NORTH CAROLINA.

Comptroller's Office, 7th Dec., 1833.

        I, James Grant, Comptroller of Public Accounts, do hereby certify the foregoing statement to be the aggregate amount of the annual expense of the Government from 1810 to 1832, inclusive.

J. GRANT, Comp.

--Legislative Documents, 1833.

9. CALDWELL LETTERS ON POPULAR EDUCATION.

        Title page of the collected letters as published.

LETTERS
ON
POPULAR EDUCATION, ADDRESSED
TO THE PEOPLE
OF
NORTH CAROLINA.

How can he rule well in a commonwealth
Who knoweth not himself in rule to frame?
How should he rule himself in mental health
Who never learned one lesson for the same?
If such catch harm, their parents are to blame:
For needs must they be blind, and blindly led,
& Where no good lesson can be taught or read.

Cav. in Mir. for Mag.

HILLSBOROUGH:
PRINTED BY DENNIS HEARTT.
1832.

PREFACE.

        Report of 1825 committee work of the chairman.

        Plan called for too vast expenditures.

        A few years ago the attention of our Legislature was directed upon the subject of general education. They closed their proceedings upon it at that time by appointing a standing committee of four persons from the community at large, to whom it was prescribed to consider the subject of popular education through the ensuing year, and report to the Assembly at its next Session. That committee never met and no opportunity was afforded of comparing the sentiments of its members in personal conference. Towards the close of the year a paper drawn up by the chairman was sent to the other members for perusal, that if no other should have been prepared, and they should express their assent to such a measure, it might pass as a report to the Legislature. It detailed a plan conformable with the practice of some other states in the east and north, with provisions adapting it to our own circumstances. Objections were not raised to the measure, and it was presented as a report. As a basis it called for the creation of funds so vast as to preclude all hopes that it would be deemed practicable, and the anticipated issue was verified, that the ways and means necessary to its accomplishment, were of themselves an insuperable objection.

        Caldwell's plan of public education embodied in these letters.

        The writer of these letters, it may be recollected, was honored with an appointment on that committee, and it will not be strange that himself or any other person on whom the eye of the Legislature had been thus particularly turned, should feel some sense of obligation to reflect more fully on the subject, and engage in further researches as longer time and larger opportunity might put them within his power. He feels himself to be standing on ground somewhat different from that which he would have continued to occupy, had the appointment never occurred.

        From the circumstances, as they have been explained, it might be concluded, that all he has to think or say on the

subject of popular education is already before the public, which now at least, and for three years past would not do justice to his opinions and views. Had the writer been called upon at any time within this compass, to explain such a scheme of elementary education as would be preferable to all others, especially in our circumstances, and which instead of being impracticable can with the utmost facility be commenced and carried forward into execution without delay, the system he would have proposed is fully exhibited in these letters. They have occupied no small portion of his inquiries on a subject which involves the very highest interest of the State. He has now discharged what, with such views as he had, he could not but consider as a duty, and to his fellow citizens, he cheerfully leaves the consideration and disposal of it.

        No intended reflection on real teachers.

        In these letters remarks have been made freely upon the past and present method of schools in our own state. It may appear that injustice is done to many respectable and useful men, acting in the occupation of schoolmasters. It is hoped that these strictures will not be understood as pointed upon individuals, or upon the profession. It is to this class of society that the writer himself belongs. Is it not natural that he should be jealous for its honor? He is fully aware of the proper distinction between the truly respectable and worthy, and others who are wholly unmeet for the trust, in principles, character and qualifications. If a proper system of education were established, these would no longer appear as blots upon the profession. Instead of securing its high and important purposes to the community, they have exerted an influence baneful to an extent which none can tell, and have been most accountable for the reproach in which all education is now held by multitudes throughout the state.

Chapel Hill, Oct. 17, 1832.

LETTERS ON EDUCATION.

LETTER I.

Fellow Citizens,

        Letters originally appeared in the Raleigh Register.

        The substance of these letters was commenced in publication more than two years ago, in a different form, with the signature of Cleveland, in the Raleigh Register. It soon appeared that, from failure of health and inevitable avocations, my purpose could not then be prosecuted. From the postponement, greater opportunity has been given of revolving the subject, and maturing the plan it was then intended to suggest, of popular education. I believe, however, that nothing material has since occurred to change the views then contemplated, and they are now presented in the form of letters, instead of numbers with the chosen signature.

        Any plan of education must consider the conditions peculiar to North Carolina.

        I have no need to inform you that my life has been much, may I not say exclusively conversant with the subject of education. It has been passed too, among your selves, in habitual familiarities with the necessities of the state, its difficulties, the habits of the people, your peculiar sentiments on the subjects of legislation, and on the nature and extent of the means at once in unison with your inclinations and commensurate with your resources. The necessity of such information for the construction of plans to advance the interests and meliorate the condition of the people is indisputable. The writer of these letters is fully sensible of the deficiency of any pretensions he can properly make to a competent share of this species of qualification, compared with what might be rationally expected from the circumstances in which he has been acting for more than five and thirty years, and in comparison too with many others of his fellow citizens, who have enjoyed far less opportunities in reference to this particular subject. It has been his object however, to discipline his views

to the particular circumstances of his countrymen whose welfare he would consult, and to exclude everything which would be impracticable or hopeless for want of concurrence with their established modes of motives and action, while he should forever repudiate the thought of urging one consideration, or recommending one step, perceived to be variant from integrity, and in the practical adoption of which he is not prepared to make common cause with his countrymen to its utmost issue.

        An innovation in North Carolina legislation must embody great advantages to gain consideration.

        When a people have continued long in one course of legislation, when they have frequently and habitually resisted essays made to diversify or enlarge it, any measure which looks beyond the limits of their ordinary action, must conspicuously embody advantages great and numerous and unquestionable, if it would hope for complacent consideration, much more for final acceptance. Should an innovation in any instance gain their assent, and through malformation or mismanagement unhappily fail to secure its object, the event will be pregnant with disappointment to all future efforts at improvement. If on the contrary it should prove successful, even inveterate prejudice may be weakened and dissolved and many things become easy which before were impossible.

        Recent progress in primary education.

        Examples of the perfection of the schoolmaster's art too remote.

        There is perhaps no art or science in which greater improvement has been made than in that of education in primary schools. It has assumed a character wholly different from that of former times, and from that in which it still appears among ourselves. The mode of communicating instruction, the variety of which it consists, the interest ever kept alive in the bosom of the pupil, the exclusion of corporal punishment with which it is most successfully conducted, the activity and versatility to which it trains the intellectual faculties, the life and force which it imparts to the human affections, and the wide range of thought and knowledge which it opens before the reason and curiosity of the pupil, transcend the anticipated pictures even of an indulged imagination. Could we witness

it in its processes and effects, its superior excellence would assuredly occur to us with a conviction as complete, as every one now feels in favor of the gin in preference to the fingers in the process of now cleaning cotton, of the steamboat compared with sails or oars, or of a locomotive engine carrying its numerous tons at twelve miles an hour, contrasted with the labor and plodding movement of wagons and horses, of which unhappily to our incalculable loss we are still fain to avail ourselves, over the sharp pinches, the floundering water pits and jolting obstacles of highways on which the hand of improvement has never operated. Nothing certainly is wanted but this occular demonstration, to the resolute and instant adoption of all these astonishing and inestimable improvements which distinguish the generation of men and the age to which we belong, above the bygone ages and generations of the world. But to witness the present perfection of the school master's art is not our privilege, for its examples are too remote. And this presents an obstacle to any system of elementary schools we can recommend for the children of our state.

        Our aversion to taxation for support of schools.

        Another obstruction meets us in our aversion to taxation beyond the bare necessities of government and the public tranquility. Any scheme of popular education must be capable of deriving existence originally, and of maintaining it perpetually, without taxing us for the purpose, or we are well aware that we shall not as a people consent to its establishment.

        Indifference of many to the advantages of education.

        Picture of the results of lack of education on the thinking of the masses.

        A still further difficulty is felt in the indifference unhappily prevalent in many of our people on the subject of education. Vast numbers have grown up into life, have passed into its later years and raised families without it: and probably there are multitudes of whose fore-fathers this is no less to be said. Human nature is ever apt to contract prejudices against that which has never entered into its customs. Especially is this likely to be the case if there have been large numbers who were subject in common

to our same defects and privations. They sustain themselves by joint interest and feelings against the disparagements and disadvantages of their condition. It becomes even an object to believe that the want of education is of little consequence; and as they have made their way through the world without it, better than some who have enjoyed its privileges, they learn to regard it with slight if not with opposition, especially when called to any effort or contribution of funds for securing its advantages to the children. Such are the woful consequences to any people who, in the formation of new settlements, have not carried along with them the establishment of schools for the education of their families. So strangely may the truth be inverted in the minds of men in such circumstances, that they become avowed partizans of mental darkness against light, and are sometimes seen glorying in ignorance as their privilege and boast. When a people lapse into this state, and there is reason to fear that multitudes are to be found among us of this description, it must be no small difficulty to neutralize their antipathy against education, and enlist them in support of any system for extending it to every family in the state.

        Sparse population.

        I might mention further, as one of the greatest obstructions, the scattered condition of our population, over a vast extent of territory, making it difficult to embody numbers within such a compass as will make it convenient or practicable for children to attend upon instruction.

        Lack of commercial opportunities a great difficulty in the way of the support of schools.

