STATEMENT OF MR. C. M. ZORN, JR., CHAIRMAN OF THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF THE EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN SYNODICAL CONFERENCE OF NORTH AMERICA, CLEVELAND, OHIO

Mr. ZORN. Gentlemen of the committee, they picked on me first so that, if you get a bad taste, the others will take it away. I do not mean to reflect on the other members of the committee, but the next one is a little better, and the last one is the best. I will let them speak for themselves.

There was a great philosopher at one time I do not know his name; I have not been able to find out his name-who said:

This is a hard, hard world. If you speak, you are either misunderstood or wilfully misinterpreted; and if you are silent, your silence is either misunderstood or misinterpreted.

I think the records will show that the Lutheran Church, as such, has rarely appeared in public-has rarely appeared before any committee of Congress, at any rate; and while we appear with some diffidence, still we have taken heart, because we feel that we ought to appear in opposition to this bill.

We hold that it is our first and foremost duty toward the child to give it a thorough Christian training. We must first of all look after the spiritual welfare of the child. The care for the bodily welfare of the child is a natural duty. You do not have to tell anybody that. An animal will take care of its offspring from purely natural instinct. But in the church, we look upon the spiritual welfare as the first consideration. That is a matter of conscience with us-a matter of religious conscience and is therefore not subject to debate. It is not a thing that you can debate about. When a man holds that a matter is one of spiritual conscience with him it is not debatable.

We begin to take care of this obligation toward the child in the home as we should. But homes are of different character, even among members of the church. The father may not be there; and another one may have greater or lesser gifts. And so wherever possible we maintain what we call Christian day schools. We do that, as I said before, as a matter of conscience, and one of the best evidences of our considering it a matter of conscience is the fact that we spend upward of $4,000,000 a year for the maintenance of these schools. That does not take in the cost of erecting buildings and maintaining buildings; it is only the direct expense of teaching the child.

Besides that, we maintain institutions of learning where we train the teachers for this work, and we are rather fortunate in the fact that our teachers, taken by and large, have a life tenure. We have men who have taught in our schools for 50 years. It is a rare occurrence, indeed, when a teacher leaves his calling for any reason other than illness, old age, or death.

But besides being members of a church, we are members of a community, and we hold that we must in all things which do not conflict with the teachings of the Bible aid our Government and in every possible way further its interests.

The direct calling of the church is the preaching of the gospel, and by sticking close to that calling we make of our members the best possible citizens of the Commonwealth at the same time.

There has been a great deal of publicity in the last few years which calls for religious training of the child. They say that that is the only solution of the difficulties which confront the Nation, and we quite agree; and that is why we have our schools and why we stress this matter so much. But other relation to the State than to preach the gospel and make of its members the best possible citizens the church does not have. Its members, however, come in contact with organized government, and one of the fields in which they come in contact with organized government is the field of education.

As I stated before, it is a matter of conscience with us that our children should have a thorough Christian training, and we believe the only really effective way of accomplishing that is by having our own schools, in which, by specially trained teachers, we have the Christian spirit permeating the teaching of every subject, even the secular ones. Whether it is geography or mathematics or what not, the Christian spirit permeates the teaching of all.

Organized government has the police power. Its duty is to make such laws as will prevent harm to its subjects; and therefore, when the state passes laws which compel the parents to so educate their children that they become fit and useful citizens of the Commonwealth, I believe that the State or organized government is entirely within the sphere of its lawful activity. As soon, however, as organized government goes beyond that point, it trespasses upon the domain reserved to the parent by our Constitution.

To repeat again, it is a matter of conscience with us to preach the Gospel, and to begin at home with our own children. We do not hold with those who spend millions for establishing schools in China and neglect their own children in their own homes; who pay no attention at all to the spiritual training of their own children, and send the money to China, where no one would think of establishing a mission, which is preaching the Gospel, except by first establishing schools. We begin at home, by first beginning with our own children. That is where our duty begins.

