Religious Instruction in the Public Schools
By Editor
IN the New York Times of April 7, 1912, there appeared a statement to the effect that ex-Controller Bird S. Coler had published two pamphlets in which he deprecated the elimination of sectarian religious teaching from public schools. Mr. Coler recommended that "the state take supervision of all schools, public and private, insist upon character and competence in instructors, and then pay each school upon a per capita basis for the secular education furnished." This proposal is in perfect harmony with what is demanded by the Roman Catholic hierarchy, and it has been defended by at least one Roman Catholic paper. In the Times of April 27, there appeared, in opposition to Mr. Coler's proposal, the letter which follows:— "To the Editor of the New York Times. "The Times to-day [April 29] quotes Bird S. Coler to the effect that the introduction into the schools of various kinds of instruction touching every-day life has excluded religious teaching. 'God was crowded out,' he says, and he attributes this result to the intrusion of the 'socialistic theory of state supervision.' Perhaps he is giving socialistic doctrines too much credit; perhaps the curtailment of religious indoctrination in the schools is due, in part at least, to a lingering respect for the Constitution and the secular ideal which gave to us the First Amendment to that great code of fundamental law; perhaps some of our educational authorities are not in Mr. Coler's company in wholly forgetting that the union of church and state is medieval, unjust, and dangerous. "If a Christian majority rightfully may tax minorities of Jews, Mohammedans, and freethinkers for the propagation of the specific dogmas of Christianity, why may not a majority of Catholics rightfully tax a minority of Methodists or Presbyterians for the propagation of the specific doctrines of Catholicism, or a majority of Baptists rightfully tax a minority of Catholics for the propagation of the specific tenets of the Baptist Church? "May one pertinently suggest without impertinence that Mr. Coler might do well to make a serious attempt to acquaint himself with the fundamental principles of secular justice?"