MR. PRESIDENT,--My colleague does not see the difference between a
tax on a boy’s clothes and a tax on his book. The country, in its
experience, from the first settlement at Plymouth Rock, has seen it.
Clearly it saw the difference, when it undertook to say that education
should be at the public cost, free of charge to every one in the
community. My friend [Mr. HOWE] shakes his head; he knows well that
one of the proudest acts in the history of New England was when at
an early day she established her system of public schools, which has
continued ever since, where every child is educated free of charge. He
was educated at the public cost, but not clothed at the public cost.
And, Sir, if you would know what gave to New England those elements of
prosperity and of influence, which are, I think, sometimes recognized,
you will find them in that very education at the public cost. It was
because those early settlers, founders of communities, saw that the
mind should be clothed, and willingly undertook to clothe it. The
family at home were left to clothe the body. Now I would have the
country act according to this illustrious precedent, which has done so
much for the national name, and remove every impediment in the path of
knowledge. Do not tell me that by the same rule you must remove the tax
from clothes. The conclusion does not follow. If our fathers were right
in establishing free schools, it is right for us now to insist upon
free books.
The amendment of Mr. Sumner was lost,--Yeas 5, Nays 27.
THREE CONDITIONS PRECEDENT TO THE RECEPTION OF SENATORS FROM A REBEL
STATE.