Part 2 — CHAPTER VI Attempts to Control Textbooks

The public school deals with that period of life in which strong impressions find easy lodgment in the child’s memory. Altruism, glorification of national achievements, hero worship, and other emotions are excited by contacts with teachers and books. It is the age in which the child’s ideals can be fired by the sayings of famous men and in which the story of valorous deeds stirs a responsive enthusiasm. Indeed, it is a common belief that the influences of these early associations and impressions persist far into maturity, for “as the twig is bent, so the tree is inclined.” With a keen appreciation of the possibilities of this plastic period of child life, authors of textbooks in history and the other social studies, obedient to the spirit of their times, have exalted and condemned as the prevailing temper has dictated.

History for the sake of propaganda is not a unique possession of any one country. It has been employed in the name of “patriotism” by many nations. Livy extolled Rome, Green exalted England, Bancroft eulogized the exploits of the founders of America, and Treitschke and Nietzsche pictured the glories of an imperialist régime in Germany. As a result, there has developed an overweening pride in national and racial attributes and achievements. From such a source has sprung much of the hereditary enmity between France and Germany. Indeed, it has been said that an analogous situation exists in the United States, and a well-known writer recently declared that, through the study of American history, “Americans are taught to hate Britishers, ... and not only descendants of the men who made the Revolution, but every newly arrived immigrant child imbibes the hatred of Great Britain of today from the patriotic ceremonies of the public schools.”[411]

Propagandist history, however, is not merely an instrument of the ultra-nationalist. By the pacifist it may be employed to depict with a vivid gruesomeness the horrors of war; by it the militarist may demonstrate the advantages of preparedness; the racially conscious may narrate, in their history, achievements of their heroes to the exclusion or derogation of those of other groups; the religious enthusiasts may commend the contributions of their sect to the neglect of others; and economic and social organizations may seek to serve their particular purposes. Demands for revised history textbooks, such as emanated during the World War, to teach the point of view then current, are but a recent instance of a practice as old as the teaching of history.

HISTORY TEXTBOOKS IN THE SOUTH

In the United States, as well as elsewhere, propagandist influences have played their part in shaping the content of history textbooks. The South, in particular, has shown such tendencies, attempting in the ante-bellum days to propagate a history favorable to the slave-holding interests, and since that time endeavoring to justify the past in the eyes of posterity. The desire to depict events from a sectional point of view was especially apparent in the decade preceding the Civil War when a concerted effort to prescribe the content of history textbooks expressed itself in frequent agitations against the use of Northern textbooks. By the Southerner was raised the same query which has been raised in our own time—whether the author of a textbook has a right “to step aside from his proper course to drag in his own private views on vexed questions of national import” about which a writer should “maintain an impartial stand.”[412] Such criticisms were directed against Northern textbook writers; for Southerners were agreed that an author would not be guilty of a heinous offense if he should “step aside ... to drag in” views favorable to the institution of slavery. Indeed, a sectional presentation of history was deemed a necessity; and a movement for “home education” to combat the teachings of the “abolitionist North” attained considerable vigor in the ’fifties. To the Southerner, “home education” meant Southern trained teachers and textbooks filled with the convictions of the slave-holding South. Through such agencies it was hoped to expel from their midst “the wandering incendiary Yankee school-master” with “his incendiary school books”[413] parading under “the black piratical ensign of abolitionism.”[414]

Even prior to the ’fifties, the South had realized the value of a propagandist literature, for Duff Green, a relative of John C. Calhoun, had secured a charter from South Carolina for a Southern Literary Company for the purpose of publishing school books adapted to his section.[415] Green’s efforts must have proved unsuccessful, for it was followed by much newspaper discussion of the situation, which gained in asperity as the South became more belligerent in the assertion of her rights.

Writing in De Bow’s Review of 1855, one alarmist declared: “Our text-books are abolition works. They are so to the extent of their capacity, and though the poison of anti-slavery dogmas has not found its way into arithmetic and mixed mathematics, yet we should not be surprised to find that some work is now in progress in which the young learner will find his sums stated in abolition phrases, and perhaps be required to tell how many more sinners might have gone to Heaven if Abraham, the ‘father of the faithful and the friend of God’ had not been a slave holder and a dealer in human chattels; ... and so long as we use such work as Wayland’s Moral Science and the abolition geographies, readers and histories, overrunning as they do, with all sorts of slanders, caricatures and blood-thirsty sentiments ... [they will] array our children by false ideas, against the established ordinances of God,....”[416]

Another writer could not condone the indifference of his section to the existence of such conditions. “When the public mind of our section was divided as to the justice and propriety of this institution [slavery] ...,” he remarked, “it was not then to be wondered at that we should remain indifferent to the views presented to our youth on the subject, and that we should carelessly allow them to peruse, even in their tender years, works in which slavery was denounced as an unmitigated evil, and the universal race of Ham’s descendants were blazoned forth as a set of dusky angels and martyrs. Such a course may have been defensible at that period, but tell me, what show of propriety is there in its continuance at the present day? We have become awake to the rightfulness and justice of our stand; we have come to know that we are more sinned against than sinning; and we have witnessed the complete failure of many quixotic attempts to transform negroes into prosperous and thriving freemen. Why then should we wish that the rising generation, who are to frame and control public opinion, after we have passed from being, should be on this question of vital importance taught doctrines which are in direct conflict with what we now believe?”[417]

Because “southern life, habits, thoughts, and aims” were “so essentially different from those of the North,” another protagonist of “home education” maintained that a different character of books and training was required to “bring up the boy to manhood with his faculties fully developed.”[418] Nor could this “true man” be developed if he must sit “at the feet of some abolition Gamaliel of the North,” but he must have “books and teachers of history from the South who should point out the destiny of the South.”[419]

As a result of the agitation of the press, the commercial conventions, which met during the years from 1853 to 1860, committed themselves with one accord, to the Southern educational program. The Memphis Convention of 1853 demanded the employment of native teachers, the encouragement of a home press, and the publication of books adapted to the educational wants and the social conditions of the section.[420] The following year, the Charleston Convention passed a resolution which urged the production of textbooks by Southern men “with express reference to the proper education of the Southern youth.”[421] The resolution declared that “this Convention earnestly recommends all parents and guardians within these states, to consider well, that to neglect the claims of their own seminaries and colleges, and patronize and enrich those of remote states, is fraught with peril to our sacred interests, perpetuating our dependence on those who do not understand and cannot appreciate our necessities and responsibilities; and at the same time fixing a lasting reproach upon our institutions, teachers and people.”[422]

In 1856, the Savannah Convention issued to “The People of the Slaveholding States” an address advocating joint action on the part of the Southern legislatures. “It will be well, at least, to look to our school books,” they declared. “Can the making of these be entrusted exclusively to those, who by instilling an occasional heresy, dangerous to our repose, imagine that they serve at the same time God and Mammon—their consciences and their pocket? The State Legislatures at the South alone are competent to heal this mischief. Property will submit to any amount of taxation for such a purpose. A system can and ought to be matured at the South by which the most ample encouragement shall be given to its educational system and its press. Withdraw at once the contributions which are returned too often to us now in contumely and insult.”[423]

At the same convention the committee upon the subject of “Text Books for Southern Schools and Colleges” reported that “the books rapidly coming into use in our schools and colleges at the South are not only polluted with opinions adverse to our institutions, and hostile to our constitutional views, but are inferior in every respect, as books of instruction to those which might be produced amongst ourselves, or procured from Europe....”[424] The Committee proposed that the convention take the matter “under their auspices and select or prepare such a series of books, in every department of study, from the earliest primer to the highest grade of literature and science, as shall seem to them best qualified to elevate and purify the education of the South.”[425] The Committee further recommended that “when this series of books shall have been prepared, the Legislatures of the Southern States be requested to adopt them as text-books.”[426]

The committees appointed at the Southern conventions evidently failed to obtain results, for De Bow’s Review of 1858 querulously remarked that the committees seemed to have dropped into repose after their appointments.[427] Newspaper agitation, however, continued without abatement, The Constitutionalist suggesting, in 1858, that Georgia by law should compel her schools to use Georgia school books in which information was given regarding the early history of the state, and which contained “eloquent and patriotic emanations from the gifted pens” of some of their “ablest writers.”[428]

History textbooks held a conspicuous place in most of the discussions. Peter Parley’s History, extensively used at this time, came in for much adverse criticism because, in the opinion of the Southerner, it “insulted” and “misrepresented” the institutions of the South.[429] “If it is important for us to have a home literature of our own in the lighter departments of reading and knowledge,” one critic remarked, “how much more vitally essential it is to our best interests that the books from which our children imbibe their earliest lessons in history and political economy should be written by those who are able to expound and vindicate, instead of misrepresenting and defaming the institutions under which they are to live and be educated.”[430]

Further criticism of the same textbook is found in an article on “Wants of the South” in De Bow’s Review for 1860. “Our schools have long been groaning under the burden of questionable orthodoxy, and in some instances decided hostility to the institutions which her public instructors, of all others, may reasonably be expected to advocate and defend,” said one writer. “... no teacher or pupil who has used Peter Parley’s Histories, or any of the popular ‘Readers’ and ‘Orators’ from which juvenile disciples of Demosthenes have learned to spout so glibly eloquent invectives against slavery, the slave trade, will fail to recognize the long-deplored existence of this deadly evil.”[431]