        A most serious impediment is felt in our want of commercial opportunities, by which, though we may possess ample means of subsistence to our families, money is difficult of attainment to build school houses and support teachers. Could the avenues of trade be opened to this agricultural people, funds would flow in from abroad, and resources would be created at home, which would make the support of schools and many other expenses to be felt as of no consequence. Excluded as we now are from the market of

the world, the necessity of rigid economy is urged against every expenditure however small, and the first plea which meets us, when the education of children is impressed upon parents is their inability to bear the expense. This is one principle reason why it has been thought that among all the improvements upon which we are called to engage for the benefit of the state, commercial opportunity shall be the first. With the enlargement of funds, every difficulty would vanish in the way to such improvements as are rapidly elevating other states to distinction and opulence.

        Summary of difficulties in the way of supporting schools.

        It appears then how numerous are the discouragements we have to encounter in framing any plan for popular education. Our habits of legislation have been long established, and their uniformity has in few instances been broken, from our first existence as a state. To provide for the education of the people, has unhappily never entered as a constituent part of these habits. We are wholly unaware of the immense improvements, which would render captivating to us if we could but witness them, the methods of instruction in elementary schools, now practiced in other parts of the world. Our aversion to taxation, even to provide for the education of poor children, is invincible, and extinguishes at once the hopes of any plan to the execution of which such means are necessary. The same fate awaits every scheme of education, which looks for success to the borrowing of funds. Through the influence of inveterate habit, large portions of our population have learned to look with indifference on education. But to what an appalling magnitude does this difficulty grow, when among many, a spirit of hostility is even boasted in behalf of ignorance against knowledge! We want resources too, and must for ever want them, not only for educating our children, but for every other improvement, so long as we are without commercial intercourse with the world.

        Aversion to surrendering any personal liberty another difficulty in the way of public education

        I have already mentioned seven distinct causes of embarrassment

in the organization of any plan for popular education. It were easy to extend the enumeration, but these will suffice to show the serious obstacles that meet us in the formation of a system of primary schools, to stagger our hopes of its acceptance with the people. An eighth, however, I must not omit, on account of its very great influence. It is seen in the aversion with which we recoil from laws that exercise constraint upon our actions. We are a people whose habits and wishes revolt at everything that infringes upon an entire freedom of choice upon almost every subject. It would be easy to elucidate how this has come to be a trait so deeply marked in our character, but its reality is unquestionable. Provision for general instruction can scarcely be effected, without some compulsory measures regulating the actions of individuals into particular channels directed upon the object. Every such measure is felt to be an entrenchment upon the indefinite discretion to which we tenaciously adhere, when a relinquishment of it is not absolutely indispensable.

I am, fellow citizens, yours,
With the highest respect,
and best wishes for your welfare,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER II.

Fellow Citizens,

        Our duty to find a way around the difficulties.

        Such difficulties as have been enumerated must be either avoided or overcome in any scheme which we would propose as practicable for popular education. And what is our object in the specification? Is it to discourage or induce the conclusion that the object is unattainable? Certainly not. If impediments must be encountered on our way to a distant spot to which we would travel, of these we ought to be well informed, lest we waste time or effort in arriving at it, or be wholly repulsed in the attempt. The obstacles appear numerous, and some are invincible, but let

us endeavor to select a course that will either shun or surmount them. As a total relinquishment, can we be reconciled to acquiesce in it, till every trial shall have been made, which may issue more happily.

        We have not been in the habit of taxing ourselves for education.

        We have been in certain habits of legislation, until they have become fixed upon us, and any deviation from these seems to be almost instinctively regarded with aversion. Among the objects for which we have, through our whole history been accustomed to provide, education is not one. But the reason why we have never acted upon the subject is confessedly, not because it has not been deemed desirable, but that the methods proposed for effecting it have depended upon taxation. Is there no course then to be taken, to which funds thus raised are unnecessary? If one may be found, the plea of mere habit is probably displaced with the cause to which our habit, on this point at least, owes its inveteracy.

        All would favor public schools if they could see what was being done in other States.

        If our indifference and inactivity in regard to popular education be in any degree due to the wretchedly imperfect methods of instruction in our primary schools; if a knowledge of the admirable height of improvement which they have reached in other states, and other parts of the world, would kindle an enthusiasm for the acquisition of their privileges, which would no longer brook delay, let us hope that this want of information and light is not so essential to the subject, as to be an insuperable impediment. In truth, I have no hesitation in averring that it does constitute a difficulty equal if not superior to any other with which we have to contend. We may venture to predict, that could every parent in North Carolina be present for a few hours only to witness the process of elementary schools as they are now conducted in New York, and Connecticut, and Massachusetts, the impressions they would produce could never be effaced, nor the impulse excited in his bosom repressed. Could the conviction attending such a scene be common to every head of the family in our state,

how soon would all hearts and all hands be united in some effort, which by the union would be irresistible.

        Taxation will be fatal to any plan.

        With respect to the difficulty arising from our aversion to taxation, I am ready to admit, nay conclusively to affirm that it must and will be fatal to every scheme of popular education to which it is made necessary.

        People can not be said to favor ignorance.

        As to a spirit of hostility against knowledge, and a determination upon principle to sustain the cause of ignorance and to exclude all education as a foe to human happiness, and to true republicanism, the portion of our people who hold such opinions, is too small to contend with the great body of our citizens, who for the honour of our state, it is verily believed, are of entirely different sentiments. If no system of primary instruction has been established among us by legislative action, it is not that N. Carolina is at enmity with the subject itself, but because her means have been thought inadequate to its accomplishment.

        Other difficulties may be surmounted.

        Our resources doubtless fail, for want of commercial privileges. But this obstacle, too, ceases, if some plan for the diffusion of education can be effected by means already at our command.

        Lastly, it is true, we are a people, whose feelings may be said to be sensitive to the irksomeness of constraint. Let us then consult this feeling with all the delicacy in our power. Let us, if possible, contrive the structure of our schools so as not to depend upon compulsion but upon inducement. Let it lie principally upon the attractions of its charms. Let it avoid giving offence by the imposing sternness of its features.

        It is not then to dishearten, that I have spoken in detail of such difficulties as meet us, in digesting a plan of popular education. The survey is attended with no dispiriting effect, if we can only keep clear of one or two principal obstructions, to which the rest owe their chief if not all their influence.

        Schemes of education by taxation only perpetuate party spirit and will ever fail.

        It will be forever vain to mediate plans of legislative action, if we persist in looking to means, which the people

have given prescriptive evidence that they will never adopt. Why continue to press schemes from year to year, involving the necessity of taxation? such projects may serve to amuse, to distract, to weaken. Party spirit, which is the bane of all wise and sound policy, is perpetuated from year to year, assumes a standing character, and is propagated among the people, poisoning the fountains of legislation. The halls of the Assembly become an arena to fight over again the same battles, in which it often happens that the best interests of the country are connected with the degradation of defeat. Success is made the test of merit. The strength of a cause is estimated not from the benefits with which it is pregnant to the state, but by the comparative numbers enlisted in its support or subversion, by adherence to a party, the agitations of hope and fear, and the delusions of artificial excitement. The triumphs of victorious opposition, even to an object so sacred and all important as the education of the people, are capable of covering the object itself with ignominy, through an indiscreet and persevering connection of it with loans and taxes to which our established feelings are in revolting and irreconcilable aversion.

        The fate of former schemes of taxation for education should give us pause.

        The laws and measures which have been urged upon us by the most unquestionable patriotism, and by minds of every rank in ability, and which have owed their prostration to the taxes proposed for their execution, who could attempt to enumerate? They lie entombed in the mouldering records of our legislative assemblies. Were each to occupy the space of earth usually alloted to a fellow mortal, no repository of the dead in the wide range of our state would be ample enough for their receptions. Let us take warning from their fate, and look to other means.

        The people will accept an inexpensive voluntary plan of education.

        Thousands of parents are ready to second any practicable system by which education may be accessible to their children. Let it be offered to their voluntary acceptance by the best methods of instruction, and at the least expense,

and they will grasp with eagerness the proffered privilege. How can we imagine that a people like ourselves, living in an age of knowledge every where distributed through a thousand channels, can continue indifferent to its opportunities. There is not a wind of heaven, come from what quarter it may, which wafts not to our ears, improvements and discoveries that fill the world with activity and interest.

        Deplorable condition of the man who can not read.

        Can we sit contented to hear of them only in confused sounds, unable to examine for ourselves? Shall the eyes of a people so numerous, and prepared for the full exercise of every knowledge of personal and public freedom, continue wrapt in clouds and darkness? And shall not our imaginations, too, be set at liberty to delight themselves in the rich luxuriancy of their proper enjoyments, which the journals of travelers, the productions of genius, and publications of every discription, are daily offering to our contemplation? It is our boast that we live in an age fruitful in wonders both in art and knowledge. How deplorable is the condition of that man who is debarred all access to them by the use of books. To him who can read, the press is a watch-tower from whose summit he can extend his view over the whole earth, stretching into boundless prospects of harvests, and fruits and flowers, under a culture unexampled in the past ages of the world. To what but the press does the present generation owe its superior light? It is the vehicle by which we travel over every region of the globe, surveying its continents, islands, oceans, with their productions in endless diversity. The animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms, the manners and customs of its tribes and nations, their governments, the causes of their happiness and their miseries, their institutions and inventions, superstitions and prejudices, their depravity and cruelty, their struggles for liberty, their forfeiture of its blessings by dissention, ambition, and by yielding themselves a prey to despotic power, are all made

to pass in review by the mysterious revelations of the press before the optics of the mind. Who that enjoys its opportunities can frame adequate conceptions of the dark prison of his thoughts who cannot read, and the contracted limits of his intellect? To him the lament of the poet is applicable, whom blindness by disease had shut up from the light of day.

                         "This to me returns not,
                         But cloud instead, and ever-during dark
                         Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men
                         Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair
                         Presented with a universal blank
                         Of the world's works, to me expunged and rased,
                         And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out."

