The Bible Excluded from the Schools of the State of New York.
It is announced, with great exultation, that the Superintendent of Public Instruction in the State of New York has decided against the use of the Bible in the public schools of the State. A violent conflict has been going on in the village at Hunter’s Point, opposite this city, on Long Island, for some months past, on this question, between the Romanists and Protestants. Violence has been resorted to, and the fight had become fearful. We gave full accounts of it at the time. Quiet has been enjoyed for some time, while the matter has been in the hands of the Superintendent. His decision is at length given, and we copy it in full in another column, from the New York School Journal. By looking over this “Decision,” it will be seen that the Superintendent does not pretend to cite any law on which it is based. He refers to his own and former decisions “in this department,” and on these citations alone proceeds to say that “the action of the Board of Education of Long Island City in directing the reading of a portion of the Bible as an open exercise in the schools under their charge, &c., has been without warrant of law.” It would have been much more satisfactory had he given some citations to show that his own dictum was made with “warrant of law.” Even by this decision the Board of Education are authorized to provide for the continued reading of the Bible at the usual hour. There is no “warrant of law” requiring them to commence the exercises of the school at 9 o’clock, and if they please to direct the teacher to read the Scriptures at 9 A. M., and to direct that all pupils whose parents do not wish them to hear the Scriptures shall come at 10 minutes past 9, the Superintendent cannot interfere. We think the Trustees are very unwise to expel any pupil for not attending at the reading, but it is plainly within the power of the Trustees, even under this decision, to continue the daily reading of the Bible, and we trust they will. In regard to the great question that underlies this whole matter, our own opinion, often and freely given, is, that the Bible is not a sectarian book; that such portions of it as all good citizens unite in receiving may be read with profit, and that an order to exclude the Bible is an insult to God and to the moral character of the State. We would arrange the time and place of reading it, so that the children of parents unwilling to have their children hear it, may not be required to be present, and so remove any reasonable ground of objection. If the objection were sincerely made, it would be easy to obviate it by any one of various arrangements. But it is not a serious objection. It is a captious, popular argument used by the enemies of our public schools, who desire to break them up and to obtain the public money for sectarian schools and, therefore, for sectarian churches. It is part of the crusade which Roman Catholics, in the spirit of the Pope’s famous Syllabus, are waging against the education of the people. And as in this country the power is in the hands of the people, the Romanists are gradually succeeding in obtaining political influence to secure such action as this decision of the Superintendent. At first view it seems to be in defiance of the people. But upon second thought it will be seen that the political parties are so disposed toward the Roman Catholics, that unless we should elect a Legislature on this question, it would be impossible to reverse the fatal and fearful decision. Among mere politicians there is not courage and principle adequate to save the Bible for the schools of the country. The demands of the Romanists will not stop here. As they have now an official decision that forbids the reading of the Ten Commandments or Christ’s Sermon on the Mount in school hours, they may next demand that the precepts of such lessons shall not be taught; and then that those who believe them to be of divine authority shall not be employed as teachers; and so from step to step downward we may go, until every element of moral power has vanished. “What are you going to do about it?” For ourselves, we shall stand by the public school system, with all the imperfections and disadvantages its enemies may encumber it with. We do not attach any great immediate and direct value to the reading a few verses of Scripture in schools. It is a principle which we do not surrender, but which is torn from us by violence. We think the ultimate moral effect of making a portion of God’s word the daily food of a scholar’s mind is great, and as the State is bound to make good citizens, we would never give up the Bible. But if we are beaten down by politicians and Romish priests, and the Bible is by them thrust out of the school room, we still remain and will “fight it out on this line” to the end of life. We will re-double our efforts in mission and Sunday-school work, to reach the young with religious truth, and by voluntary outside efforts we will seek to inculcate in the youthful mind those principles of virtue which are essential to good citizenship. With God’s help we will never give up the children of this land to Romanism or Infidelity. And if the exclusion of the Bible by State authority from our public schools should have the effect to supplement our secular school system with a plan for the moral and religious culture of the children, such as will reach the wild Arab races of the streets and slums, going beyond the present system and taking the ignorant and neglected for whom now “nobody cares;” we may yet see that Romanism has overleaped itself, when it hoped to doom the people to moral darkness by shutting the light of the Bible from the public school.—N. Y. Observer.