Other books of an historical nature, which were especially obnoxious to the South, were Gilbert’s Atlas and Appleton’s Complete Guide of the World, which contained “hidden lessons of the most fiendish and murderous character that enraged fanaticism could conceive or indite.”[432] “This book and many other northern school books scattered over the country come within range of the Statutes of this State [Louisiana], which provide for the imprisonment for life or the infliction of a penalty of death upon any person who shall publish or distribute such works ...,” declared one writer.[433]

Whelpley’s Compend of History was also considered heretical in nature because of its discussion of slavery, which inculcated “improper precepts in the minds of our children.”[434] The writer in his diatribe against this book quoted the following passage from Whelpley to prove his point: “But for what purpose was he [the slave] brought from his country? Why was he forced from the scenes of his youth, and the cool retreats of his native mountains? Was it, that he might witness the saving knowledge of the gospel?... No. He was deprived of his freedom, the dearest pledge of his existence. His mind was not cultivated and improved by science!... He is detested for his complexion, and ranked among the brutes for his stupidity. His laborious exertions are extorted from him to enrich his purchasers, and his scanty allowance is furnished, only that he may endure his sufferings for their aggrandizement.”[435]

The discussion of slavery in the Northern textbooks was not the only cause for irritation. Equally distasteful to the Southerner were the invidious comparisons made between North and South.[436] The histories produced by the North, one writer pointed out, “are filled with praise and glorification of the New England and Northern states generally, as a set of incorruptible patriots, irreproachable moralists, and most exemplary models for future imitation, and their descendants are depicted as fully equalling the standard set for them by their distinguished ancestors, of unexceptionable demeanor. On the other hand, the individuals who organized society in the Southern States are pictured as a race of immoral reprobates, who have handed down all of their vices and evil habits to their descendants of this day. While the institution of slavery and its introduction into our country are made the occasion of much violent invective, there is but a slight effort at rebuke, and a large amount of apology is offered, for the amusements of burning witches, hanging Quakers, and banishing Baptists, formerly so very popular in New England. While we, who now support and defend the institution of slavery, are either denounced or pitied, the residents of the Northern States, who have always been the chief prosecutors of the slave trade are allowed to pass uncensured. Such is the state of the histories.”[437]

To Willson’s Historical Series objection was raised because “the author has elected to make himself sectional and therefore must expect sectional support.” “Why say of the odious Hartford Convention,” a critic remarked, “‘Its proceedings were not as objectionable as many anticipated,’ or why use comparisons between the different sections as invidious, and as we believe and know, as false as these: ‘In Virginia and the southern colonies, where the inhabitants guided in the selection of their dwelling places chiefly by consideration of agricultural conveniences, dispersed themselves over the face of the country, often at considerable distances from each other, schools and churches were necessarily rare, and social intercourse but little known. The evils of the state of society thus produced still exist to a considerable extent in the southern portions of the Union. The colonization of New England was more favorable to the improvement of human character and morals.’” Further cause for complaint lay in the following passage: “Of the state of manners and morals in Maryland, Virginia and the southern colonies generally, we cannot give so gratifying an account. While the upper classes of inhabitants among the southern people were distinguished for a luxurious and expensive hospitality, they were too generally addicted to the vices of card playing, gambling and intemperance, while hunting and cock-fighting were favorite amusements of persons of all ranks.... It cannot be denied, however, that New England colonial history furnishes, on the whole, the most agreeable reminiscences, as well as the most abundant materials for the historian.”[438]

So common was a biased presentation of controversial questions in the books of the time that William Howard Russell, The [London] Times correspondent during the Civil War, declared that he was unable to obtain “a single solid, substantial work” on the controversy between the North and the South, for there was not one published which was “worth a cent.”[439]

Little response to the exponents of “home education” seems to have been made at this time by the state legislatures, although, in 1859, the Louisiana legislature adopted a resolution endorsing the movement “to encourage the production of and introduction into the schools of Louisiana of a series of school books written by citizens of the State, published in the South, not contaminated by the fanaticism of Northern authors.”[440] Other Southern states since the Civil War have prescribed the type of histories to be used in their schools, but they have had for their chief intent a “proper presentation of the War of the States.”

Since the Civil War the most active exponents of a pro-Southern history have been Southern veterans’ associations and kindred groups. Especially vigilant have been the United Confederate Veterans who, since 1892, with few exceptions have announced in annual convention their advocacy of “a true and reliable history.” In 1892, the first historical committee, composed of “comrades skilled and experienced in such matters,” was appointed to “select proper and truthful histories of the United States to recommend for use in the public and private schools of the South.”[441] No meeting of the Veterans was held in 1893, but the following year the Historical Committee offered an extensive and elaborate report.[442] This report suggested the establishment of a chair of American history in Southern universities with time for research; that the Association recommend to the legislatures of Southern states that provision be made in the public school course for the teaching of history of the native state for one year, and for the establishment and support of a chair of American history in the state university or some suitable state institution, and that the preparation of school histories of the state be encouraged; that all private schools and academies teach the history of the state one year and devote the same amount of time to United States history; and that state legislatures be memorialized in order to gain their coöperation in securing “a different presentation of the narrative of facts for the truth of history of our common country.”[443]

The Committee, besides their recommendations, classified school histories in three groups. In the first class were those issued in the first ten or fifteen years following the close of the War, “dictated by prejudice and prompted by the evil passion that time had not then softened.” Secondly came those Northern histories apparently fair, either through a revision of an earlier edition or emasculation, in an “effort to curry favor with the text-book patrons of both sections”; also those histories with separate editions for North and South, as well as those “written and published at the North in which an honest effort is made to do justice to the South” but which failed to emphasize the distinctive features of the South or to emphasize the place of the South in the history of the Union. The third group contained a list of text-books acceptable to the Veterans, including Hansell’s Histories by H. E. Chambers of Louisiana, History of the American People by J. H. Shinn of Arkansas, History of the United States by Alexander Stephens of Georgia, History of the United States by George F. Holmes of Virginia, History of the United States by Blackburn and McDonald of Maryland, Grammar School History by L. A. Field of Georgia, and History of the United States by J. T. Terry of Georgia.

The report of the Committee of 1894 was accepted unanimously and the resolution, passed to continue the committee, urged that it “do everything in its power to encourage the preparation of suitable school histories and especially to encourage their publication by the building up of Southern publishing houses....”[444]

The Reports of 1895 and of 1896 manifested the same spirit and offered substantially the same recommendations as those made by the Committee of 1894. Both desired a “vindication for the Southern people and a refutation of the slanders, the misrepresentations and the imputations” which they had “so long and patiently borne.”[445] The Report of 1895 pointed out that “while the South has always been prominent in making history, she has left the writing of history to New England historians” whose chief defect was “lack of catholic sympathy for all sections of the country.”[446] The importance of the work of the Historical Committee was recognized in 1895 by increasing its membership from seven to fifteen to include a representative from each Southern state.[447]

By 1897 the agitation for sectional histories had become so stormy that the Nashville reunion took under advisement a suggestion of the Grand Army of the Republic of Wisconsin, which proposed the appointment of a “commission of distinguished educators from the ranks of the contending armies” who should write a history of the period 1861 to 1865 which should be satisfactory to both sections.[448] The Historical Committee of the Confederate Veterans, however, deemed it inadvisable to undertake such a project, believing that a history textbook could not be written as well by a commission as by one person. However, the Committee pointed out that “the destiny of the South is now inseparably bound up with that of this great republic and that it is to the interest of the whole nation and its citizens everywhere that coming generations of Southern men should give to the Union the same love and devotion which their fathers gave to the United States and then to the ill-starred Confederacy;....”[449] And, although they realized that “no sectional history is wanted in the schools of this country,” yet the Southern people desired in their histories “to retain from the wreck in which their constitutional views, their domestic institutions, the mass of their property, and the lives of their best and bravest were lost, the knowledge that their conduct was honorable throughout, and that their submission at last ... in no way blackened their motives or established the wrong of the cause for which they fought.”[450]

Among the points at issue in the adoption of Northern textbooks was the use of certain opprobrious terms. At the Atlanta reunion in 1898, a resolution was adopted which gave voice to such objections. It requested the substitution of the term “the civil war between the States” for “the war of the Rebellion,” because such an expression reflected “on the patriotism of the Southern people and the cause for which they so heroically fought....”[451] The Historical Committee at the same time indicated their aversion to other “offensive epithets” in Northern histories, such as “rebels” and “arch-traitors.”[452] They recommended, among other things, that “Boards of Education and all others having charge of the selection of histories, geographies, speeches, readers, etc., be careful to exclude works that show the partisan, sectional and unpatriotic spirit.”[453]

Yet the need of a “broad American patriotism” was recognized by the United Confederate Veterans regardless of their attacks on Northern produced histories. Such an attitude manifested itself in the committee report of the reunion of 1898 which quoted with favorable comment an extract from an address of Commander John W. Frazier of the Fred Taylor Post, G. A. R., of Philadelphia. The Confederate Veterans especially approved the spirit of Mr. Frazier when he declared: “We must under the blending influence exerted by the new order of things, undo that which sectional feelings led both North and South to do in regard to the publication of public school histories—certain to create and foster lasting and bitter prejudices—and use our influence in behalf of a public school history of the late war and the causes leading to it, that will be used in common in all the public schools of the country,....”[454]