        He lives indeed in the most enlightened period of the world, and the sun of knowledge is blazing in splendor around him, but he is enclosed in walls impenetrable to its beams, and he is sunk in the obscurity of a distant age.

        Do we reflect, fellow citizens, on the multitudes who are in this dark and cheerless condition, constituting no small portion of our population? How many more of our generations must still grow up, to pass through life, surrounded with the gloom of three hundred years ago? Shall we not say with united voice, this evil is too grievous, too inglorious, and in its effects too mischievous to be borne? It must have a remedy and it must have it soon. Let us bring all the resources of our minds to bear anew upon the subject, and use the best means in our power to disseminate education through every county of the state, and among every portion of the people.

I am, fellow citizens,
Yours, with the highest respect.

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER III.

Fellow Citizens,

        Three methods of popular education.

        Two methods of providing for popular education occur in ordinary practice. One is voluntary, leaving it wholly to the discretion of the people themselves, without aid by the state; the other is by the intervention of the legislature. A third will appear in a combination of both. On the two former some explanation, as brief as I can make it, will help us to arrive at intelligent and satisfactory conclusions. This will be given in the present letter.

        The voluntary plan we now follow; its evils.

        The first method is the one which we now practice. It consists in the origination and maintenance of a school in any neighborhood, by a voluntary combination among as many of the inhabitants as will agree. Its insufficiency is proved by all our past and present experience. A school house is to be erected at the common expense; a site for it is to be chosen with the consent of all; a master is to be found; a selection and approbation if there be more than one, is to be discussed and settled; his compensation and support must be fixed to the general satisfaction, and the time of continuance must be stipulated.

        Here are six principal points on every one of which dissention of opinions, feelings and interests may spring up, to produce weakness or defeat. It is unnecessary to enlarge upon the perplexities that meet us at every step, and the discouragement of failures and disappointments, until at last in a vast number of instances, the object is relinquished in despair.

        Lack of proper teachers the greatest evil; condition of the primary schools.

        The evil which is the greatest of all, is the want of qualified masters. It may be difficult to obtain a teacher at all, but it is pretty certain in the present state of the country, not one is perfectly fitted for the occupation. Do we think that of all the professions in the world, that of a schoolmaster requires the least preparatory formation? If we do, there cannot be a more egregious mistake. For if any man arrived at years of maturity, who can read, write and

cypher, were taken up to be trained to the true methods of instructing and managing an elementary school, by a master teacher who understands them well, he could scarcely comprehend them and establish them in his habits in less than two years. This is not to speak with looseness and extravagance on the subject; and we need only to examine with opportunity of information, to be convinced of it as a practical truth. Yet in our present mode of popular education, we act upon the principle that school-keeping is a business to which scarcely any one but an idiot is incompetent, if he only knows reading, writing and arithmetic. If in almost every vicinage there happens to be one or a few who have more correct opinions, the numbers who think otherwise carry it over their heads, and our primary schools are kept sunk down to the lowest point of degradation, and education is disgraced by our own misconceptions and mismanagements.

        Teaching regarded with contempt.

        In the present condition of society and of public opinion, the occupation of a school master in comparison with others, is regarded with contempt. It would be wonderful were it otherwise, when we look at the manner in which it is very often, if not most usually filled. Is a man constitutionally and habitually indolent, a burden upon all from whom he can extract a support? Then there is one way of shaking him off, let us make him a school master. To teach a school is, in the opinion of many, little else than sitting still and doing nothing. Has any man wasted all his property, or ended in debt by indiscretion and misconduct? The business of school-keeping stands wide open for his reception, and here he sinks to the bottom, for want of capacity to support himself. Has any one ruined himself, and done all he could to corrupt others, by dissipation, drinking, seduction, and a course of irregularities? Nay, has he returned from a prison after an ignominious atonement for some violation of the laws? He is destitute of character and cannot be trusted, but presently he opens

a school and the children are seen flocking into it, for if he is willing to act in that capacity, we shall all admit that as he can read and write, and cypher to the square root, he will make an excellent school master. In short, it is no matter what the man is, or what his manners or principles, if he has escaped with life from the penal code, we have the satisfaction to think that he can still have credit as a school-master.

        People's estimate of education degraded by the poor teaching done in the primary schools.

        Is it possible, fellow citizens, that in such a state of things as this, education can be in high estimation among us? Is it strange that in the eye of thousands, when education is spoken of, you can read a most distinct expression that it is a poor and valueless thing? Can we rationally hope that so long as a method of popular education as this shall be all to which we look, the great body of the people will become enlightened and intelligent? Will they be qualified to act in all the various relations of parents and children, brothers and sisters, masters and servants, neighbors, members of the community, citizens of the state, subjects of providence and heirs of immortality? In all these capacities every child that grows up into life must necessarily act, and the teacher whose habits, views and dispositions do not qualify, and whose conscience does not urge him to instill into his pupils the principles, excite the emotions, and select the books best fitted to them all, is totally defective in the business of a school master, and has need to learn the first elements of his art. If any difficulty occurs as to the largeness of the qualifications of a common teacher, which seem here to be required in excess, it is a subject on which I propose to explain more fully afterwards, and will hope for a reference at present to the further remarks to be made upon it.

        Every species of business may be executed with various degrees of ability, and men may differ in their opinions of such as possess skill of a higher order in their professions. But respecting such as possess no talent, no qualification,

none can mistake. All must feel one common overpowering conviction that their pretentions are despicable. Let any profession be wholly consigned to occupants so wretchedly destitute of every qualification in skill or principle, let it be known to the people only in such defective and degrading forms, and how can it be otherwise than contemptible, and all that is connected with it of little or no worth?

        The people must be given better teachers in order to change present conditions.

        It is apparent then that popular education cannot be efficient, when left to the insignificancy into which it sinks, with no other security for its prosecution than the accidental and voluntary action to which it is now left. So unvarying and universal has been this method of educating children among us, that to speak of schools and school masters modelled upon other plans, as they are understood and maintained in other parts of the world, would probably expose a man to the charge of romancing, or at least as recommending something to us wholly unattainable, and fitted only to men of different attributes and capabilities from our selves. This plan of popular schools, hitherto, the only one we know, is so meagre and deformed in its features, and rickety in its constitution, that its repulsiveness prevents many from the use of it, who have not a doubt that education is of the utmost importance to the young, to families and to the population of a free state. The mind is a proper subject of cultivation, as much at least as the soil which we subdue and mellow for a harvest. Its powers must be developed, and its affections moulded by an informing and plastic hand. It should have the knowledge of letters, and the easy use of them, both in reading and with the pen. These are the portals which should be thrown open to all, that they may have free access to the information of the age. These are essential; but to know how to read and write are but a part of the great objects of early education.

        Good and evil dispositions must be distinguished, and

habits established of feeling and thinking and acting. Reading and writing are but instruments for forming the mind. All this would be admitted, nay strenuously asserted by many, if not by every individual. But when the concession is made, when the conviction is complete, and we turn to the means of securing these advantages for children, how are all our ardors suddenly arrested and congealed, as soon as we turn to the only means for forming their principles and dispositions. The school house too often presents itself to the eye as a region infested with mists and noxious reptiles, and poisonous plants, and among these the dearest objects of our affections must be placed, that they may have access by reading and writing to the springs of knowledge and intellectual life.

        That education in our primary schools should be held in low estimation, is but a natural consequence of the circumstances in which it is acquired. It never can be valued so long as they continue. The resources to which we have been left through our whole progress as a people, being of this character, the consequence is well known that thousands, and perhaps tens of thousands, are left to grow up unable to read at all. Experience has made it undisputable that the plan which we have practiced, if plan it can be called, is a total failure so far as North Carolina is concerned. Can evidence be wanting of its deplorable consequences, when it is by no means rare to hear men directing upon education a derision which would imply that they can deem it a glory and a privilege to be without it? I have been placed in circumstances, and there are few I fear who have not been similarly situated, where it would be dangerous to the election of a candidate to have it thought that he had any pretensions to information or culture, at least beyond a bare capacity to read. And some miserable being, to secure the great object of his ambition, has frontlessly presented it as a sure and glorious passport to success over the head of a rival, who was so unfortunate

as to have had some education, that he belonged to the class of the ignorant, with whom the greater part considered it their glory to be ranked.

        We see, then, the consequences of educating children by such wretched methods as we commonly practice. Thus it will always continue to be, so long as these methods are retained. We dress up the occupation of a school master in rags. It appears in hideous deformity by our own arrangement. It is no wonder if that which we intended for the figure of a man, cannot be thought of otherwise than as a laughing stock a by word, or a scarecrow, and then education is put down as a questionable subject. Nay, it becomes a thing of scorn and reproach. The repulsive and disgraceful forms in which it appears, have been given to it by ourselves, in the crudity of our own misconceptions. Where is the subject or the personage that may not be exposed to derision and rejection by a similar process?

        And how shall the confidence and the affections of the people be regained? It is by stripping off the offensive and contemptible disguise, and presenting education in all the beauty and excellence of her proper character. No sooner shall this be done, than all will fall in love with her. Her presence will be courted as the privilege and ornament of every vicinage, and under her patronage the clouds and mists that lower upon us will be dissipated.

With the highest respect,
I am your obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

Fellow Citizens,

        Summary of preceding letter.

        My last letter was occupied in showing that inefficiency of the mode of popular education, which has been our sole dependence in North-Carolina, and the pernicious effects it produces in harassing those who look to it, in disappointing their wishes, and in planting and in propagating prejudices upon the whole subject of knowledge and education.

