarchy as water is to flow down hill.

Catholicism teaches her children that our public schools are “plague spots” and “nurseries of hell,” and impresses upon their minds that education, in a broad sense, is not essential, and also teaches them that they must look to the priestcraft for their education, and at the same time the priestcraft is instructed by the Pope of Rome that a broad-gauge education is not permissible to be given to the followers of Catholicism, and the Pope of Rome teaches her bishopric and her priestcraft that they must fight the public school system, and in its stead erect the parochial schools of Rome, which are nothing more nor less than schools of dogmas, and these dogmas are incubators of anarchy, for without education and without love of country, anarchy is as certain to follow as the day is certain to follow night, but still Protestantism stands idly by and allows Catholicism to villify her institutions, and at the same time permits Catholicism to place her followers in a position to draw salaries from the institutions which they despise and hate with the venom of hell.

It is my object and my aim to arouse Protestantism to a sense of their duty, and if I can do this I will feel that I have accomplished a task that will eventually call forth the plaudits of the American people, for as sure as God reigns, just that sure our public schools will be crushed out of existence by Catholicism unless Protestant America raises her voice and her strong arm in defense of our public school system, and against the encroachment of the damnable and diabolical doctrines of Catholicism.

Our greatest American statesmen, our greatest American patriots, our greatest American thinkers, our wisest and most loyal citizens, and our grandest old mothers are Protestants, and born of Protestant stock; then why should we hesitate to denounce this anarchistic demon of Rome, when we know what she thinks of our American institutions, and when we are absolutely certain that if it was within her power she would crash into dust everything that is near and dear to Protestantism?

Arouse, ye Protestant hosts, and buckle on the armor of your forefathers and march out in a solid body of Protestant warriors and fight to the death the encroachment of Romish rule and force her back into the trenches of her degradation, and compel her to remain within the border of the countries which she has desolated by her hellish dogmas, and purge the shores of the “home of the brave and the land of the free” of this scarlet-robed hag, who would paralyze our American institutions which are near and dear to every pure American, both man and woman, who dwells beneath the folds of the American flag.