However, we can not in all cases establish schools of our own, because by far the greater number of our people are farmers and are scattered over a large territory, and it is therefore a physical impossibility to establish schools of our own. In those cases our children attend the public schools. We have in the public schools about a quarter of a million children, and we have in our own schools slightly less than 100,000. It is therefore obvious that if we want to seek the best interests of our children, we must also seek the very best interests of the public school, because by far the greater number of our children are in the public schools and not in our own schools. When we, therefore, appear before you in opposition to any bill, we do not appear here as enemies of the public-school system. Directly on the contrary, we appear here and we believe we are entirely correct in stating that we appear here as people who are better qualified to speak of the welfare of the child in the public school than people who know no other mode of education than the public school. If nothing else, self-interest would dictate that we should seek the very best interests of the public school.

I am sorry that the proponents of this bill should feel that everybody who is opposed to this bill is an enemy of the public schools. I have before me an editorial written by Dr. A. E. Winship, dean of

education of journalists in America, and published in the Journal of Education, in which he simply classifies everybody opposed to this bill as an enemy of the public school. That, gentlemen, is incorrect. We are, if anything, the best friends the public school has, and as such we appear here.

I thank you, gentlemen.

Mr. REED. Do any of the members of the committee wish to ask any questions?

Mr. HOLADAY. Mr. Zorn, I wish you would point out the provisions in this bill that would interfere with your church schools.

Mr. ZORN. I may say that later speakers will touch that point. I am merely here to state our position with reference to education in general. I am not giving any arguments pro and con with reference to the bill. As you probably noticed, I did not bring out any of those points.

Mr. HOLADAY. All right.

Mr. WENCHEL. Mr. Zorn just wanted to outline and emphasize why we are here.

The next speaker that we would like to have heard is the Rev. John C. Baur, of Fort Wayne, Ind.

STATEMENT OF REV. JOHN C. BAUR, FORT WAYNE, IND.

Mr. BAUR. Mr. Chairman, members of this committee, it is my privilege and desire to explain to you, in the name of the many Lutheran people whom we represent, why we are opposed to the Sterling-Reed education bill.

We wish to be entirely frank. As Lutherans we are opposed to this measure principally because we believe that it is potentially a menace to private and church schools. We hope to be able to persuade you that our fears are justified, and thus effectually also to settle the question as to why the private and church school people are opposed to this measure. We are not sure that a sufficiently clear and explicit answer has heretofore been given to this very important question.

In order that you may better understand our viewpoint, we wish at the very outset to draw your attention to the fact that the Federal Government has heretofore practically kept itself out of the business of educating. As a result of this policy, the Federal Government has been able to remain wisely and benevolently neutral in all matters relating to education, particularly to educational ideals.

Throughout the Nation opinions differ widely, and I might also say, uncompromisingly, on the question of what constitutes an ideal education. Some believe one thing; others hold fast to something else. A great multitude of people, for instance, earnestly and sincerely believe that the ideal education may be had only in public elementary and higher schools. Many others, however, believe just as fervently and sincerely that the private school provides an ideal education, particularly for some children, or that the ideal in education is more nearly attained in a church school, which, unlike the public schools, is able to give instruction in religion and to provide a religious motive for the entire training of the pupils committed to

its care.

The mere fact that opinions differ widely on these and kindred buestions will hardly be denied.

There exists, then, a great controversy over the question, what constitutes an ideal education and where may such an education be had? This we hold is quite natural; for education is not a fixed science like mathematics, and, what is more, it never will be. Education belongs in the category of things concerning which, as in religion, there will never be entire harmony and unanimity. And let us add here that attempts to enforce unanimity and uniformity in education should not be made any more than with respect to religion.