We saw that from disagreements among neighbors when schools are to be instituted, from the incompetency of teachers, their total ignorance of their profession, the profligacy, idle habits and degeneracy by which many of them are characterized, such a method of elementary instruction has left us overwhelmed in thick darkness amidst a firmament gleaming with the brightness of the most enlightened age. It is in a persevering adhesion to this system, if system it can be called, that it has become fashionable with many to decry education as a thing of no value, and as qualifying men, not for distinguished usefulness and integrity, but for dexterity in the arts of cunning and selfishness. So long as we continue these methods of educating children, it threatens an invelopement in denser clouds of obscurity and prejudice. It surely behooves us to make good our escape from it without delay, from the baleful effects it has already produced, and which it will surely multiply upon us, if it cannot be replaced by something better.

        The Connecticut plan of education will not be adopted here.

        Another system which in our circumstances however is beyond our reach, it is my purpose now to explain, for the single reason that it comes upon us with reiteration from year to year, with no other consequence than to occupy our time, to distract the public mind, and to dishearten us with efforts terminating in abortion. It is the method practiced in some of our sister states, especially in Connecticut, New York and others. In these states, through time, and by such resources as they could command, a vast school fund has been treasured up, to such an amount as a million and a half of dollars. By the annual interest of these funds, schools are supported for educating every child in the country. The state is divided into districts of convenient size, a school house is erected in each, and teachers are either partially or entirely maintained by appropriations from the proceeds of the school fund. In New York a district is not entitled to aid until it can report authentically

that it has already provided a school-house, and is prepared to pay a certain sum towards the support of a teacher.

        Calculation to Show that the plans of other states can not be carried out here.

        Let us now enter into some computation, to see whether such a plan is within our power. If it be not, it is useless to think of it. It is worse than useless, it is time misspent on projects which must end in baffling disappointment. To make the subject plain, let us begin with the supposition of a single school in each county of North Carolina, and that fifty dollars, only, are annually allowed from a school-fund for its support. This supposition is put not with the idea that one school is enough for a county, or fifty dollars for its maintenance, but for further calculations.

        The state containing sixty-four counties, an allowance of fifty dollars to each, calls for an annual expenditure of three thousand two hundred dollars. The capital necessary to yield this interest at six per cent. is 53,333 dollars. Hence the following table is easily framed, showing the capital which must be accumulated for the maintenance of schools, from one to sixteen in each county, at fifty dollars each. Fractions are omitted, except in gaining other numbers from the preceding.

        

TABLE I.

For 1 school to a county, at $50 per annum a capital must be created and kept at interest of.	$53.333
For 2 schools to a county, at $50 each	$106.666
3 schools to a county, at $50 each	160.000
4 schools to a county, at $50 each	213.333
5 schools to a county, at $50 each	266.666
6 schools to a county, at $50 each	320.000
7 schools to a county, at $50 each	373.333
8 schools to a county, at $50 each	426.666
9 schools to a county, at $50 each	480.000
10 schools to a county, at $50 each	533.333
11 schools to a county, at $50 each	586.666
12 schools to a county, at $50 each	640.000

13 schools to a county, at $50 each	693.333
14 schools to a county, at $50 each	746.666
15 schools to a county, at $50 each	800.000
16 schools to a county, at $50 each	853.333

        The counties are very different in size; and the schools assigned must vary in number, according to the circumstances. Taking thirty-two miles square for the extent of the counties one with another, and alloting a school to a space eight miles square, each county would have sixteen schools. In this case the distance which some children must go to a school is at least four miles, but they would be those only who lived at the limits of the square. For sixteen schools to a county, a fund of eight hundred and fifty-three thousand three hundred and thirty-three dollars must be vested at interest, to pay fifty dollars a year to every school. The table shows us by inspection the fund required for any less number of schools.

        But it will hardly be thought that fifty dollars a year will be sufficient for the maintenance of a school. A hundred would probably be too little, but let us take that sum for exemplification. The following table is furnished upon the same basis, and we have only to double the former numbers:

        Further calculations.

        

TABLE II.

For 1 school to a county, at $100 per ann	$106.666
2 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	213.333
3 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	320.000
4 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	426.666
5 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	533.333
6 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	640.000
7 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	746.666
8 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	853.333
9 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	960.000
10 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,066.666
11 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,173.333
12 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,280.000

13 schools per annum, at $100 per ann	1,386.666
14 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,493.333
15 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,600.000
16 schools to a county, at $100 per ann	1,706.666

        It is probably unnecessary to explain the use of this tabular statement. It is obvious that the fund necessary for the annual disbursement requisite for sixteen schools to a county at $100 each is one million seven hundred and six thousand six hundred and sixty-six dollars.

        We can now see the extent of our enterprise, if we undertake to provide for popular education upon the plans of New York, Connecticut and some other states. If 150 dollars be allowed to each school instead of 100, the numbers of both tables must be united to exhibit the requisite funds.

        No hope to raise such a large sum.

        But the essential question occurs, How shall the funds be created which the tables show for executing such a system? That it will be done by taxation, there is no prospect. To raise a fund of a million and a half dollars, we must be taxed to the amount of a hundred thousand dollars annually for fifteen years. Is this within the limits of probability? It is presumed that no one will announce that it is. Were we taxed at the rate of fifty thousand dollars a year, thirty years must pass away before the fund would be completed. Both the amount of the tax, and the postponement of the time, are enough singly to preclude all thought of such a measure.

        Present taxation of 75 cents on each poll regarded as oppressive.

        Our habits are at variance with taxation for any purpose, beyond the bare necessities of governmental subsistence. Even this levy it is our anxious and ever exerted effort to reduce to the very lowest point by every device of legislation. The tax now paid by the people for the support of our state government is twenty-five thousand dollars a year. Have we any doubt whether the sum is so small as this? The Bank stock owned by the state, I am informed, amounts to seven hundred and fifty thousand

dollars. The annual revenue derived from it into the treasury, at six percent is forty-five thousand dollars. If the expenses of our state government be seventy thousand, no more than twenty-five thousand are necessary beyond the interest of the stock to make up the sum, and this is not twenty cents to the poll. It is evident that I speak of bank stock in its ordinarily productive state.

        Of county taxation we cannot speak with precision. In no two counties is it probably the same, and it fluctuates in each county from year to year, with the emergencies with which it is to provide. It is for those who are better informed than I am, to say whether it is likely to be more than such a sum as fifty cents to the taxable poll, upon an average through the state. Admitting this, our annual taxation in North Carolina, is at the rate of seventy-five cents to every taxable poll. If there be any mistake in these statements it is easily corrected, but it is presumed the result will not differ much from the truth. Such taxation as this, we should think, must be too small to excite discontent. But who does not know that it is habitually urged as subject of complaint, if not as oppressive. Now if while it is so inconsiderable, we have our eye ever solicitously directed upon its diminution, how shall we expect that any plan of popular education shall be accepted and carried into execution, to which additional taxation to the extent of a hundred thousand dollars a year, or fifty thousand dollars a year, or even a much smaller sum, becomes necessary for fifteen or thirty years to come?

        Better to drop the idea of schools by taxation.

        It is now submitted to the dispassionate consideration of those who look to New York, or Connecticut, for plans of popular education, whether the proposal and discussion of them is likely to be attended with any other consequences than apprehension in the general mind that the whole subject of education is hopeless. Is it not better to drop them, and turn our eye to a different direction? There may possibly be other methods of accomplishing the object.

Let us not despair that one may be devised susceptible of execution by means within our power. In one assurance at least we may rest with satisfaction, that if our time may be lost in adopting this course, in cleaving to the other it certainly will.

        No hope that bonds will be issued.

        Nor can we look with better hopes to the consent of the state to borrow the necessary funds. To loans as well as taxes for all purposes such as these, we have ever shown an invincible dislike. It is in vain to urge the authority and-the example of other states. We may lament over the losses both of moral and pecuniary wealth to an incalculable amount perpetuated through every year of our existence, by what we may call our unhappy prejudices against a taxation which we should not feel, and against raising funds by loan to be attended with immense profits to the state; but to what end shall we repine, and vent our regrets in the most flowing and eloquent strains? We wish to provide a system of elementary schools. If we would busy ourselves with the least prospect of success, let us avoid placing it upon the issue of loans and taxes. While the spirit now ascendant shall continue to reign in our political atmosphere, the vessel which shall have the hardihood to venture freighted with these, may for a white buffet the surge. Her friends may with momentary exultation exclaim,

                         Her path is o'er the mountain wave;
                         but soon it shall be as a doom pronounced upon her,
                         Her home is in the deep.

I am yours, with the highest respect,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER IV.

Fellow Citizens,

        Qualified teachers necessary whatever plan of education is adopted.

        I have mentioned some difficulties in the way of making provision for general education, most of which it is probably in our power to supersede. But one there is, of which

in our present situation, that is not to be said, and until it is removed it would prove alike fatal to all that could be proposed. It is the want of teachers qualified for the business of instruction, whatever be the mode of instituting and maintaining schools. To no purpose should we create a capital of a million and a half or two millions of dollars, if school masters could not be called into action competent to their office. This is a truth as vital as it is unquestionable. Teachers are necessary instruments to every system of popular education, and here, as in everything else, without the means, the end cannot be accomplished. It is a part of the subject, on which if it be not understood, it is most difficult to give the necessary explanation. Doubtless there are many, to whom a want of instruction would appear least likely to produce any embarrassment. For who is there able to read, write and eipher, who cannot teach a school? If there be any who have such opinions as these, an error more essential cannot be held upon any subject. That I may not appear to be speaking things extravagant and without authority, permit me to quote the opinions and declarations of others.

        School for training teachers.

