Still further,--and here I approach a more technical view of the
subject,--it is an admitted principle, that the regulations and by-laws
of municipal corporations must be _reasonable_, or they are inoperative
and void. This has been recognized by the Supreme Court in two
different cases,--_Commonwealth_ v. _Worcester_, (3 Pick. R., 462,) and
in Vandine's case (6 Pick. R., 187). In another case, _City of Boston_
v. _Shaw_, (1 Met. R., 130,) it was decided that a by-law of Boston,
prescribing a particular form of contribution toward the expenses of
making the common sewers, was void for inequality and unreasonableness.
Assuming that this principle is applicable to the School Committee,
their regulations and by-laws must be _reasonable_. Their discretion
must be exercised in a reasonable manner. And this is not what the
Committee or any other body of men think reasonable, but what is
reasonable in the eye of the Law. It must be _legally reasonable_. It
must be approved by the _reason_ of the Law.
Here we are brought once more, in another form, to the question
of the discrimination on account of color. Is this _legally
reasonable_? Is it reasonable, in the exercise of a just discretion,
to separate descendants of the African race from white children merely
in consequence of descent? Passing over those principles of the
Constitution and those provisions of Law which of themselves decide the
question, constituting as they do _the highest reason_, but which have
been already amply considered, look for a moment at the educational
system of Massachusetts, and it will be seen that practically no
discrimination of color is made by Law in any part of it. A descendant
of the African race may be Governor of the Commonwealth, and as such,
with the advice and consent of the Council, may select the Board of
Education. As Lieutenant-Governor, he may be _ex officio_ a member of
the Board. He may be Secretary of the Board, with the duty imposed on
him by law of seeing "that _all_ children in this Commonwealth, who
depend upon Common Schools for instruction, may have the best education
which those schools can be made to impart."[39] He may be member of
any School Committee, or teacher in any Common School of the State. As
legal voter, he can vote in the selection of any School Committee.
[39] General Laws of Massachusetts, 1837, Ch. 241, sec. 2.
Thus, in every department connected with our Common Schools, throughout
the whole hierarchy of their government, from the very head of the
system down to the humblest usher in the humblest Primary School,
and to the humblest voter, there is no distinction of color known
to the law. It is when we reach the last stage of all, the children
themselves, that the beautiful character of the system is changed
to the deformity of Caste, as, in the picture of the ancient poet,
what above was a lovely woman terminated below in a vile, unsightly
fish. And all this is done by the School Committee, with more than
necromantic power, in the exercise of a mere discretion.
It is clear that the Committee may classify scholars according to
age and sex, for the obvious reasons that these distinctions are
inoffensive, and that they are especially recognized as _legal_ in the
law relating to schools.[40] They may also classify scholars according
to moral and intellectual qualifications, because such a power is
necessary to the government of schools. But the Committee cannot
assume, _a priori_, and without individual examination, that all of
an _entire race_ are so deficient in proper moral and intellectual
qualifications as to justify their universal degradation to a class by
themselves. Such an exercise of discretion must be unreasonable, and
therefore illegal.
[40] Revised Statutes, Ch. 23, sec. 63.
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