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ARGUMENT.

May it please your Honor :—

The spectacle which is presented to-day in this court, is indeed novel and strange. A worthy teacher of one of our principal public schools, who is bound by our wise and benevolent laws to impart the great gifts of free instruction in piety and morality and learning to his pupils, is arraigned as a criminal-arraigned by one of his own pupils at the bar of this court as a criminal because he has attempted to do his duty—because he has obeyed that ancient, wise and beneficent law, which in words of simple and familiar beauty enjoined upon him to "impress upon the minds of the children committed to his care, those principles of piety, justice, love of country, humanity and universal benevolence, which are the basis of a Republican government, and tend to secure the blessings of liberty."

He stands indeed before the bar of this court arraigned as a criminal, but he stands there in proud humility, proud of his position, conscious that in the execution of the delicate and important trusts committed to him, he has done his duty boldly and manfully-confident that the laws will protect him-confident that the hearts and the minds of his fellow-citizens will sustain him gratefully, because in the hour of peril and of duty he was true to the laws.

But this is not the whole picture. In the dark back ground are seen his accusers; the real criminals, who have usurped the place and the name of accusers. And who are they? Some are seen and some are unseen, some are known and some are unknown, some are seen in full view, while some are only seen as doubtful and mysterious shadows; but the brief, strange record of this case tells its own significant story.

For years we have enjoyed the highest blessing which even a free government can bestow upon its citizens-the blessing of education, unbought, unsold-free to all, common to all, without distinction of birth, or sect or race. Under the wise and parental system of our public schools, our children were taught together as one free, and happy, and united family. The children of the emigrant and the alien sat side by side with the son of the free-born American-they learned from the same book— they shared the same instruction, profited by the same culture -and they left the school together to enter upon the broad highway of life with the same lights of learning behind them, the same stars of hope and promise before them, free and equal under the laws.

This was the story. of yesterday; but to-day we find a sad and mournful and ominous change. Suddenly-at the absolute will of one man-by the exercise of a dark and dangerous, a fearfully dangerous power, hundreds of children of tender years, children who were living in the full enjoyment of liberty and of learning, are not only arrayed in open rebellion against our established regulations, and in open violation of our laws, but are deliberately taught that they are to sacrifice all the benefits and blessings of free education, and are led out by their priest from the protecting roof of the school-house to the temptations, the dissipations and crimes of the streets. This course is even now justified and persevered in; the same influences are still at work in our schools, and we are told to-day by the advocate of those deluded children, that this dangerous and unscrupulous priest was in the right, that the laws under which my client justifies himself, were rightly denounced from the altar, were properly set at defiance by the pupils, and are destructive of the liberty of conscience, intolerant, illegal, unconstitutional and void.

Who is this priest who comes here from a foreign land to instruct us in our laws? For whom, and on whose behalf, is this charge of intolerance-this charge that we are violating the sacred liberty of conscience-brought against the people and the laws of Massachusetts? Can it be that one of the Society of Jesuits is the accuser? I wish to discuss this case as calmly as I may. I wish to say nothing to arouse feelings which cannot easily be allayed; but there are memories which we can never banish from heart or brain; there are records on

earth and in heaven which can never be blotted out; there are pages of history written in letters of fire, and of blood; and the man who leads forth his flock of children, and boldly arrays. them in open defiance of our established laws, who audaciously and ungratefully assails our established regulations as intolerant and unchristian, and as violating the sacred liberty of conscience, would do well to look behind him, as well as before -would do well to pause and reflect if he is in a position which authorizes such grave accusations, or justifies such violence.

But I must discuss this case with more of method and order, and I will not answer this attack upon our laws and our institutions until I have shown how material it is to the decision of this cause-how vital and deadly a blow is aimed at our institutions, our liberties, and our laws.

My client is charged with an unlawful assault upon one of his pupils. There was a pretence originally made, that he had been guilty of needless and unreasonable severity in enforcing the established regulation of the school, but that pretence has faded-and faded away into utter insignificance.

The evidence of the boy himself, and of the physician who saw him, showed that the punishment was neither unusual nor

severe.