The suggestion of Mr. Frazier reflected the welding influence of the Spanish-American War upon all factions in America. In 1899, the Historical Committee of the Confederate Veterans announced that its duty was “little more than to keep watch upon the histories of the day” for “the prospect for fairness and candor in historical writing” seemed “much improved since the Spanish War,” because “a new perspective,” had been afforded the historian.[455] Yet the same report evidenced a watchfulness on the part of the Southerner to prevent the use of books which “either pervert or fail to do justice to the history of the people of this section.”[456] The reunion further endorsed the recommendation of the Historical Committee for the appointment in each state of a sub-committee of three to examine “every history taught in the schools of the state with especial reference to ascertaining whether said books contain incorrect or inaccurate statements or make important omissions of facts, or inculcate narrow or partisan sentiments.”[457] In the event that any defects were found in any of the histories used in the schools, the Committee suggested that each sub-committee should “enter into friendly correspondence with the authors and publishers of such books, with a view to correcting such errors, or supplying such omissions.” In addition, it became the duty of each sub-committee “annually, one month before each reunion to make a report” to the Historical Committee, showing what histories of the state and of the United States were used in the schools of the state; and further “to make such suggestions with regard to school histories and with regard to the teaching of history” as might seem appropriate.[458]

The reports of the next few years show a slackening vigilance on the part of the historical committees. At each meeting of the Veterans a report and suggestions as to the improvement of historical instruction in the South were offered, but much of the recriminatory tone of the reports of the ’nineties had disappeared. In 1900, the Committee recommended again that the term “the war between the states” be substituted for other terms, and that money be appropriated in order that the Historical Committee could carry on their campaign, through the press and public meetings, for the use of histories doing “full justice” both to the South and the North.[459] The Reunion of 1902 sanctioned the suggestion of the Historical Committee dealing with the preparation of a source book portraying the “character, the ideals and the leadership of the South,” and called favorable attention to Thomas Dixon’s novel The Leopard’s Spots.[460]

The historical reports presented to the reunions held in 1908, 1909 and 1910 still discussed the need for “true history” although commending the fairness of most historians. Yet the Committee hesitated to relax its watchfulness because “the history of the Confederate period as it is told in many books that may be used in our schools, ... demands and deserves undiminished vigilance.”[461]

The Report of 1910 expressed, however, a sanguine satisfaction in the condition resulting from the agitation about history textbooks. “We do not fear the bookmaker now,” the Veterans declared. “Southern schools and Southern teachers have prepared books which Southern children may read without insult or traduction of their fathers. Printing presses all over the Southland—and all over the Northland—are sending forth by thousands ones which tell the true character of the heroic struggle. The influence and wealth of the South forbid longer the perversion of truth and the falsification of history.”[462]

In the reports of the historical committees two history textbooks received specific criticism for their treatment of Southern institutions and life. In 1903, attention was called to a paragraph in The Young People’s Story of the Great Republic by Ella Hines Stratton, in which “a most false and misleading account” was given of the capture of Fort Pillow by General N. B. Forrest.[463] The Report of 1911 devoted considerable space to an attack on Elson’s History of the United States. “One of the most extraordinary happenings in regard to the history of the South occurred in Virginia in the last few weeks,” chronicled the Report. “Elson’s History of the United States had been selected as a textbook by Roanoke College. Miss Sarah Moffett, one of the students of the college, refused to attend the history class or use this history where it referred to the South and its people. For this she suffered reprimand.”[464] The Southern Cross Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy thereupon undertook an investigation and issued a circular which was “widely distributed.”[465] The circular was addressed: “To the Daughters of the Confederacy, the Camps of the Confederate Veterans, the Sons of Veterans, and to all Who are Loyal to the Southland, and Love Her Traditions and Desire a truthful History of Her Social and Political Life.”[466]

The charges brought against Mr. Elson rested upon “the partisan spirit that prompted the writer to slander a people who had reached the pinnacle of high ideals, refinement and culture, and to which it has never been the fortune of many to attain.”[467] To the Southerner was especially abhorrent the portrayal of slave life in the South in which it was said: “‘Often the attractive slave woman was a prostitute to her master,’” “‘an evil’” that “‘was widespread at the South.’”[468] Further objections arose to the statement: “‘A sister of President Madison declared that though the Southern ladies were complimented with the name of wife they were only the mistresses of Seraglios’”; and that “‘a leading Southern lady declared to Harriet Martineau that the wife of many a planter was but the chief slave of his harem.’”[469] Mr. Elson was also regarded as misrepresenting the cause of the Civil War, which he attributed “to slavery and slavery alone” and not to state rights, which he declared “in the abstract had nothing to do with bringing on the war.”[470]

In response to the circular of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, the Veterans adopted a resolution indicating that it could not be “too earnestly pressed upon the attention of those in charge of our educational institutions the supreme importance of excluding from our schools and colleges all histories that do not in their reports of the great struggle for constitutional liberty ... fairly and impartially represent the facts.” The Reunion further resolved that there be used “only such histories as will recognize the justice of that cause [of 1861-1865] in support of which so many of our brave comrades shed their blood and gave their lives.”[471]

In 1912 the agitation regarding history textbooks had lost much of its bitterness and the line of cleavage between the Northerner’s history and that of the Southerner seemed less apparent. Under the fusing influence of the World War, the Confederate Veterans held their reunion in 1917 in the city of Washington where Confederate and Union flags waved together.[472] But the spirit of sectional interest had too long enslaved them and, in 1921, the Reunion favorably adopted a report of the Rutherford Committee. Chief among the achievements for a “true history” which the Committee were able to report was the adoption of satisfactory histories in the states of Mississippi and Texas. The Committee predicted similar action in North Carolina where there were “true histories by Southern authors and published by a home house,” thereby eliminating any necessity for even considering “any Yankee books.”[473]

A revival of propaganda for sectional histories since 1921 is due in some degree to the appearance of two pamphlets which set forth the need of a distinct type of history for the South: The Truth of the War Conspiracy of 1861, by H. W. Johnstone, and Truths of History, by Mildred Lewis Rutherford, state historian for the United Daughters of the Confederacy. These pamphlets received the unanimous endorsement of the United Confederate Veterans at their meeting in Richmond, Virginia, June, 1922, in a resolution recommending their use in the public schools.[474] Among other things, these writings purported to establish the fact that Lincoln began the Civil War. The committee report declared: “This [The Truth of the War Conspiracy of 1861] presents the official evidence gathered principally from the United States Government archives, which proves the Confederate War was deliberately and personally conceived and its inauguration made by Abraham Lincoln, and that he was personally responsible for forcing the war upon the South.”[475]

The endorsement of this ultra-Southern viewpoint caused a storm of protest, particularly in the North. Under the caption “The Confederate Veterans’ New Glands,” the Chicago Daily Tribune observed: “We are moved to wonder, ‘What is history?’ The Standard Dictionary defines it as ‘a systematic record of past events.’ No better definition in six words occurs to us. But more or less recent events in world politics, coupled with the current action of the Confederate Veterans, indicates [sic] that that definition is in error. History is becoming, if it has not already reached that stage, a medium of propaganda. That became evident in the world war, when European histories were combed for evidence of the innate barbarity of the German people. It was more evident in the efforts to arouse the American people to the point of intervention and actual warfare to free Ireland. It is now emphasized through the efforts of the Confederate Veterans to impose upon the children of the south their own interpretation of the Civil War, regardless of accuracy or the effect upon the nation. The Veterans are attempting to pass on their old hates and rancors to their descendants. They have not yet surrendered to Grant. They are a trifle feeble, to be sure, but apparently becoming less so. They are busily engaged in swapping their old glands for new.”[476]

The New York Times expressed equally strong disapproval of an effort to revive the bitterness of the past and attempt “a revocation of beatification or canonization” of Lincoln.[477]

No less resentful at the attempted disparagement of Lincoln’s services were the officers of the Grand Army of the Republic, who assailed Miss Rutherford’s statement that Lincoln began the war as a “lie.”[478] Mrs. John A. Logan, representing the Dames of the Loyal Legion, also offered objections to such “a perversion of facts,” and declared that all patriotic societies would be urged to seek the suppression of any such histories.[479]

Protests against this revival of sectional animosity were not localized in the North. The Macon [Georgia] Telegraph suggested to Miss Rutherford that she would find better employment were she to bring to public view the virtues, the generosities and heroisms which were in the Old South and should be carried over in the New South. The Telegraph also believed that it would prove fruitful of good were she to dwell on the cordial tributes paid by the North to Lee as a man and as a general; and as for Lincoln, with much less research than she used in unearthing dubious evidences of his antagonism to the Southerners, she could find almost innumerable and indubitable proofs of his good-will. The Telegraph concluded that “the whole nation looks upon its Lincolns and its Lees as Americans, and humanity looks upon them as its own.”[480]

Beside the allegation that Lincoln began the Civil War, Miss Rutherford, following the impulse given her by the Johnstone pamphlet, Truths of the War Conspiracy of 1861,[481] offered quotations to show that Lincoln was not a fit example for children, nor was he given his rightful place in history. Such quotations as the following are indicative of the character of her remarks: “People found in Lincoln before his death nothing remarkably good or great, but on the contrary, found in him the reverse of goodness or greatness. Lincoln as one of Fame’s immortals does not appear in the Lincoln of 1861 (Schouler’s History of the United States, Vol. VI, p. 21).”[482] “Lincoln signed the liquor revenue bill and turned the saloon loose on the country, thus undoing the previous temperance work of the churches.”[483] “Mr. Lincoln went to church, but he went to mock and came away to mimic.”[484] “The people all drank, and Abe was for doing what the people did, right or wrong.”[485] Miss Rutherford also presented evidence designed to prove that Lincoln was a tricky politician,[486] and that the Emancipation Proclamation was unconstitutional.[487]