        It will be seen in the course of these letters, that an institution for preparing school masters for their profession is regarded as necessary, and in the first instant at least as a competent provision in our own state, for general education. To this thought as an original conception by me I make no pretentions. It has been often urged and sometimes adopted in practice in other parts of the world. In the year 1826, Gov. Lincoln addressed the legislature of Massachusetts upon the subject in these terms: "The qualifications of instructers deserve much more of care and attention. To the great honor and happiness of the commonwealth, this employment has become an extensively desirable and lucrative occupation. It may be safely computed that the number of male teachers, engaged by the

towns annually, for the whole or parts of the year, does not fall short of twenty-five hundred different individuals, to which, if the number of female instructers, and those employed in private schools be added, the aggregate would amount to many thousands. Knowledge in the art of governing, and a facility in communicating instruction, are attainments in the teacher of indispensable importance to proficiency by the pupil. These talents are as much to be acquired by education, as are the sciences themselves. It will merit the consideration of the legislature, whether the provision for the preparation of a class of men to become the instructors of youth in the public schools, is not among the highest inducements to the measure, and should be an object of primary and definite arrangement."

        "Nothing surely," says the Journal of Education, "can be more beneficial to the interests of our state, than the establishment of a seminary, which may furnish a constant supply of well educated teachers, prepared to enter on their office with accomplished minds, and enlightened views of the whole subject of education, as well as the best practical qualifications for instruction. Such a seminary cannot fail soon to become so popular as to support itself. But all its actual success must depend on the liberality with which it must be enabled to commence its operations; for a poor and imperfect institution, instead of promoting the object desired, would unavoidably fix and entail a low standard of qualifications on the part of instructers, and consequently a low state of public education."

        Even Massachusetts has found such a school necessary.

        Public education has never been neglected in Massachusetts. The first settlement of the state commenced with provisions for popular schools, that not a child should grow up in the new republic uneducated. It was felt to be a first principle, that in a free and popular state every member of it ought to be enlightened. These were men as strictly tenacious of original and inherent rights as any whose names are recorded upon the page of history. Are they to be considered as committing a breach upon these

rights, when they established laws for educating the children of the state? Such laws have ever been maintained through their whole progress to the present hour. We should suppose that among such a people, an ample supply of men could always be found well qualified to act as school masters. Yet we have seen what were the sentiments of one of their governors upon the subject and his recommendation to the legislature, that a seminary should be forthwith instituted for training teachers to the business of their vocation. In North Carolina no provision has ever been made for the maintenance of schools. Our population have spread themselves over the soil to the utmost limits of a large state, and the education of families has been wholly excluded from our policy. Is it likely, then, were we to adopt any plan of popular education at present, it could be carried into effect, without such an institution for preparing instructers, as is deemed necessary even in Massachusetts.

        Bell's plan of central teachers' schools in India.

        It is well known to have been an object for many years past in British India, to discover and put in practice the most effectual methods of diffusing christian civilization among the population of that country. It was in the prosecution of this object that Bell instituted his system of mutual instruction. It was soon considered as the most successful plan of instruction in elementary schools. Its peculiarities were so various, and so much depended upon familiar acquaintance in the teacher with these peculiarities, that few could adopt them from description, and none could fully understand and apply them in practice without witnessing the processes through which the pupils were passed in the whole course of their education. It was on this account deemed expedient to establish institutions called "Central Schools," whose purpose was to train up teachers qualified to take charge of schools as they might be formed in every place, and conduct them with the necessary skill. The reason why they were denominated

Central Schools, obviously occurs. They were points of emination, fountains of light, from which knowledge was to be propagated in every direction, till it should reach the extremities of the empire. From the "Christian Observer," a publication second to none of the present age in talent and benevolent spirit I extract a brief notice, touching upon the subject of Central Schools, shortly after their commencement in 1820.

        "The president and the members of the Bombay School Committee, after having provided for the education of European and Christian children of both sexes, have at length turned their serious consideration to the means best calculated for extending the blessings of intellectual cultivation to the native children of India.

        "The result of this consideration has been the proposal of a plan, so palpably beneficial that it has already met with the complete aprobation of the assemblies of two classes of the native inhabitants.

        "A Mohammedan youth, the son of a Sepoy in the office of the chief secretary to government, who has received instruction for about a year at the Central School in the town of Bombay, gave, in the course of a rigid examination, such proofs of his capacity to convey to his countrymen the rudiments of tuition in English, on the plan of Dr. Bell, that the first class of upwards of twenty Parsee children was to be placed under his care. A prospectus of the proposed plan is now printing for the purpose of distribution, in order to diffuse among the native inhabitants a more general knowledge of the means about to be offered them, of educating their children more extensively, economically, and effectually, than has hitherto been in their power. A teacher of the Guzerattee has declared himself ready to attend the Central School, in order to prepare himself for instruction on Bell's Plan*."

        * See Christian Observer for year 1820, p. 528.

        Fellenburg's school in Switzerland, and others, examples.

        Seminaries then for training teachers to act with ability in their profession, were established and proved of the highest benefit as early as 1820. It has been customary for such as wish to improve the art of education, and learn its best methods, to visit personally the institutions which have been thought to exhibit the best models. Scarcely a traveller passes through Switzerland, who does not make it a special object to visit Fellenburg's seminary at Hoffwyl, and formerly it was no less customary to look with inquiry into that of Pestalozzi at Yverdun. Lancaster's system was similar to Dr. Bell's, and who knows not the curiosity which has prompted numbers to witness the regulations of his schools where they have been ably conducted? The modes of business may be viewed for an hour or two with gratification, and we may become enlightened and convinced in regard to the best methods of instruction. But the art of teaching by these and other methods as they have advanced to perfection through many years past, is not to be acquired and appropriated in a moment. The knowledge of them is to be gained by minute study, the habits of its application in practice are to be established, the principles upon which the teacher is to live, and feel and act in his profession, must be planted and grow into strength, that he may intelligently and conscientiously adhere to them and take delight in them, and his dispositions and affections must be formed to the proper charities of his office. Do we think that all this can be comprehended, and assumed and confirmed in any individual in a moment, and that all we have to do is to pronounce that he shall be a school master, to convert him into a fit character to our hands? Such was not the opinion of Gov. Clinton on the subject.

        Gov. Clinton on the education of teachers.

        "In the first place," said he in 1827, "there is no provision for the education of competent teachers. Of the eight thousand now employed in the state of New York, too many are destitute of the requisite qualifications. Perhaps

one-fourth of our population is annually instructed in our common schools, and ought the minds and morals of the rising generations to be entrusted to the guardianship of incompetence? The scale of instruction must be elevated; the standard of education ought to be raised, and a central school on the monitorial plan ought to be established in each county, for the education of teachers, and as examples for other momentous purposes, connected with the improvement of the human mind."*

        * Journal of Education, Vol. II, p. 118.

        What 200 trained teachers could do in this State.

        It is no new undigested, or untried project, then, which is recommended to your adoption. If at this moment two hundred teachers could be produced from among us in the different counties of the state, all well accomplished for the direction of primary schools and universally known to have been formed and disciplined under a head master eminently skilled and of established reputation in the monitorial methods of instruction, we may assert with confidence that not a month would pass away, before they would be called into action. Nor would there be danger that we would be overstocked. The new methods of government, the unexampled alacrity of the pupils, the rapidity of their advancement, the evident influence upon their principles and habits, the total elevation of mind and heart under such tuition, would present the advantages of education they would impart with irresistable conviction. At the end of a single year it is not to be doubted that requisition would be importunely urged for a far more numerous body of the same description.

        We could use the interest of the Literary Fund to establish a teachers' school.

        It is in our power without delay to commence an efficient plan of popular education, by providing such a corps of instructers and offering them to the people upon terms to which few or none could think beyond their ability. We have a literary fund to the amount of eighty or a hundred thousand dollars. Let it forthwith be profitably invested. Let its annual interest be applied for the erection of a central school, that is, an institution for preparing

school masters upon the most improved methods of instruction. Let a head teacher be selected with time and opportunity for inquiry, from the whole field of the United States, and a salary be allowed him, to take charge of the institution, and in the central school let him train men sent to it from all the counties of the state, or at least from such as shall think proper to avail themselves of the opportunity. A single year need not pass, after teachers thus formed should have commenced their operations, till a demand for them would be heard, clamorous for more than could be supplied. Give us such teachers as those, would be the cry, and we too will have a school for our children.

I am, fellow citizens,
Yours, most respectfully,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER VI.

Fellow Citizens,

        Purpose of former letters.

        My object in the preceding letters has been to explain the reasons for circumscribing and concentrating our views upon a plan for effecting popular education, which is now to be detailed. We have looked at the obstacles which usually meet us upon this subject, to which is to be ascribed an abortion of such laws as are commonly proposed for its accomplishment.

        Central school for preparation of teachers; necessity for it.

        Central school to have two years' course of study.

        Let a central school be instituted by the legislature, for the purpose of educating and preparing instructers of elementary schools for their profession. It is denominated a central school not because its situation is necessarily to be in or near the center of the state, but because wherever it is it will be a point or focus from which education is to emanate with diffusion to every part of the country. The provision of it evidently implies that the business of an instructor in popular schools, is itself an art not to be comprehended, and established in the habits of an individual, without much time, education and discipline for its formation

to it. It implies too, that the methods and results of education in these primary schools have become vastly, may totally different, in their present advanced stage of improvement, from school keeping as it is for the most part still practiced among us. For the reality of this it is not asked of any who have not had opportunity of information, that they take it for granted from the declaration of the individual. Numbers among ourselves can attest it to a greater or less extent by their knowledge, and the world abounds with publications to illustrate and confirm it. Some examples of this evidence have been selected, and are presented in an appendix to these letters. Let even these few be carefully perused, and it will begin to appear that so various and comprehensive are the objects of well trained and qualified teachers at present in their profession, that a man can scarcely be supposed to become intelligent, prompt and skillful, in less than eighteen months or two years, with diligent and well guided application through the whole time. In its merits and the importance of its effects, it claims the first attention of a people. It befits the dignity of the wisest and most enlightened legislature, and is worthy to be sustained by the zeal and energies of the state.