Now, by practically keeping itself out of the business of education the Federal Government has, as stated, succeeded heretofore in remaining entirely neutral on controversial educational questions. This has been, we would like to repeat, decidedly a wise policy, and this policy has been pursued for the very best interests, so we believe, of the whole Nation; and we are firmly convinced that the Federal Government will be able to serve the cause of education-the whole cause of education generally-best by keeping out of the business of educating, which means practically by keeping away from educational controversies. For if, as has been repeatedly asserted, it is true that proper education of the youth is of vital concern and importance to the Nation-and we believe it is-then the Federal Government can do itself and the entire Nation no better service than by keeping severely aloof from all controversies over education and educational systems, and by doing nothing that will hinder or prevent such controversies from being carried on unhampered and unchecked. For it is an axiom that progress comes from the clashing of diverging opinions and convictions. And let us insert there that it is entirely fallacious, so we believe, to argue that because a matter is of vital concern to the Nation that therefore the Government must take hold of it. If that were true, this Government would be compelled to provide religion for its people.

Many things are vitally important, in fact, indispensable, to the well-being of the people and of the State, but a real, self-reliant, energetic, and independent people take care of these themselves, without going to the Government for aid. Religion is one of these things. Education comes very near being one of these things. And let us also here bear in mind that when a matter has to do with the inner man, the Government-especially the Central Government— should be very chary about taking a hand in it, and when it takes a hand in it, it should be very particular about the manner in which it does it. Only well-proven inability on the part of the people to take care of certain things themselves, and indisputable demonstration that its lack will work harm to the Commonwealth, or, as in public education, the utter inability of the smaller governmental unit, which lies closer to the people, to handle matters, could possibly excuse even the slightest interference by the central authority. The central authority may well afford at all times to counsel and advise; but it should let it go at that.

Let us at this point, and in order to justify our premises, draw your attention to the incontrovertible fact that the Sterling-Reed bill proposes that the Federal Government shall forsake its lofty and neutral position in educational matters, inasmuch as it essays to put the Federal Government definitely into the business of education; not of education as such, but of public education, both elementary

and higher. It proposes that the Federal Government shall, by spending possibly $100,000,000 annually-possibly also many times more than that-for the first time in the history of this country officially become a partisan of education in public institutions. For it is, of course, conceded that the Federal Government can not, and that it should not, ever support private institutions.

Is there any one who can claim that the Federal Government will continue to feel as neutral toward all legitimate experiments in education as it does now, once it begins to support the States' taxsupported systems? Is it likely that the Federal Government will fail to become a partisan for and a protagonist of the public school systems of the States as against all other schools when it begins to support them as heavily as this bill proposes? And are we, who believe that the ideal education is permeated by the spirit of religion, and are those who support secular private schools for the sake of other ideals, not justified in fearing that when the Federal Government has committed itself to one of a number of educational ideals, it may, and probably will, in many ways, and in the course of time, become dangerously hostile to all education that is not of the taxsupported type?

These fears are by no means unfounded. They are based on many and varied harassing experiences that we have had in our dealings with the several State governments. It is an open secret that many States are waging a ceaseless and a relentless war of attrition on all but tax-supported schools. The most refined chicanery is at times heartlessly proposed and resorted to in an effort to discourage and to destroy the schools of such as honestly believe that there are vital elements in education which the Government can not possibly supply in its schools.

Oregon methods are not the methods we fear most.

In view of these experiences in the several States, is there any wonder that we look askance at this attempt to line the Federal Government up to education in the public schools, especially when we see that some of the most active proponents of this measure have of late also been actively engaged in a number of States to establish a State monopoly in education?

We are satisfied, perfectly satisfied, to have local governmental units and the States themselves provide public schools in the interest of the public welfare. The very practical and potent argument that vast numbers of our people would unfortunately remain illiterate, and that the public's interests would suffer severely, if these units did not provide public schools, has settled that question satisfactorily, and I think forever. The several State school systems were born of practically a compelling necessity, and, I think I may say here, not really of any inherent and original right on the part of the State to claim education as one of its primary functions.

But that sole evil is by no means an argument for putting the Federal Government jointly with the States into the business of educating. Granting for the sake of argument that the statistics which have no doubt been presented to you by the proponents of this bill are correct, and that they do clearly and unmistakably disclose serious and deplorable deficiencies in the public-school systems of this country, as well as other deplorable conditions among the people generally, does it not seem proper that additional facts and