In contrast with these characterizations of Lincoln are the “spotless integrity, controlling conscience” and “sincere religious convictions” ascribed to Davis. Even a Northern historian, Ridpath, according to Miss Rutherford, testified that Davis had bitterness toward no man.[488]

Eighty-one per cent of the schools and colleges in the South, according to Miss Rutherford, were using, in 1921, “text-books untrue to the South,” and “seventeen per cent” were “using histories omitting most important facts concerning the South.”[489] As written, the histories “magnify and exalt the New England colonies and the Mayflower crew, with bare mention of the Jamestown Colony, thirteen years older, and the crews of the Susan Constant, the Discovery, and the Goodspeed.”[490] Other objectionable features in most school histories were the “extended account” generally given to the “religious faith and practice” of New England with no mention of Sir Thomas Dale’s Code in the Jamestown Colony, “which enforced daily attendance upon Divine worship, penalty for absence, penalty for blasphemy, penalty for speaking evil of the Church, and refusing to answer the Catechism, and for neglecting work.”[491]

Other Southerners than Miss Rutherford have criticized the customary presentation of history. “We owe it to our dead, to our living, and to our children, to preserve the truth and repel the falsehoods, so that we may secure just judgment from the only tribunal before which we may appear and be fully and fairly heard, and that tribunal is the bar of history,” asserted Benjamin H. Hill.[492] Likewise Thomas Nelson Page declared: “In a few years there will be no South to demand a history if we have history as it is now written. How do we stand today in the eyes of the world? We are esteemed ‘ignorant, illiterate, cruel, semi-barbarous, a race sunken in brutality and vice, a race of slave drivers who disrupted the Union in order to perpetuate human slavery and who as a people have contributed nothing to the advancement of mankind.’”[493]

Among the textbooks designated by Miss Rutherford for special criticism were Davidson’s History of the United States, Montgomery’s Beginner’s American History, and Muzzey’s An American History.[494] Davidson was criticized because he asserted that “the Jamestown colonists were vicious idlers and jail birds picked up on the streets of London,” and because of the statement that “side by side the two civilizations had grown up in America—the one dedicated to progress and kept up with the spirit of the age—the other a landed aristocracy with slavery as the chief excuse for its existence.”[495]

Condemnation was meted out to Muzzey’s textbook because it was alleged that he said, “The cause for which the Confederate soldiers fought was an unworthy cause and should have been defeated,” and because “it is impossible for the student of history today to feel otherwise than that the cause for which the South fought was unworthy.”[496] Montgomery was placed in the objectionable group because he described the settlers of Georgia as “filthy, ragged, dirty prisoners taken from the ‘Debtor’s Prison’ by Oglethorpe.”[497]

On the other hand, R. G. Horton’s A Youth’s History of the Civil War presents a point of view acceptable to Miss Rutherford, for it declares that “the withdrawal of the Southern States from the Union was in no sense a declaration of war upon the Federal government but the Federal government declared war on them, as history will show.”[498]

Doubtless the most prejudiced discussion of mooted questions since the Civil War appears in the textbooks produced before the opening of the twentieth century. This period, in general, characterized by a spirit of intense local patriotism, reflected itself clearly in the history textbooks. During this period were published such Southern textbooks as Venable, A School History of the United States, Lee, New School History of the United States, Chambers, A School History of the United States, and Taylor, Model School History.

Susan Pendleton Lee’s New School History of the United States can be quoted as typical. “The Constitution of the United States recognized slavery.... The opinion that it was a moral wrong did not prevail before the days of Garrison and his followers who pronounced it to be the sum of all ‘iniquity.’... The outcry against slavery had made the Southern people study the subject, and they had reached the conclusion that the evils connected with it were less than those of any other system of labor. Hundreds of thousands of African savages had been Christianized under its influence. The kindest relations existed between the slaves and their owners.... The bondage in which the negroes were held was not thought a wrong to them, because they were better off than any other menial class in the world.”[499] The same author justified the Ku Klux Klan because “no high spirited, courageous people could patiently submit to such a government.” “As open resistance was impossible,” she declares, “they, too, had recourse to secret organizations. They were at first local, and were intended for self-protection against the barn burnings and worse outrages committed by misguided negroes.”[500]

As a result of this desire to present the history of their section in terms of their own convictions, the Southerners have always agitated for textbooks different from those used in Northern schools. Northern textbook companies whose enterprise was much condemned during the ante-bellum period have capitalized this sectional preference and produced for Southern consumption, among others, Evans’ The Essential Facts of American History, Chambers’ A School History of the United States, and Stephenson’s An American History.[501] On the other hand, for the North, the same book companies have published textbooks satisfactory to that section. Today, in substantially all of the states which formed the Confederacy, specific textbooks in American history are prescribed, a practice not so universal in the North, where local adoption is sometimes found.[502] An analysis of these Southern textbooks, however, discloses a very temperate presentation of controversial questions. Upon the points of contention between the North and the South, there is a natural bias in favor of the South, a tendency to attempt justification and exoneration. Evans, in The Essential Facts of American History, for example, in discussing “reasons for secession,” lays greater stress than the textbooks of the North on the right of secession, a “right which had been asserted by other than the Southern States.”[503] Stephenson, in An American History, dubs John Brown as “that terrible John Brown,”[504] and characterizes the carpet-bag governments as insolent, dishonest and violent.[505] The terms “rebellion” and “civil war” are employed by Northern, not Southern, histories, the “war of the states” and the “war of secession” being used in the South.

ATTEMPTS OF THE GRAND ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC TO CONTROL HISTORY TEXTBOOKS

Six years before the Confederate Veterans in reunion accepted the report of their first historical committee regarding the “false” histories used in Southern schools, the Grand Army of the Republic learned through a similar channel that the history textbooks of the North “signally” failed “to comprehend the causes that resulted in the war of the rebellion.”[506] Much cause for complaint arose from the fact that textbooks were “compiled for a national system of education, South as well as North,”—a condition held sadly unacceptable, it would seem, by the patriotic organizations of this period.[507]

In the Report of 1888, the G. A. R. undertook to point out statements in textbooks used in the South which appealed to them as indicative of “a thoroughly studied, rank, partisan system of sectional education.”[508] As a case in point Davidson’s School History of South Carolina, “published at Columbia, South Carolina, by one W. J. Duffie, copyrighted in 1869,” was examined. This history, so the Report declared, in Chapter 195 ascribed “the cause of secession, which was the cause of the war,” to the fact that “Congress kept passing laws which it had no right to pass according to the Constitution.”[509] Further, in speaking of the withdrawal of South Carolina from the Union the author asserted that “she had a right to do this; that is, if the States rights party of the South was correct in its doctrine.”[510]

The Report condemned another history textbook, written by Blackburn and McDonald, because of the following passage: “The second year of the war now commenced; it found each section preparing with terrible earnestness for the conflict. The South was straining every nerve to resist the Northern multitudes; ... To fill her armies the North had a better and more successful mode, she offered immense bounties and high pay. Induced by these, thousands of European mercenaries enlisted. The South had nothing but her gallant children to put in the field and thus she was condemned to stake her most precious jewels against the trash of Europe.”[511]

Other grounds for criticism were found in Alexander Stephens’ common school history which was guilty of an effort “to indoctrinate the youth” of the South with the “monstrous heresy” of state rights and secession.[512]

“These Southern histories do not fail to make known their side of this question. They are full of it,” concluded the Committee. “What we deem treason is there made respectable. While our histories on the same subject are comparatively silent, indeed are so lamentably deficient upon this question that it were far better to discard all history of our country during the epoch of 1860-5 than to admit them to our schools as now compiled. It is indeed time to cease toying with treason for policy, and to cease illustrating rebels as heroes, as in the case of some of our school histories.”[513]

The Report of 1888 inaugurated a practice extending over a period of more than twenty years. The Report of 1892 laid its emphasis upon the fact that the textbooks in history “slandered the North and the cause of the Union, ... depreciated the value of our troops, and represented that the South was in the right, and that the army which saved the Union was a wicked aggressor....”[514]

In 1895 the Encampment, meeting at Louisville, had its attention called by the Department of Indiana to the character of history textbooks used in Northern schools. In that state alarm had been excited by Montgomery’s Leading Facts of American History, “the authorized history” for the public schools of the state. Under the auspices of the local G. A. R. an investigation of this book had been conducted. As a result, seven charges were presented against it, the indictment stating that Ellis’ Eclectic Primary History and Barnes’ History were believed to be “equally objectionable.”[515]

The objections of the Indiana G. A. R. received the endorsement of the national encampment, and Montgomery’s history was found guilty on the following counts: first, it contained “no suggestion or intimation that the men who fought for the preservation of the Union were right”; second, there was “a general unfairness of treatment of the people of the North, of the officers and soldiers of the Union armies and the battles fought by them”; third, it was “calculated to give the student false impressions as to the relative courage, heroism and achievements of the contending armies, and of the endurance, devotion and sacrifices of the people of the two sections of the country engaged in the conflict”; fourth, “the accounts of the victories of the Confederates” were “exaggerated, while those of the Union armies” were “dwarfed and made insignificant by comparison”; in the fifth place, “all statements of a commendatory and eulogistic character” were “reserved for the Confederates, while nothing of like character” was said “in favor of the Union soldiers or people”; sixth, that it was “unpatriotic and partisan in statement, tone and sentiment”; and seventh, that it was “unreliable in its statement of facts.”[516]