The evidence of the boy himself showed that it was necessary he should be punished, unless all hopes of obedience and control in that school were to be abandoned forever. But what can be said now, after we have proved by witness upon witness -that gross violation of the discipline of the school-the indecent and riotous conduct of the children-their wilful and openly concerted rebellion against the masters-that planned and arranged conspiracy among the scholars, that they would unite together and overthrow the authority of the teachers, and the regulations of the school?

What justification can be offered for all this, unless indeed the novel rule is to be established in Massachusetts that a Jesuit can dictate from Endicott Street as to the management of our public schools. Unless his authority is to be superior to our laws;-unless he can set up his will as supreme;-unless his nod can justify any disobedience, any disrespect, any violence, on the part of the scholars; then it was the plain duty of the

teacher to maintain the discipline of his school; and to enforce those rules which he was as much bound to observe and execute as the scholars were bound to obey.

Need I say, in a court of law, that no punishment could be severe in a case like this? Need I allude to the authorities which give to the master in the school-room the power and the duty of a father-the power to enforce obedience, and punish resistance, especially such organized and open resistance as this? Need I remind the Court of the other facts in this case, the authority which the father himself gave to the master to punish his stubborn boy-the authority never withdrawn, and never revoked? No! may it please your Honor, I pass by all these points, for I wish for time to discuss the only question which requires, or deserves discussion-the real question in the case. And that is, whether the regulations which have been referred to are illegal and unconstitutional?

The laws with regard to our public schools are so dear to every citizen, so important in our free government, that they are familiar to every one. Free schools are established and maintained at the public charge. The children of all citizens without any distinction whatever, are allowed to attend them, and all receive the same course of instruction and are governed by the same rules. The general nature of the studies is regulated by positive statutes, but the details of discipline, the selection of teachers, the choice of books and the general management of the schools is given to school committees; which have large legislative, and almost judicial powers delegated to them by the laws. The general law which regulates the course and class of studies in our schools, is found in the Revised Statutes, chapter 23, section 7.

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It provides that "piety, justice, a sacred regard to truth, love to their country, humanity and universal benevolence, sobriety, industry, frugality, chastity, moderation and temperance,' should be taught. All these are to be taught, but first of all, piety.

In the execution of the duty which is imposed upon our school committee, of prescribing the mode and the means by which piety shall be taught; in the execution of the statute of 1855, which requires that a portion of the Holy Bible should be read daily in every school; and in the execution, also, of their

general duty, to direct the discipline and management of our schools, they have passed the following regulations, which apply to all the public schools in Boston:

The morning exercises of all the schools shall commence with reading a portion of Scripture, in each room, by the teacher, and the Board recommend that the reading be followed with the Lord's Prayer, repeated by the teacher alone, or chanted by the teacher and children in concert, and that the afternoon session close with appropriate singing ; and also that the pupils learn the Ten Commandments and repeat them once a week.

Substantially similar regulations, embracing a part or the whole of these recommendations, have always existed in our New England schools. These precise regulations have existed in our Boston schools for years. They were published widely, they were read in the schools, they were universally known, and universally acquiesced in. They were established, not for Catholics alone nor for Protestants alone-they were established to favor no particular creed; no one yet has dared to charge that they were established with any sectarian viewsthey were established for all, acquiesced in by all-and no one can doubt that they were useful and beneficial to all.

Had there been any feeling that these regulations were arbitrary or unjust had there been any conscience so sensitive that they became a burden-had any parent, or any child, of any sect of Christians objected to them, there was the fullest opportunity for remonstrance and redress. But it was not so. No teacher was requested to suspend the rules, there was no remonstrance to the school committee-no request to modify or abolish these apparently wise and useful regulations—there was no appeal to the courts, which enforce the laws, nor to the legislature which enacts them. The children obeyed without a murmur, and the parents acquiesced either from indifference, or from satisfaction.

It was in opposition to these regulations so long obeyed, so long acquiesced in, under which year after year our Catholic citizens with pride and satisfaction saw their children receiving and sharing with all others the benefits of a free and liberal education, that it has been found necessary to resort to open violence, to a deliberately planned and arranged rebellion

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