        Cost of education to the people would not be increased.

        Nor is it to be supposed that the education we recommend is too extensive or costly. The expense of such schools as we propose will probably be the same as it is in the present common schools of the country, or but little different. The time allowed to it by the parent will be discretionary with himself, while the whole manner and value of the instruction will be incomparably superior. With unhesitating confidence we may affirm that it would redeem the cause of education from the deplorable degradation to which it is sunk, and the public mind, by the convictions it would produce, would undergo a total regeneration in its sentiments upon the subject.

        Central school board; observation school.

        A board of education being appointed by the legislature,

consisting of men wisely and dispassionately selected, their first business would be to determine the site of the institution. The choice would properly be governed by the circumstances of health, cheapness of living, vicinage, facilities proffered, peculiar adaptation of service to the objects in view, the easy constitution and maintenance of a primary school for exemplification, accommodation to the whole state, and possibly proximity to the seat of the legislature.

        Teachers for the central school; importance of a trained principal.

        A head master or principal teacher must be sought out and appointed to take charge of the institution. As the success and efficacy of every plan of public education must chiefly depend upon its execution, nothing will be of greater import than a happy choice of the master who is to manage the details of the institution, and stand as a pilot at the helm. He should be one uniting much experience, sound discretion, a vigorous and well regulated mind, correct principles, regular habits of life, and a heart ardent with the benevolence of training up the rising generation to usefulness, the social virtues, to all the "charities of father, son and brother," and to the best prospects of a happy immortality. By past fidelity and success he should have already given proof of a mind fertile in resources, adapting itself to occurrences, and replenished with expedients practically ascertained in the most distinguished institutions during many years past, while the arts of education have been rapidly advancing to their present perfection.

        I might enlarge much on the selection of the principal; but though numbers may be found who combine all these qualifications eminently, and at least sufficiently, for it is honorable to our age that it is singularly productive of characters thus accomplished, many might distrust the possibility. They might apprehend that if our success is to depend on the discovery and employment of such a teacher, our hopes are scarcely to be admitted as feasible.

It is true that if we must find him among ourseives, our efforts might end in disappointment. Nor let it be imagined that this is said from an opinion that our own population does not furnish as large a proportion of mind as any other upon earth, suscepitble of every capacity and accomplishment we could desire. But we will know that the methods of primary education have been but little cultivated among us, and it is a necessary consequence that they must be less understood here, than in parts of the world where they have been assiduously studied, and reduced to practice with the best opportunities.

        The school interior.

        The principal should be a member of the board of education, and it would be of consequence, could the appointment be previously made, that he should be liberally consulted respecting the form, the size, the extent of school rooms, and on their furniture and its disposition, that the various purposes of a whole system may be best consulted, every movement performed with order and facility, and the whole management be conducted with interest to the scholar, and a distinct understanding between himself and the teacher. Schoolrooms thus constructed become patterns, no less than the modes of instruction, to the teachers reared in the central school, to the best proficiency in their vocation.

        Duties of the Principal.

        Lectures are there to be given by the principal, on the different methods of instruction, the ends to be kept in view, and the true means of success in their attainment. The manner of addressing the minds of the children, and of influencing their affections would be explained. The benevolent, elevated, and pure principles which properly characterise the profession of a teacher, would be set before the candidate for the office, until they should be admired, imbibed and become habitual to his bosom, and flow forth in his actions and intercourse. The consequence must be that he would be captivated with their harmonies, their moral beauties and their effects. He would carry them

out into the practice of his occupation. He would prefer and enjoy them for their excellence, improve upon them with intelligence and a virtuous emulation, and persevering in them from choice, would elevate the standard of knowledge and morals in the community which had chosen and patronized him for these generous and important purposes.

        The present Literary Fund of $100,000 will support the schools; guiding principles.

        The literary fund of North Carolina, if I mistake not, amounts to a hundred thousand dollars. This is amply sufficient for the creation and support of the institution of which we speak. Let the money, bank stock, and other property of which it consists, be examined and the means devised of converting the whole, or as much of it as possible, into active and productive stock at the rate of six per cent. The annual revenue from it would be six thousand dollars. The buildings should be of the plainest sort. Nothing supernumerary beyond necessity and a plain accommodation, should be permitted to enter into their composition. Their use is for men with whom utility is to be the object of supreme value, and who should be enured to pursue this with an inflexible purpose, putting down everything that is enjoyment or convenience only and yet not indispensable, under their feet, as of minor consideration. Such views should be sedulously interspersed and incorporated into the whole texture of their education, by the master who disciplines them, and by the government which calls them into action. Health and the propagation of knowledge in the elementary education of the state, should be the great objects kept steadily in view, and no considerations of bare indulgence or ease should be permitted to interfere. The man whether young or of middle age, who will not adopt these principles, and be faithful to them in practice, through his whole course in the central school, giving assurance that he is not to relinquish them in future life, it were better at once to set aside, as one that has put his hand to the plough and is looking back. Let us admit no weak fears that men enough cannot be found in every

county in the state to accept the conditions and abide by them. Perseverance for a time, with rigorous adherence to this system, will clear away all obstructions, and give the education of our school masters a true and constant direction. Upon this species of discipline in the institution, the eye of the principal of the board of education, and of the legislature should be specifically and vigilantly directed every day and month and year of its history.

        The buildings constructed with simplicity and the utmost plainness, need not cost much. But let them not be abridged of ought that is really necessary to the efficacy of business.

        Introduction of manual labor to be considered.

        Whether grounds should be annexed for manual labor, and to aid in the subsistence of the candidates, is an inquiry worthy of consideration. Beside hardy exercise united with usefulness, it would tend to rescue bodily toil from the degradation which is connected with it, by a cause of unhappy operation among ourselves. Such employment would act powerfully in preventing the candidate from being corrupted by impressions that he is to be regarded as one entitled to privileges and exemptions. He is to be a man that knows no vain distinctions between himself and the humblest citizen of the state. On this subject it is of the utmost importance that his views and feelings be steadily conformable with the true and correct standard of usefulness and virtue. His proper maxim is: He that exalteth himself shall be abased, but he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

        $6,000 sufficient for buildings to begin with.

        The sum of six thousand dollars is competent to the preparation of the buildings, and to place the principal upon a salary from the beginning. Parts may afterwards be added, as necessity may require. Observation, experience, larger information, may doubtless suggest improvements, which it will be easy to supply.

        Summary of the foregoing letter; an appeal.

        The literary fund now lies dormant and unproductive. The education of the people sustains an ever during cry in

our ears, with an importunity that is heard in every household, in our streets and highways, our fields and workshops, our schools and churches, our courts of justice and our halls of legislation. Shall we delay a moment to listen to the summons, when it is in our power to act? Should it be thought expedient to continue the enlargement of the literary fund in accordance with views originally meditated by the legislature, the instant application of that which has already been created, cannot interfere with such a purpose. No scheme of public education can ever be carried into effect without an abundant supply of teachers well qualified for its execution. We can commence the preparation of these without a moment's postponement. Who knows but that such a provision of school masters as it is in our power to make, to answer the calls which will be everywhere heard for their services, as soon as their merits shall be known, may prove all that the legislature may find necessary for giving existence to the very best of schools, by spontaneous action through all the counties and vicinities of the state. Should this be the issue, then all that mighty accumulation of capital, to the amount of a million and a half or two million of dollars, may be dispensed with as an unnecessary cause of delay, an unwieldy apparatus, a useless burden upon the people. A strong probability, if not a satisfactory certainty of this, will further appear by expositions yet to be developed.

I am, fellow citizens,
Your very obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER VII.

Fellow Citizens,

        How pupils will be supplied for the school; commissioners in each county to select pupils; county to pay $100 a year expense for each; every pupil supported bound to teach.

        How, it will be asked, is the school proposed to be filled with candidates for the profession of teachers? In every county which shall choose to avail itself of the privileges of the institution, let school commissioners be chosen by

the people themselves for as long a time as shall be thought proper. The number should be as small as will ensure intelligence and fidelity. Five or seven would probably be better than a larger number. We may propose to increase wisdom by enlarging the body, but let us remember that responsibility is weakened, and efficacy lost.

        The school commissioners being appointed, they are to govern themselves by the rules prescribed by the legislature. For a limited time previously published, they will receive the names of such applicants for education to the profession of teachers as shall choose to offer. From these they will select as many as the county will consent to support at the central school at a hundred dollars each per year, through the time required for completing an education. If more than a hundred dollars be necessary, let it be added by themselves or their friends.

        The candidates before admission may be required to enter into bond with competent security to the county commissioners, that should they afterwards desert the profession for which they were educated at the public expense, they shall replace the sum expended by the county upon their education. They may however be released at any time from this obligation by the school commissioners, should these think proper to remit it. Let it be understood also, that the first three months after the entrance of a candidate into the central school, shall be a period of probation. At any time during this period or at the expiration of it, he may be discharged from the school by the board of education, or a majority of them, with or without reasons rendered for such dismission, as they shall think proper. He may be dismissed also, at any time afterwards for misconduct, by the same authority.

        Every candidate taught at the central school, when his education shall have been completed, shall receive a certificate to that effect from the board of education, signed by the principal of the school and by the other members or by

a majority of the board. And every such qualified instructer shall be bound to teach in the county which has educated him, subject to the direction of its school commissioners, upon such general conditions and regulations as the legislature shall ordain.

        Examinations, observation school, where graduates will teach.