Among objectionable history textbooks “written by Southern authors, for the avowed purpose of giving a history of the War of the Rebellion from a Southern standpoint,” was that of “Reverend Dr. D. W. Jones, published in 1896.”[517] This book was taken “as a fair sample of its class” by the Committee on School Histories reporting in 1897. The Veterans rested their case upon such a statement as: “The seceding states not only had a perfect right to withdraw from the Union but they had amply sufficient cause for doing so.”[518]

In the “careful examination” to which the school histories of the North were subjected by the Committee of 1897 no book was found which deserved “unqualified endorsement.”[519] This was due to the “one vital defect” common to all the histories—that all of them treated the War “as a contest between the sections of the country ... and not as a war waged by the Government for the suppression of rebellion against National authority and meant to destroy National existence.”[520] Indeed, the Committee had reached their conclusions regarding the “histories in general use in all sections” after “two days of examination.”[521] During this time they had found in “many of these works extravagant expressions as ‘this crushing defeat’” in speaking of the Northern army, and such a statement as “‘the Confederates could not be conquered until they were destroyed,’”—all equally obnoxious and uncomplimentary to the North.[522] Such a condition, the Committee felt, arose from “a commercial spirit” which “largely controls and inspires these publications.”[523]

In view of the situation as it then existed, the Committee asked that the “Encampment record a solemn and emphatic protest against the further use of any history of the Civil War in the public schools of this country which does not teach that this war was a war waged by the National Government for the suppression of rebellion and the preservation of National existence; that there was a right side and a wrong side, ... that in the decision of this question the victors were right and the vanquished wrong.”[524] They further recommended that the agitation for “improved text-books” be continued, that a permanent committee on the teaching of patriotism in the schools be appointed, and that the Grand Army of the Republic and its allied organizations “give direct and persistent attention to the removal and exclusion of improper histories ... in use.”[525]

The results of the agitation for “unbiased” histories which the Confederate Veterans felt had been achieved by 1896 in the South, the G. A. R. through their activities failed to accomplish in the North before 1898. However, at that time they felt “justified to report substantial improvement in the tone and sentiment” of textbooks, particularly in “the more recent publications.”[526] Yet they urged “a continuance of effort ... to place before the children of the Republic truthful and patriotic histories” of the Civil War, and registered a “solemn and emphatic protest” against the proposal that the struggle of 1861 to 1865 be called “the Civil War between the States.”[527]

The following year the Committee report rang with a spirit of optimism because of the changed character of history writing and instruction brought about by “our organization.” As proof for their gratification they pointed out that “in one of the leading works in use more than fifty substantial changes of the text have been made in that portion presenting the history of the rebellion.”[528] Yet regret was expressed that no history known to them made “it clear in statement that the war for the preservation of the Union was prosecuted on the one side by the National Government and on the other by those in armed rebellion against its authority.”[529] To insure continued vigilance the Encampment approved the appointment of an “aide” to each department to keep in touch with the school histories in his state, and to “confer with school authorities and endeavor through them to secure the best obtainable school histories in the schools and the exclusion of such as are unfit.”[530]

The satisfaction expressed by the Committee of 1900 was reiterated at the encampment the following year. But the Committee were robbed of much of their gratification when they considered the “avowedly sectional standpoint” of histories in the South, where it was still taught that the Confederate States were “a lawful government.”[531]

The agitation to investigate history textbooks lost much of its vigor and aggressive anxiety with the opening of the twentieth century. In 1904 the chairman of the school history committee suggested “in view of the utter want of interest exhibited throughout the whole country in regard to this matter” that the committee “be abolished.”[532] Warren Lee Goss, national patriotic instructor, reporting at the forty-first encampment in 1907 declared it his belief that the G. A. R. were “not called upon to interfere in any way with the regular instruction in the schools in United States history, but rather to supplement that instruction by special observances.”[533] Two years later the portion of the report on patriotic instruction devoted to “histories” merely listed the textbooks most commonly used,[534] and in 1910 a similar report eulogized “the loyalty and patriotism of the majority [of those living] who wore the gray.”[535] This sympathetic and tolerant attitude seems to have remained unchallenged in the successive encampments of the G. A. R., and unlike the Confederate Veterans of the last few reunions, the Grand Army of the Republic have not sought to rekindle old animosities.

TEXTBOOKS FOR ROMAN CATHOLICS

As early as 1834 the Roman Catholics of New York urged upon the schools textbooks which would show agreement with their point of view. In 1828 the Public School Society, an organization designed to educate poor children not provided for by any religious society, was allowed to levy a local tax for its support. To this the Roman Catholics raised objections, since they were permitted to dictate neither the kind of instruction offered nor the textbooks adopted. Among the points in controversy was the request of the Catholic clergy that no book should be used but such as had been submitted to the Bishop and declared “free from sectarian principles or calumnies against his religion.”[536] In those books where objectionable statements were found, it was suggested “that such passages be expunged or left out in binding.”[537] The censorship requested was not granted, and in 1840 the agitation regarding textbooks was renewed. Again it was charged that some books contained passages not merely displeasing to the Roman Catholics, but hostile to their faith; whereas others indulged in statements which were both “defamatory” and “false.”

The trustees of the Public School Society, avowedly anxious to dissipate these objections, took measures to secure information from various sources, including both laymen and clergy, with the hope that a removal of the complaint might be effected. They adopted a resolution declaring that they would submit for examination, to the Reverend Felix Varela, some textbooks used in Public School Number 5. As further proof of their desire for harmony, the trustees appointed a committee of five to see whether the books in the schools or libraries contained passages derogatory to the Roman Catholics.[538] Following their action Reverend Mr. Varela pointed out certain objectionable features in some of the textbooks. In one geography he discovered a passage in which the Catholic clergy were characterized as having great influence but being opposed to the diffusion of knowledge. He also disapproved of the description of Italy in which were statements which would “tend to diminish the consideration that a Catholic child has for the Catholic Church.”[539] In another textbook, the discussion of the character of Luther proved objectionable, for, although it might please the Protestants, he felt that there was implied an attack on the Catholic Church.

On July 9, 1840, John Power, vice-general of the diocese of New York, wrote a letter to the editor of Freeman’s Journal, in which he voiced his disapproval of the textbooks employed to instruct children. Odium, he felt, was attached to the Catholic clergy because they were represented as keeping the people in ignorance to promote their own interests, and libraries contained books with “most malevolent and foul attacks on their religion ... no doubt with the very laudable purpose of teaching them [Catholic children] to abhor and despise that monster called popery.”[540]

With failure attending their efforts at censorship, the Roman Catholics resorted to an address to their “fellow citizens of the city and state of New York” in which they appealed for a redress of their grievances. “We are Americans and American citizens. If some of us are foreigners,” they declared, “it is only by the accident of birth,.... But our children, for whose rights as well as our own we contend in this matter, are Americans by nativity.”[541] Repeating the assertions of the priests, the address remonstrated against the false “historical statements respecting the men and things of past times, calculated to fill the minds of our children with errors of fact and at the same time to excite in them prejudice against the religion of their parents and guardians.”[542]

In answer to the exceptions raised by the Catholics, the trustees of the Public School Society expressed doubt as to the wisdom of expurgation, for they believed “nothing of a mere negative character” would be acceptable. “The books selected for the children,” they stated, “have, from the first, been those used and most highly esteemed as school-books. The passages objected to, or nearly all of them, are historical, and relate to what is generally called the Reformation. The writers were Protestants, and took a view of the men and incidents of that excited and eventful period directly opposed to those entertained by the members of the Roman Catholic Church. These portions, must, of course, be offensive to Catholics, and they furnish just cause for complaint.... The objectionable passages are not numerous, but the books are not to be found without them.... The difficulty of procuring books entirely exempt from objection cannot perhaps be more forcibly illustrated than by the fact that one work containing passages as liable to objection as almost any other, is now used as a class-book even in the Catholic schools. It is the intention of the trustees, nevertheless, to prosecute the work of expurgation until every just cause of complaint is removed.”[543]

As a result of the agitation, revised and expurgated books appeared; in some instances the objectionable passages were stamped out with ink from a wooden block or the leaves pasted together or removed. In some cases the books under criticism were prohibited in the libraries and the schools. Yet this failed to satisfy the Roman Catholics. When the expurgated editions were worn out, they were replaced by new books without changes, and gradually this discussion over textbooks subsided.

During the ’eighties it again became a matter of speculation with the Roman Catholics whether they should be taxed to support schools from which their children got “no benefit,” or, if attending, suffered “positive injury and injustice.”[544] They were indeed skeptical as to the merits of a non-sectarian education which they held “professedly non-Christian,”—a system that occupied itself “as little with the mission, history, and teachings of the divine Founder of Christianity” as it did “with the life and doctrines of Confucius or Buddha.”[545]

A storm center of the agitation was Boston, where the Catholics formed a considerable number of the population. Here a denunciation of public school instruction included both teachers and textbooks, resulting in the removal of Swinton’s History and the dismissal of a teacher (a Mr. Travis) for “erroneous and misleading” statements about the granting of indulgences.

