Chapter Three

1
Chapter Three

• School as a Public Institution
• The Common School Era

2

• See timetable page 76

3
Analytic Framework

• Political Economy
• Demographic Changes
• Political Developments
• Economic Developments
• Ideology Religion
• Religion
• Consolidation of Classical Liberalism
• Schooling
• Common School / Manns Reforms

4
PE / Demographic Changes

• Massive flow of settlers from the coastal states
  to the interior territories potential weakening
  of nationalism / need to increase patriotic
  impulses (symbols like flag, patriotic songs,
  cartoons like Uncle Sam)
• Irish immigration Roman Catholics, very poor,
  mostly unskilled / Irish were met with religious
  bigotry, economic and social prejudice, and
  occasionally mob violence.
• Urbanization cotton textile industrialization /
  growing gap between rich and poor, increased
  crime, alcohol consumption, lowering of morality

5
PE / Political Developments

• Andrew Jackson
• A war hero, defeated Native American in the South
  and the British in the Battle of New Orleans in
  1812
• Jackson promised to champion for the common
  people (farmers, mechanics, artisans)
• Laissez-faire philosophy, the breakup of the Bank
  of the US (getting the government out of the
  lives of ordinary citizens, allow the common man
  to compete for economic and other benefits)
• Democrats
• Jacksons Political Opponents the Whigs
• Descended from the Federalists (advocates of a
  strong central government that should function in
  the interests of the established economic order)
• Party reformation rhetoric for a strong
  government that work for the majority of people
  (support for railroads, turnpikes, and canals to
  develop remote areas of the country)
• Support for the common school (state control)

6
PE / Economic Developments

• Developments in transportation (ports, canals,
  railroads) / Huge expansion of commerce,
  especially in New York, Philadelphia, Boston,
  Baltimore
• Increase demand for educated clerks
• Increased wealth
• Industrialization / cottage industry and later
  factory (the first power driven textile machinery
  arrived in the US in 1789)
• Development of industrial morality and work
  ethic, displacement of traditional forms of
  culture / economic rewards, temperance,
  frugality

7
I / Religion

• Puritans / Conservative Protestants, Calvinists
  God was an angry God, humans are sinful,
  salvation a gift for the select few, abstention
  from worldly pleasure / literacy in order to read
  the scriptures
• Liberal Protestants, Unitarian churches
  benevolent Gad, humans are rational beings
  capable of understanding Gods works, women have
  rational capacities / literacy in order to
  understand the natural and social world and make
  rational choices
• Humanitarian Reform criminals, the mentally ill,
  delinquent children will be treated with kindness
  and be reformed (this was a religious
  obligation).

8
I / Consolidation of Classical Liberalism

• Spread of classical liberalism to the general
  public
• Laissez-faire amended government could interfere
  when necessary to assist economic development
  (seeds of the welfare state)
• Concentration of state power over education
  (state school boards instead of local school
  boards)
• Positive freedom
• Humans are capable of reason and should be
  approached on that basis

9
Mann and the Common Schools

• Served as secretary to the Massachusetts State
  Board of Education 1837-1848
• Powers limited to the collection and
  dissemination of information regarding education
  in Massachusetts
• Created county educational conventions
• Distributed annual reports
• Established Common School Journal in 1839

10
Lessons from the Prussian School System

• Designed to develop Prussian nationalism and
  position German states for world leadership
• Aristocratic tier
• Vorschule
• Gymnasium
• Military academics/universities
• Common tier
• Volkshule
• Workforce/technical schools/normal schools
• Reinforced Manns support for free,
  state-financed, state-controlled universal and
  compulsory schools

11
Manns Central Issues

• School buildings, improved physical setting of
  schools through
• Use of surveys
• Public encouragement for model districts
• Publication of school expenditures by town
• Moral values state determines and inculcates
  these values, common elements, great Christian
  truths / citizens committed to a secular faith
  whose moral values would play much the same role
  that doctrine had played in sectarian faith
  (conformity?).
• Schools as agents of social harmony
• Moral values as common elements of the common
  school
• Anti- Catholic bias
• John Stuart Mills argument for secular education
• Foreshadowed continuing separation of
  church/state issues in schools

12
Manns Central Issues

• Two conditions for the pedagogy of love (1)
  children who had been reared in homes where love,
  reason, and sound moral values predominated (2)
  teachers adequately prepared to understand the
  child, classroom management, and the subject
  matter.
• A primary goal of schooling is to train children
  in self-government rational understanding of the
  rules and laws and compliance by choice (not
  fear).
• Teacher preparation Normal school (new
  institutions, not incorporated into existing
  institutions) developed on the Prussian
  normal-school model / emphasis on methods,
  subject-matter confined to what was taught in
  schools, train technicians (not educate
  scholars).
• The feminization of teaching
• The economic value of schooling see human
  capital theory / increase production, decrease
  social unrest, improve the economic conditions of
  the poor, change the consumer into producer
  (sel-sufficiency)
• Criticism of the common elements and state
  control (Puritans, Orestes Brownson, John Stuart
  Mill, )

13
Success of Common School Reforms

• Supported by diverse interests in Massachusetts,
  including financial interests
• Manns common elements was a satisfactory
  compromise for religious interests
• Reforms incorporated popular classical liberal
  thinking

14
Comparison between Horace Mann and Thomas
Jefferson
Issue Horace Mann Thomas Jefferson
Control of schools State supported State control State Board of Education State approved texts State supported Local control District or wards (5-6 sq. miles)
Religion in schools State-mandated The Wall of Separation Local choice?
Teacher training State normal schools Females From among the best grammar school graduates Males
15
Concluding Remarks

• Massachusetts political economy and ideology
  hospitable to state-funded and state-controlled
  schools
• Horace Mann as leading proponent of schooling as
  agent of cultural uniformity
• Questions remain about the implications of the
  common school eras reforms