        Public examinations should be statedly held, of the candidates in the central school, at times and places appointed by the legislature, exhibiting the state of the institution, its progress, and its prospects. They may suggest any improvements indicated by experience to be expedient or desirable.

        A library should be provided for the central school, and the books purchased for it determined by the board of education.

        The central school should always have one or more primary schools of children and young persons connected with it, for exemplification to the candidates of the instruction in such schools. These being conducted under the direction of the principal who receives a salary, should afford tuition gratuitously to the pupils.

        What will be effected by the trained teachers.

        It is evident that when the masters educated in the central school should return to their counties, their services are supposed to be for the benefit of such neighborhoods as will erect schoolhouses, and proffer the sum requisite by law for the tuition of their children. The expense is incurred voluntarily, and not by compulsion; yet the excellence of these schools, the advantages they confer, the moral influence they produce, the interest they excite in the pupil, the beautiful and impressive order of all their processes, the variety and copiousness of their instruction the kind and benevolent sentiments they diffuse through all hearts, the sense of rapid progress and valuable attainment pervading the mind in the performance of their different offices, the neat and regular order of their movements, the quick succession of their numerous exercises developed at the word of command, and preventing weariness by frequent

and seasonable changes in employment; in short the delights of reason excited by novelty, of imagination by appropriate narrative, and of complacent feeling flowing from the bosom of the teacher as a living spring, all combine to produce an irresistable conviction that the privileges of such instruction are inestimable, and that a failure to improve them when offered to our families is an irreparable loss. I repeat, if these descriptions of the present improved modes of instruction in primary schools appear extravagances, it is because we are forbidden to look upon them by their inaccessible distance from us in other states and other countries. It is in our power, by the action of our legislature, and by a fund now in our hands to transfer them with all their blessings and benefits to ourselves. Shall we hesitate for a moment upon a question of so much importance to our own happiness, the happiness of our children, and the welfare of the republic? Do we still hesitate respecting the reality of these representations? The whole amphitheatre of christendom is full of their proofs, and can it be that they have never penetrated to us by the rays which the press is dispensing around us. The present is a period of improvement, and it has elevated the methods of education in correspondence with the perfection of other arts. Let us all look into this matter for ourselves, for it is a subject which most deeply concerns us. I would not be an egotist, but if I have ever spoken or acted in any thing involving our interests as a people, I would hope that it might all be found to have been in truth and verity, in nothing at variance with experimental certainty. How is it a privilege for us to live in the most enlightened age, if its wisdom be unstudied, its advantages unsought, and some of its effects of the very first importance be rejected from our credence, because we have never brought them within the scope of our inquiry.

        The demand for trained teachers will increase.

        Let us be willing then to admit that when such teachers as those of whom we speak, are represented to our people,

the demand for their services will especially at first, be greater than the supply. Were there two of this description in every county, two vicinities at least within its compass should speed to their employment. When the experiment shall thus be exhibited in the presence of parents and their friends, we need not fear the result. The struggle would soon be between those who already possessed them, to retain them still, and others who would not relinquish their rightful claim to an equal share in the advantages of their instruction. Should this be the case, their labors would be distributed among different schools for such terms as three, four or any other number of months, under the direction of the school commissioners of the county.

        If any county fails to send pupils, then individuals in the county should have that privilege.

        Were we to suppose a candidate to be sent to the teachers' seminary by a county every year, and the time necessary for completing his course of preparation for the instructer's office to be two years, the county would have two candidates constantly upon the list of the school after the first year, at the cost of one hundred dollars each to be defrayed by its people, and every year one would be added to the number of its teachers. The demand for these masters would probably be least pressing at first, but it would likewise increase as the people should become familiar with the merits of their instruction, and be able to report themselves to the school commissioners prepared with a school-house and compensation for their employment. The augmentation of their numbers, and the call for their services, would, from the circumstances be likely to keep pace with one another. In counties which might be indifferent to the subject, and such possibly, nay probably there would be, the provisions of the law would imply no necessity of engaging in the practice of the system. From such counties no candidates would be sent, and in them, as is reasonable, no advantages of elementary education would be enjoyed. But it is highly probable, if not morally certain, that this could not long continue. Even if the people of

a single vicinage should at any time resolve, by common consent to send a candidate to the central school, at their own expense and for their own behoof, they should not only be at liberty but encouraged by public sentiment to act a part so creditable and meritorious. This in many instances would in all probability be done, especially when the county engaged not in the plan, or when the teachers being yet few, their services in one neighborhood must be curtailed to a brief space of time at a single place. Efforts of this kind, while they would make wiser men independent of opposition from the reluctant population around them, would break down resistance, and dissolve prejudices, in portions of the country where they unhappily existed, until all at length should voluntarily concur in conceding and estimating the advantages of education.

        Other States might desire to send pupils.

        Should North Carolina resolve to establish a central school of the nature here described, it is not improbable that its privileges might be admired and craved by some at least from sister states around us. Should this prove to be the case, we should doubtless open the doors of her institution for their reception, which accords with a spirit of liberal accommodation worthy of the cause in which we should be engaged. How far the institution might receive aid from the funds thus created certainly cannot be foreseen, nor is it of much consequence to consider.

        I have thus sketched with as much brevity as I could for a distinct intelligence to the subject, the plan which it is the principle object of these letters to suggest, for commencing, at least, the prosecution of popular education. It will appear that it involves no taxation by the legislature, since the necessary ways and means are actually at our disposal. It wholly waves the creation of all that vast capital, which from the example of other states, has been thought indispensable before we could begin to move. In all its provisions and details it imposes no compulsion, should there be any counties of the state who might choose

to decline its offers. It proposes to influence only by conviction of its benefits, and the value of its advantages, relying on the attractions with which, when fully developed, it will win all to the knowledge of its excellence, and the adoption of it in practice.

        High time to devise some means of popular education.

        That it is high time for us, for the whole people of North Carolina, to look with more intentness than ever upon the subject of popular education, and to devise the means of it, is a sentiment in which surely most of us if not all will cordially concur. It claims from every man, especially from every head of a family, faithful and dispassionate consideration. How can it be otherwise than that a deep impression must be felt in the mind of every considerate man, of its indispensable necessity to a people who have remained to this late period destitute of its privileges. Our country presents to ourselves and to the world the spectacle of a strange abstraction from light and knowledge, impenetrable to their beams, while they are falling upon her externally with the meridian splendor of science, religion and the arts. Can anyone who feels toward her any affectionate desire, who wishes for her respectability, who would see her raised out of intellectual dark ness and desolation that hovers over her and settles with pervasion through the minds of her offspring, fail to be impressed with a conviction that we can no longer postpone the day of action upon the subject?

        No time in the future likely to be better to begin this work.

        Shall we still plead that our physical ability is inadequate; that we possess not the means? To what distant period then are we to look, in what more auspicious condition must we be placed, to be conscious of strength enough to set forth in the attempt? What future prosperity of growth is in our prospect, which shall take from us all excuse of delay, and dispossess the spirit of supineness that reigns in our bosoms, of the sceptre which by its torporific touch benumbs all our faculties? We are a nation in all the vigor of early manhood. If the sound of war ever reaches our ears, it is not to afflict or even to threaten

us with its ravages, but only to remind us that through forty seven years of peace out of the last fifty of our existence, we have continued under the fostering care and protecting shield of a kind Providence, in the full opportunity of growing prosperity in our worldly condition. No taxation has weighed heavily upon us. We glory in the energies infused in the heart, the muscles, and the sinews of our popular system, by the plastic force of civil liberty. A comparison with others in power and privileges would flush our cheek with disdain and indignation. We have a country inferior to none of the original states in soil; in climate it is far superior to most, in the mildness of its winters, in the diversity of its productions, and in the renovation of its crops. In the midst of these sources of wealth and opportunity, our children are left to grow up unpruned and uncultivated as the forest of the brake which the hand of our industry has never touched. This continues to the present hour, while it implies an almost total exclusion of knowledge, like the opacity of incarcerating walls, in the last and most enlightened age of the world.

        Before closing this letter, I shall present a practical statement which cannot but make a deep impression of the importance of popular education, and of providing for the diffusion of it without loss of time. It is extracted from a report of the managers of the school society in the City of New York.

        Wealth is found in proportion to education.

        "National wealth proceeds chiefly from activity of mind, and must therefore be proportioned to the extent and universality of its development. It appears by the statement of Baron Dupin that in some parts of France, those who are educated are one-tenth in others one twentieth, in others only one two hundred and thirty ninth of the whole population, and that the national revenue from these districts is nearly in corresponding ratios."

        Other advantages besides increased wealth.

        But it is not in material productions or pecuniary wealth only that education displays its most estimable effects in the employments of the understanding, in the virtues of

the heart, in the effects of these upon the energies and resources of the state in elevating, purifying, and enriching the enjoyments of life, and in training it by an enlightened piety for heaven, are to be seen in its most signal and sublime influences.

                         Culture's hand
                         Has scattered verdure o'er the land;
                         And smiles and fragrance rule serene,
                         Where barren wilds usurped the scene.
                         And such is man--a soil which breeds
                         Or sweetest flowers, or vilest weeds;
                         Flowers lovely as the morning light,
                         Weeds deadly as the aconite;
                         Just as his heart is trained to bear
                         The poisonous weed, or floweret fair."

I am, fellow citizens,
Your obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER VIII.

Fellow citizens,

        Education necessary to prepare any one to teach.

        It is no new or singular opinion of mine, as I have already shown that education is necessary to prepare men for the school master's profession, as the lawyer, the physician, the mariner, the cabinet maker, and men of other professions are trained with much application to their several employments. Of this we should all certainly be convinced, could we become minutely acquainted with the methods of instruction, in their present state of improvement, and in the perfection they have attained. If knowledge of these has not yet reached us, it is with difficulty that we shall realize their extent, or estimate their merits. They are to be seen in the various objects upon which the labors of the teacher are directed, the means proved by past experience to combine the greatest efficacy, and the

feelings, dispositions, and principles to be sustained in himself, and established in the bosoms and habits of his pupils.