“It is very hard,” declared one writer on the controversy, “that a young man who teaches only what he has been taught himself, only what thousands of young men and women have been taught and are teaching, should be singled out and set aside for penalty while others go scot free.... While the Roman Catholics were weak they could not help themselves, and we went on saying what we pleased. Now they are numerous enough in some places to hold the balance of power, and they hold it with a mighty grasp....”[546]

In an effort to prevent the exclusion of the textbook from the schools, the Protestants advanced various arguments: that it had been in use ten years without protest, that “the outcry” was not “honest,” and that the agitation was “simply the opening wedge for riving our school system and dividing the public school money between Catholics and Protestants.”[547]

Other histories than Swinton’s were in like manner placed by the Catholics in the objectionable list. It was alleged that Prescott’s works “swarm[ed] with Puritan prejudice against all things Catholic” and that Macaulay’s History of England emphasized the worst traits of Catholic personages and gave little credit to the Jesuits.[548] So far as Macaulay was concerned, one Catholic objected to sending his children to school to study history from a book acknowledged by the Protestants to be “a gloriously Protestant book,” by which his children would be “gloriously indoctrinated into Protestantism and a hatred of their parents’ religion.”[549]

As a means of settling the controversy it was suggested that all history or the parts relating to the Protestant and Catholic churches be omitted from the curriculum. This could be done, one writer maintained, “without missing anything of value to our common school system or to our other cherished institutions.” Moreover, it was also held that there were “plenty of undisputed topics” to be studied in the schools which were looked upon with “entire unanimity” by “all creeds,” such as two and two make four. For “nothing should ever be taught in schools supported by common funds except that which is accepted by the common faith.”[550]

With the great expansion of the Catholic Church in the United States since the Civil War and the growth of parochial schools in all parts of the country, the particular needs of the Catholics have been met by the enterprise of publishers in supplying special textbooks for their use.[551] As a result today there are found in parochial schools such social study textbooks as McCarthy’s History of the United States, O’Hara’s A History of the United States, A History of the United States for Catholic Schools by the Franciscan Sisters of the Perpetual Adoration of St. Rose Convent, La Crosse, Wisconsin, Lawler’s Essentials of American History, Betten’s The Ancient World, Betten and Kaufman’s The Modern World, and Burke’s Political Economy.[552]

The desire to present events in American history in such a way as to show the importance of the Catholic Church has led to the preparation of textbooks like McCarthy’s History of the United States. In this book it has been “made clear that Catholics discovered, and in a large way, explored these continents, that Catholics transferred civilization hither, that they opened to the commerce of Europe the trade of the Pacific, and that they undertook the conversion of multitudes of dusky natives, of whom few had risen to the upper stages of barbarism.”[553] Although the “war for independence” was begun largely by Protestants, the author avers the help of Catholic nations like France and Spain gave “undoubted assistance to the New Republic.” Norse settlement and discovery are treated extensively, and Columbus’ missionary spirit receives considerable attention. Catholic notables like Governor Dongan, the Calverts, Captain John Barry, and Thomas Macdonough are given more space than ordinarily allotted in school histories. “The winning of the West, in which Catholics acted an important part,” the war on the sea in which are enumerated “the exploits of the O’Briens of Machias, Maine,” “the beginnings of the Catholic Church in America” and “Washington’s patriotic letter to his Catholic countrymen” are other unique features.[554]

Similar in point of view is the textbook written by the Franciscan Sisters of the Perpetual Adoration. Its contents, announces the Foreword, are not immured within the bounds of “the usually taught historical facts,” but include “the too often forgotten efforts of the Church in American History.” Not only is the story of “the venturesome explorer, the intrepid colonizer, the hardy pioneer, the noble warrior, the eloquent statesman” narrated, but there is also depicted “the quiet heroism of the loyal sons and daughters of the Catholic Church.” “Our country is justly proud of the liberty she offers to all her children,” affirm the authors, “but these children are many in faith, and diversified in race peculiarities. Common interests may seem to unite them from time to time, but there can be no true, permanent union except where the spirit and the faith are dominating forces. But where is such a bond of unity except in the Catholic Church? Mother Church folds her arms about all her children and questions not their color or their race.”[555]

To the teachers, the authors offer certain aids and directions. The importance of a “proper setting of United States history with a knowledge of the threefold chronological divisions of world history” and an insight into the “difference between Sacred history and Profane, or Secular history” are indicated. In the period of colonization, teachers are urged to make clear, among other things, “how the Catholic Church, like the mustard seed of the Gospel, has flourished and grown, as it were, into a mighty tree.” The Sisters urge, also, a thorough delineation of the growth of the educational system of the United States including an understanding of “how our cherished parochial schools grew from humble beginnings into the splendid system which now labors so zealously for the spiritual and intellectual welfare of our country.”[556]

The Betten-Kaufman histories, The Ancient World and The Modern World, are typical of Roman Catholic textbooks in the field of European history. Based upon West’s Ancient World and his Modern World, the authors have introduced changes desirable for the purpose of “promoting the great cause of Catholic education.”[557] The chief departure from the traditional European history textbook used in the public schools is in the discussion of Luther and the Reformation. Although Tetzel’s use of the theory of indulgences is criticized in the Betten and Kaufman textbook as “ill advised,”[558] Luther’s theories regarding the remission of sins are characterized as “monstrous.”[559] The Church as an agency for good and for promoting the civilization of the world is given significant attention; the “Catholic view” of social evils is set forth in opposition to other theories, and a discussion of “harmonious coöperation” between church and state is intended to disclose the influence of the Church in the solution of the world’s evils.[560]

In an allied field Father Burke has written his Political Economy designed for use in Catholic Colleges, High Schools, and Academies. Here political economy is discussed not only from the standpoint of “the merely concrete, material things that enter into the science, but also with reference to the personalities of the members of society whose activity is exercised on these concrete, material things.”[561]

Father Burke’s book is divided into twenty-three chapters with titles common to the usual economics textbook. Its unique feature lies in the treatment of various economic theories from the point of view of the “Catholic School.” The doctrine of Malthus is rejected for moral and economic reasons, which take their course in “human injustice and selfishness in the spirit of greed that closes the hearts of men to the dictates of charity and fairness,” and which lead to “improper methods of the distribution of wealth.”[562] The author expresses a belief in the inequality of man, through which comes inequality of distribution. Such a hardship is due, in no small degree, Father Burke declares, to the “fallen state” of man. Because of the sin of his first parents he is “subject to death, to sufferings, to misery, and to labor.” This can be proved, it is averred, by the Book of Revelation. “Hence,” asserts Father Burke, “evils may exist in this world, injustice and oppression may go on, and the equilibration of things may never take place here; the wicked may prosper and the honest and just may be oppressed, and no adequate remedy may appear; yet the moment of compensation, of perfect justice, will come, if not in this life, then in the life of eternity.”[563]

Such a presentation of economic theories has been acclaimed highly satisfactory in Catholic reviews, for, “since ethics as a science directing human actions according to right reason embraces of necessity all of man’s activities, it follows that political economy is rightly subject to the laws of ethics.”[564] “This clear understanding of the state of the question ... enables us at once to detect the errors and dangers of many of the high sounding economic theories which occupy so much space in the literature of the day,” declares one reviewer.[565] Another reviewer in Extension believes that an accurate knowledge of economic principles is impossible “from an examination of the text-books used in some of the secular colleges and universities” in which not only are “some of the so-called principles false, but the resultant deductions, where they are not entirely fallacious, are frequently misleading.”[566] The Pilot offers its endorsement of the textbook because “in these days of industrial and economic unrest, when so much that is false and misleading is written on political and social problems, a book on political economy for Catholic schools is most welcome. Catholic philosophy sets forth sound and unimpeachable principles bearing upon the rights of the individual and of the family, and upon the powers and functions of ‘the State.’”[567]

The purpose of these books is to place emphasis upon Catholic contributions and the power of the Church. As indicated in a textbook written in the later nineteenth century, whose content is much the same as the more recent Catholic textbooks, it is “the manifest duty of those who are entrusted with the education of our children to see that in learning the history of the country they do not lose sight of the rise, progress, and social influences of the Church in the United States....[568] And finally, as religion is always the sweetest inspiration and support of patriotism, the breaking down of religious beliefs in various modern nations, and notably in our own, is accompanied by a loss of patriotism.... Reverence for authority is lost, and society, in order to protect itself, is driven to appeal to force. Nothing can avert the danger but the influence of a great moral power endorsed with all the attributes which create respect and encourage obedience. The Catholic Church is this power....”[569]

In turn, these textbooks have been criticised because of the amount of space given to the Catholic Church in comparison with that allotted other churches. One critic has asserted that the history by the Franciscan Sisters does not mention a single Protestant body after the period of the Revolution, and that “one ignorant of the true situation and reading this particular history would imagine that the United States was a Catholic nation.”[570] Further criticism has arisen because, in the critic’s mind, facts of history are mixed with “acts of Catholic piety.” As proof of this objection is cited an excerpt from a Catholic textbook in which is given a description of the death of Pizarro: “Just before he died he called upon his Redeemer and tracing with his bloody finger a cross upon the floor, he kissed the sacred symbol and expired.”[571]

Further evidence of this is seen by the same writer in the statement that “as the missionaries made their way westward, the worship of St. Mary marked their path till the great Mississippi, the River of the Immaculate Conception, bore them [down] toward those Spanish realms where every officer swore to defend the Immaculate Conception.”[572] To this objector of a separate history for Catholic schools, “it is the very evident purpose of these texts ... to propagate Catholic ideas and not to give a true picture of the development of America.”[573]

TEXTBOOKS IN CIVICS, ECONOMICS AND SOCIOLOGY

Criticism of public school textbooks and teaching is not confined solely to the subject of history but includes in its ever-widening circle books in the allied fields of civics, economics and sociology. Especially is this true of those in government or civics. Since the close of the World War a movement for the teaching of the Constitution has closely paralleled that for the study of American history. Organizations and individuals with the avowed purpose of inculcating patriotism have urged that more attention than formerly be given the study of the machinery of government. To this end influence has been exerted for the passage of laws requiring the subject of civics in the schools, and many books on the Constitution have appeared to meet an increased demand.

Among the organizations which have sponsored the movement for instruction in the Constitution have been the American Bar Association, the National Security League, The Constitution Anniversary Association, and the Better America Federation. Organizations such as the Sentinels of the Republic are engaged in a similar program in adult education.

In 1922 in pursuance of a resolution adopted by the executive committee at Tampa, Florida, the American Bar Association appointed a Committee on American Citizenship “to devise ways for promoting the study of and devotion to American institutions and ideals.” This resolution was interpreted as laying upon the Committee “the duty to prepare a program under which the lawyers of the United States, coöperating with every patriotic society and organization, and with every true American man and woman, shall be urged to join in an earnest effort to stem the tide of radical, and often treasonable, attacks upon our Constitution, our laws, our courts, our law-making bodies, our executives and our flag, to arouse to action our dormant citizenship, to abolish ignorance, and crush falsehood, and to bring truth into the hearts of our citizenship.”[574]

The Committee recommended the appointment of a standing committee on American Citizenship, the appointment of local committees “to see that the Constitution of the United States is taught in every school ... to report to the bureau the courses in each state, the textbooks used, and the qualifications of teachers for teaching American citizenship.” In addition it was suggested that the coöperation of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws be enlisted “in an effort to have enacted in each state suitable laws making a course each year in the study of and devotion to American institutions and ideals part of the curriculum in all schools and colleges sustained or in any manner supported by public funds.”[575]

The Reports of 1923 and 1924 again envisaged “the need of activity” because of “the socialistic doctrines ... taught in many of our schools and colleges,” and pointed out that efforts of the Bar toward laws requiring the teaching of the Constitution had received encouragement from legislators and the public in general.[576] In 1923, according to the Report of that year, twenty-four states had definite laws, in five states laws had been introduced and in nineteen states there was no such statute. The principal difficulty which the Committee had encountered in having such a law passed had arisen out of “the conservatism of school authorities,” who appeared “fearful that the mere requirement” would “not necessarily be the best means of promoting the teaching of the Constitution,” and who were “slow to change from long established methods that had been used in connection with the school curriculum.”

In their advocacy for a wider-spread knowledge of the Constitution the American Bar Association received the coöperation of other organizations interested in the same work, such as the American Legion, patriotic societies, women’s organizations, the Masonic Service Association, the Knights of Columbus, Chambers of Commerce, the Rotary, Lions, and Kiwanis. Yet they felt that “the most powerful influence” that they could evoke “undoubtedly would be the association of teachers,” for they wished “to reach the mind of the child while it is still plastic.” They affirmed as their “ultimate aim” that “no child should leave even the common schools without an elementary knowledge and appreciation of our Constitution and what it means to every individual.”[577]

By 1924, the Committee reported the existence of a law requiring the teaching of the Constitution in thirty-one states, and in other commonwealths regulations of the state department of education effecting the same purpose.[578] One of the aspects of the situation which appeared to the Committee as more important even than properly qualified teachers was “the proper attitude toward our government and the spirit in which the teaching is performed”—a teaching which should be grounded “on bed-rock Americanism” and “imbued with a desire to communicate such spirit to their pupils.”[579] Indeed, it was held that “the schools of America should no more consider graduating a student who lacks faith in our government than a school of theology should graduate a minister who lacks faith in God.”[580]

According to the Report the educational activities of the Committee were many, “even going so far as to suggest to the ministers appropriate texts for Thanksgiving Day which should call attention to the blessing of our form of government.”[581] Members of the Bar had written special articles for several periodicals on good citizenship as well as furnishing cartoons for the press of the country. The Committee had aided in the display and sale of books on the Constitution, they had sponsored “a nation-wide celebration of Constitution week,” they had appeared as speakers on community programs and otherwise had helped in the celebration of national holidays. In addition they had prepared a “citizenship creed.” This creed stressed the obligations of citizenship and a faith in the American government, “the best government that has ever been created—the freest and most just for all the people.” To uphold and defend the government was at all times a duty of the citizen. “Just as the ‘Minute Man of the Revolution’ was ready upon a moment’s notice to defend his rights against foreign usurpation” so it was the citizen’s duty “as a patriotic American to be a ‘Minute Man of the Constitution’ ready at all times to defend the long-established and cherished institutions of our government against attack, either from within or with out,” and to do his “part in preserving the blessings of liberty” for which his “Revolutionary forefathers fought and died.”[582]

The National Security League is likewise engaged in the movement for teaching the Constitution in the schools. Through the Committee on Constitution Instruction and its Civic Department, the League has campaigned “for over three years” to have passed a bill requiring definite courses in the Constitution in all public schools.[583] According to literature circulated by the League, the Committee was rewarded by the passage of such a requirement in thirty-six states, in most cases the legislatures taking over verbatim the bill drafted by them.[584]

To the League’s program opposition to a mandatory legislative control of education occasionally arose from educational authorities in states where the bill had been introduced. But the chairman of the Committee was “glad to say that state legislators generally, representatives of the public will, have not agreed with these gentlemen and their arguments, and have looked upon a knowledge of the Constitution as an essential in citizen making.”[585]

In addition to legislation which requires the study of the Constitution, thirty-three states by May, 1925, made mandatory a teacher’s examination on the Constitution.[586] So far-reaching were the results of their activities, that the League’s Committee on Constitutional Instruction estimated that 200,500 teachers were required to teach the Constitution of the United States to a total of over 4,000,000 school children.[587]

To find suitable textbooks became a problem, for the Committee held that “while there are many books which satisfactorily explain the Constitution to advanced students and adults, there is practically nothing which suitably transmits the basic principles of our government to the minds of children.” For this “short stories” on the Constitution were necessary in order that facts concerning the history of the document would be “readily understood by the average child,” because when “eloquently taught and interpreted in story form by a teacher who knows it and reverences its provisions, it will rouse any class to enthusiasm.”[588]

Besides the “nation-wide popularization of the Constitution” through the distribution of almost a million copies of a “Catechism of the Constitution,” the National Security League endeavors to assist teachers in passing their examinations for licenses by publishing a Course on the Constitution for Normal Schools.[589] Its literature on the Constitution has been sent by request to 2038 teachers, to whom was also made available Dr. Jean Broadhurst’s book, Verse for Patriots to Encourage Good Citizenship, “of special value in teaching English literature and patriotism” and for holiday program materials.[590] In the campaign for education, Beck’s The Constitution of the United States: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow was also sent “to the governors of all the States where the bill requiring the compulsory teaching of the Constitution has become a law, ... with the advice that the book is available for all teachers and instructors in their states upon application.”[591] A teachers’ manual “which is attracting wide attention under the title ‘Our Constitution in My Town and My Life’ which contains 115 questions and answers on the Constitution for classroom use” has been written by Miss Etta V. Leighton, Civic Secretary.[592]

As an “evidence of the value” and of the influence of the Security League’s educational program, the “Report” for November 15, 1925, recounted “that the Professor of Political Science in a large western university will use our suggestions in revising her text book on the State and National Constitution.”[593]

The Constitution Anniversary Association, incorporated March, 1923, is another organization engaged in promoting a study of the Constitution in order to familiarize to a greater degree the people of this generation with “those historic days incident to the writing of the Constitution,” that they may “recognize their value” and understand “the danger of our drifting during recent years away from representative government toward direct action; from individual property rights to socialism; from individual responsibility for individual conduct toward class consciousness, class agitation and class legislation,....” A purpose of the Association is “to arouse interest in the men who wrote the Constitution ... to make clear that they were governmentally-minded as Edison and Marconi are electrically-minded; as Emerson and Socrates were philosophically-minded; as Shakespeare and Longfellow were literary-minded; as Mozart and Mendelssohn were musically-minded; and that in the light of all that history and experience could teach, they were making a contribution as important to the science of government as was [sic] the ten digits to the science of mathematics, the scale to music, or the alphabet to language.”[594] A further aim of the organization is “to urge upon educational institutions that in the teaching of History, Civics and Political Science the Constitution be given the place of prominence and importance which it deserves.”[595] The observance of Constitution Week, as the name of the Association attests, is of primary interest to the organization.

Harry F. Atwood, author of Back to the Republic, Safeguarding American Ideals and Keep God in American History, directs the activities of the Constitution Anniversary Association. Since 1918 Mr. Atwood “has spoken in all parts of the country to various types of audiences on the Constitution.”[596] While addressing a Los Angeles gathering under the auspices of the Better America Federation in May, 1922, Mr. Atwood sowed the seed for the National Oratorical Contest on the Constitution. It was at this meeting that Mr. Harry Chandler, of the Los Angeles Times, conceived the idea “of developing interest in the Constitution” by conducting such a contest in the schools of the state. As a result, “the school year of 1922-23 witnessed the preparation of over 8000 orations,” and “the final contest was held in Los Angeles where prizes aggregating $5000 were awarded.”[597] This led to similar contests in other states, supported by “the American Bar Association, the Constitution Anniversary Association and other patriotic organizations.”[598] The contest became nation-wide, the final meeting being held at Washington. In the second contest (1924-1925) over 18,000 schools entered; the awards amounted to $45,600, and 1,500,000 high school students competed. Twenty-eight daily newspapers across the continent conducted this contest.[599]

Mr. Atwood carries his advocacy of a knowledge of the Constitution and of representative government to the people not only through his addresses delivered throughout the country but also by means of his writings. It is his belief that “we have drifted from the republic toward democracy; from statesmanship to demagogism” in “an age of retrogressive tendencies.”[600] He holds that a republic provides the “golden mean” of government, autocracy and democracy offering “undesirable extremes.” To make clear his meaning parallels are drawn between “the realm of nature and of human activity” and the realm of government, attributing to each “two extremes and the golden mean.” For instance, he believes that “what thirst is to the individual, autocracy is to government; what drunkenness is to the individual, democracy is to government; what temperance is to the individual, the republic is to government.”[601]

According to Mr. Atwood “the most defective portion of our thinking and teaching in the schools is that phase of education which pertains to civics, economics and history.”[602] So far as textbooks are concerned, Mr. Atwood was convinced that “there are comparatively few who will contend that there has ever been written a good history of the United States of America.” The same statement holds true for textbooks in civil government, for none makes clear “to the average student the form of government that was established here under the Constitution.”[603] Mr. Atwood was concerned still more with the fact that so few students had read the Constitution,—students who had received from twelve to sixteen years’ education at the expense of the state. “So long as the expense of the public schools and State universities is paid by the government,” Mr. Atwood declared, “one object at least should be to turn out well informed and patriotic citizens, and the best possible way to do that is to give them an understanding of the meaning of the Constitution and a high regard for its wise provisions.” Mr. Atwood is, moreover, sympathetic with those who maintain that “teachers in the public schools should be impressed with the fact that their salaries are paid at public expense.”[604]

The sentiment of the Better America Federation of California regarding the study of the Constitution in the schools is not unlike that of the Constitution Anniversary Association. Mr. Woodworth Clum in “America is Calling,” a pamphlet to the students in high schools and colleges, sets forth the tenets of his organization, in his declaration that he would like to see “every school and college student in America not only learn the Preamble to the Constitution so that they could repeat it verbatim at any time or any place, but ... also have them know its meaning so well that when they repeat it they would recall the entire philosophy of the American government.”[605] Much apprehension was felt by the Better America Federation because of “groups of free thinkers or radicals” agitating for some other form of government under which there would be “no profits ... in business.”[606]

In accord with an interest in education evident in its earliest meetings, the American Federation of Labor has carried on investigations as to the character of teaching and the content of textbooks in the social studies. In 1903, the Executive Council was directed “to secure the introduction of textbooks that will be more in accord with modern thought upon social and political economy, books that will teach the dignity of manual labor, give due importance to the service that the laborer renders to society, and that will not teach the harmful doctrine that the wage-workers should be content with their lot, because of the opportunity that may be afforded a few of their number rising out of their class, instead of teaching that the wage earners should base their hopes upon the elevation of the conditions of the working people.”[607]

In 1919, the Executive Council was instructed “to appoint a committee to investigate the matter of selecting, or of preparing and publishing textbooks appropriate for classes of workers,” because the convention found “one of the chief difficulties in securing appropriate classes for the workers is the dearth of unbiased and suitable textbooks.”[608]

The committee thus appointed reported in 1920 an insufficient and inaccurate teaching of industrial growth and of the trade union movement. The responsibility for this condition was assessed upon the economists of the past “whose teachings still largely dominate in the educational institutions of our time,”—teachings “which have failed to stand the test of experience and of unbiased investigation.” Ideas held faulty were thought, furthermore, to be in no small measure the outgrowth of ideas gained from books failing to “state accurately and interpret correctly economic laws and their application to our modern industrial society.”[609] The Committee therefore recommended the preparation of a textbook by a competent trade unionist under the direction of the executive officers of the American Federation of Labor with a special committee for this purpose, and “the teaching of unemasculated industrial history embracing an accurate account of the organization of the workers and of the results thereof, the teaching of principles underlying industrial activities and relations, and a summary of legislation, state and federal, affecting industry.”[610]

The attention of the convention was focussed in its educational program the following year upon a proposed investigation of textbooks in civics, economics and history. The committee to whom this task was delegated reported in 1922. Their report, published in 1923, pointed out the importance of “instruction in social and economic studies,” because such studies are “vitally concerned with wide-spread understanding of our social and economic institutions and forces.”[611] Yet the American Federation of Labor expressly denied a desire to have their point of view “stressed to the exclusion of all others.” They wanted merely “an emphasis commensurate with its significance.” Nor did they wish “public education to be influenced by partisan bodies of any kind.” For they esteemed “the persons most competent to judge in detail what should be taught and how it should be taught ... those who are themselves engaged in the educational profession.”[612]

Inasmuch as “there are no more important determining factors than the economic fabric to which the majority of citizens contribute the larger share of their creative energy” the Federation considered essential a knowledge of the trade-union movement and “of all other social problems having to do with the welfare of the working people.”[613] The information held important for the worker they felt should be taught in the junior as well as in the senior high school, in order to reach those students who leave school early.[614]

In the consideration of the textbooks most commonly used in the public schools, the Federation’s committee held it “obvious that old-fashioned didactic methods of teaching are not suitable to the new treatment,” that “subjects should be presented not in the form of finished judgments and dogmatic rules ... but rather as observations of the world about us, concerning which the pupil must to a great extent exercise his own judgments;” and that “in the case of highly controversial subjects, important dissenting views should be fairly and adequately presented.”[615] Although special pleaders for some change in common educational practice, they asserted that “the labor movement, unlike selfish interests, does not and cannot depend for public favor upon narrow propaganda; what it wants and needs is the light of day and freedom of opinion. The more people know, and the more they think, the better in the long run for working men and women, and for all our citizenship.”

As a consequence of their premises, the Committee applied to the textbooks considered the following tests: “In the first place, is the book of old, narrow type, or of the newer and broader type? In the second place, is its general method that which inculcates certain fixed principles which may have been acceptable some time in the past, or, on the other hand, that which portrays society as a group of growing and changing institutions? In the third place, does it include adequate information about important subjects, particularly subjects of concern to the wage-earning population, such as trade-unionism, collective bargaining, standards of living, hours of work, safety and sanitation, housing, unemployment, civil liberty, and the judicial power? And in its treatment of these subjects, does it fairly present labor’s point of view as well as that of others?”[616]

The application of these tests to one hundred twenty-three textbooks—forty-seven histories, forty-seven civics, twenty-five economics, and four sociologies, revealed that fifty-five per cent were of “the newer type dealing with the broader aspects of government, and the social and industrial life of the people rather than with forms of organization, military events and abstract themes.” Sixty per cent were found to be “dynamic rather than static in their method of treatment” in that they recognized “to a greater or less degree the power for growth in our institutions.”

On the other hand, the Committee decided that “a majority of texts fell short of the standards in one or more important respects,”[617] although, on the whole, “the newer type of text” attempted “to give the labor movement in the problem of industry adequate and just consideration.”[618] Failure to do so the Committee attributed either “to ignorance of the author or to a hesitancy to deal with this difficult subject, rather than to a deliberate attempt to keep the facts of industry out of the schools.” The survey found “no evidence that text books are being used for propaganda purposes.”[619]

The Public Service Institute through its chairman also has urged a more extensive study of “labor civics,” and commended the New York course in civics for older grammar grade children and first year high school pupils.[620]

Still others have become censors of the character of social study instruction in the public schools. Books treating the modern problems of race, labor and capital, immigration, private property, and topics of like nature have been examined with a critical eye. The portrayal of facts relating to races and nationalities in the United States has proved a fruitful source of attack. Authors have been asked to omit or make colorless references to controversial topics in the preparation or the revision of textbooks which would discuss, for example, the Chinese and Japanese in America, the Italians and the Jews. In one city the negroes protested the use of a textbook because of a statement to the effect that the Southern white man tried to keep the negro from voting, the protest carrying enough weight to cause a special edition of the book to be printed for use in that city.

Its presentation of the subject of private property was the source of an attack upon Berry and Howe’s Actual Democracy, “an elementary discussion” of present-day problems in America. Exception was taken to children being taught that “private property is one of the fundamental institutions of American democracy ... an unmistakable index of social progress ... [which] cannot be destroyed without destroying also the ideals of liberty and democracy in which Americans believe.”[621]

Its method of discussing trade-unionism[622] and immigration likewise met disfavor. In the case of the latter subject, the critics were disturbed because, among other things, the authors concluded “that the immigration situation has rendered necessary a profound change in the very structure of our government. [For] in order to control the turbulent non-American elements, we have been compelled to modify many of our earlier democratic ideals and to adopt centralization of authority, which is far different in spirit from American traditions ... [and] that [due to immigration] American democracy is facing a life and death struggle with Marxian socialism.”[623]

In treating freedom of speech the author of the secondary school textbook is to no less degree upon slippery ground, for here again critics have acclaimed partisanship and bias evident in discussions. On this charge A. T. Southworth has been adjudged guilty in his The Common Sense of the Constitution of the United States in that he says, “This amendment [the first amendment] also guarantees the right of free speech. There can, of course, be no such thing as absolute free speech. The only persons who say exactly what they think every minute of the day are babies and fools.... There is reason in all things, and on general principles a person may say in this country anything he pleases, provided what he says is not libelous or slanderous, or contrary to the public morals; and provided that he does not advocate the overthrow of the government by force. In this country where we have a government, not of men but of laws, it is not reasonable that anyone should preach the overthrow of the government by force. If B says, ‘Murder A, throw him out of office, and let me rule,’ then it is perfectly logical for C to advocate the murder of B after B has set himself up as a ruler. This is anarchy.”[624]