        Were all these actually exhibited in the order and time requisite for their practice, they would afford an explanation more lucid, and impress us with proof more conclusive, than all that could be said upon the subject, though we should listen with unfailing patience to the most luminous details. Such exhibitions are unhappily inaccessible to most, if not all of us. No interests that concern us as individuals, and in our national character we may confidently affirm, are in importance compared with this.

        That the education of the young consists in learning to write, read, and cypher, and in these only is a common and pernicious error. Were this opinion correct, no institution would be necessary to qualify men for the business of instruction. It would be to swell the machinery beyond all proportion to the little purposes to be affected.

        The true aim of teaching.

        If we look no further than these it is an admitted impossibility to show valid reasons for the necessity of the apparatus which men of the first authority have pronounced indispensable to elementary education. To govern and maintain order in such schools is an additional talent, but though this were included, we would still fall immensely short of the ends affected by the present modes of instruction. They conspicuously relate to the elicitation of thought and the enlargement of the faculties with aptness and variety; to the discipline of the affections, to the principles and habits of action, to the knowledge to be selected and reposited in the minds of the young. Hundreds are able to read a book, to perform the mechanical operation of writing even handsomely, and to solve all the questions of arithmetic, but not one in a hundred is qualified to act upon the hearts and minds of the children, and mould them in the true principles of personal virtue and social intercourse. The man who has not learned to unite

both the mechanical and the moral, in the whole selection, order, and spirit of a system as comprehensive as it can be made, not by suggestion of his own mind only, but by the ingenuity, experience, and wisdom of others, is deficient in the talents which every master ought to possess, and which by the opportunities of a well constituted central school it is easy to furnish.

        Present methods of good teaching.

        Reading, spelling, writing, arithmetic, and geography, constitute the basis of modern education in primary schools. The system is now left in this unhappy and unquestionable figure of a mere skeleton. Nor is it left to cover itself with flesh and features as accident shall direct, according to the fatal influences of companionship, or the crude notions of one who has dropped into the profession of an instructor, cut of the accidents of life, perhaps out of it vices, weaknesses and follies and irregularities. Fulness and proportion have been given to the system. In the maturity of its growth it is presented to us with graceful outlines, the interesting expression of benevolence and good sense, healthful complexion and compactness of constitution, to fix at once our confidence and admiration. The essential subjects of art and intelligence in the education of a child are incorporated and intermingled throughout, with the best moral influence that should reign in the heart, illuminate the features and give its own proofs of inward reality by the optward action.

        By the later improvements, celebrity is gained in the acquirement of the physical part of education. Variety and extent of information are increased. Promptness, force, and aptness of skill in the use of the faculties are acquired. Interest and pleasure and not necessity, are made the inspiring and animating motives. These we shall admit are high recommendations. But to these are superadded others of most eminent value, without which too many proofs exist that education is a "curse instead of a blessing." It is the watchful and incessant study of

an instructer to reform the affections and mould them to their true standard. The government of the passions becomes habitual in the converse of the school. It is made as distinctly an object to repress selfishness, impatience and insolence, as it is to communicate the knowledge of the rule of three or practice in arithmetic. The virtues are kept steadily in view in all that is said or done. They are held up prominently to the eye of the pupil by examples and in impressive and brief narratives, in small books admirably composed and compiled for the purpose. Faults and vices of mind and conduct are set forth conspicuously, as they occur in the subjects taught, or in the feelings and actions of the child, in a manner to convince him that it is not to wound and mortify, and to indulge in a spirit of crimination or irritability, but to show him his errors, their unhappy effects upon his habits and his happiness, to infuse into his bosom the feelings of equity and complacency, to captivate him with the virtues for their excellence, and for the richness of their fruits, inspire detestation of vice for its hideousness, and its odious effects upon himself as well as others.

        The course of study broader than formerly.

        In the education of popular schools matured and perfected as it now is, are combined the acquisition of art and knowledge, the formation of moral character, and the invigoration of the faculties. The progress of the scholar in one of these branches only, the arts of reading, penmanship and numbers is pushed to far greater extent in the same compass of time than under the old system. But both the others are simultaneous accompaniments that elevate the character and enhance the value of education, investing it with an aspect and excellence of a far superior order. Even the amusements of children are included among the objects of the teacher. While he studies to make them interesting, they are directed to the innocent and humane feeling, the exclusion of vicious and impure motives, and to the most salutary exercises of the limbs and muscles. Modes of influence and control in the whole conduct of

business have especially been consulted, which render severity of punishment unnecessary, secure diligence by the delights of variety, by seasonable changes in the subjects, by exemplifications for illustrating them, by emulation without envy, by curiosity, by reason, by dexterity, by accuracy in order and movement at the word of command. The child thus taught takes pleasure in the school, is unwilling to stay away, becomes intent upon its occupations and the interests they excite. All this is associated with the best dispositions, the preference of the virtues, a rejection of bad principles and hateful feelings, the love of the master, kindness, deference, and obedience to parents, and good will in intercourse with all. Here is no gloom settled upon the mind and clouding the brow from apprehension of stern vigorance, or impending punishment, no oppressive weariness from unchanged posture for many hours, and unvaried subject of study for successive days. In schools such as those of which I speak, it must follow that more of everything will be required. The heart of the pupil will be imbued with virtuous principles and amiable qualities. He will be prepared for action in all the relations of life and in social intercourse in love of industry, cheerfulness of disposition, order of business, quickness of thought, alacrity in action, and fertility of resources.

        Many ignorant of the recent progress in education.

        Some will probably doubt of the reality of such improvements, and whether all these splendid results in primary schools are attainable. In this incredulity most men would have concurred, even at the close of the last century. But since that period scarcely any art has advanced with more rapid march to eminence than elementary education. The present age is replete with proof that is not safe to imagine or to pronounce what is possible in improvements in any department of knowledge or practice. Had we been told at a period not far remote, that it was practicable to travel fifty miles an hour on land; that a single

horse could carry from ten to fifty tons on level ground; that the time would come when men could mount into the region of the clouds, and descend into neighboring countries; that methods might be contrived for diving to the bottom of the sea, and for carrying on submarine labors and discoveries, what would have appeared more incredible, and yet we well know that all these are practicable realities.

        Some may question the possibility of determining the distance and size of the sun, moon, and planets, their motions and exact places during the whole long tract of time assigned for their existence; yet to the mind most tenacious of doubt on the perfection to which science has attained on these subjects, the prediction of eclipses and of the reappearance of some comets must enforce an admissibility scarcely to be questioned.

        And why should we be sceptical respecting the improvement in the methods of education more than in those for effecting other purposes? Fixing our eye distinctly upon each of these, may not a faithful and practiced ingenuity invent and arrange means peculiarly and powerfully fitted to accomplish them all?

        It can not surely be that teaching alone has not lately made improvement.

        That an end more important than the best education of the young, cannot be placed before the human mind, the very attempt to prove to any man would be an impeachment of his understanding and his heart. Let us be assured that the profession of a teacher has not, among all the arts and professions of civilized society, remained without improvements so various and so apt in their connection and agency, as to be complicated and powerful in the production of their effects. We may now avail ourselves of the very circumstance of this elevated advancement in the system, in its operative powers, and in the quality of its fruits to excite an interest and an avidity in every bosom which will ensure a diffusion of it through the country, by the facilities which it is in the power of the

Legislature to afford for its dissemination among the people.

        What the central school will do.

        These ends will be accomplished by a central school under the tuition of a man fitted by his dispositions, his virtues, his knowledge of the most approved methods of primary education, and his address acquired in their practical application. A body of counsellors in a board of education appointed by the Legislature will at once sustain him in the functions of his office, and act as the medium of communication with that body, and the link binding him by the necessary responsibility. This institution will furnish an educational corps, augmenting from year to year, to be called into action as fast as their numbers can be increased. An analogy may be perhaps seen in the corps of civil engineers educated in the military academy at West Point, the members of which are incessantly called into active employment on plans of internal improvement through the different States of the union. The education of schoolmasters can never terminate ineffectually. Whenever we shall adopt any scheme of popular education, let it be what it may, it can never be carried into successful operation, without the supply of professional men properly trained to their vocation.

I am, fellow citizens,
Your obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER IX.

Fellow Citizens,

        Humanity pained to behold ignorance.

        To the man who enjoys the privileges of education, and is humanized by its influence, no prospect can be more painful than that of a people destitute of its opportunities. It has ever been the object of tyrants to keep their subjects in ignorance and blind them with superstition. A man may desire the same thing from other motives which the tyrant desires for security to his power. "He may wish

all mankind to remain in ignorance of important truths, when the most important truths that could be revealed to them, were to be the discovery of any other genius than his own. When a statue had been erected by his fellow citizens of Thasos to Theagenes, a celebrated victor in the public games of Greece, we are told that it excited so strongly the envious hatred of one of his rivals, that he went to it every night, and endeavoured to throw it down by repeated blows, till at last unfortunately successful, he was able to move it from its pedestal and was crushed to death beneath it on its fall. This, if we consider the self-consuming misery of envy, is truly what happens to every envious man. He may perhaps throw down his rival's glory; but he is crushed in his whole soul, beneath the glory which he overturns.

        Tyrants dread popular education.

        "The monarch may dread popular education, on account of the light which it sheds into the national mind respecting the great objects of civil government, and the abuses of power. The republican too, may regard with malignant eye the diffusion of knowledge among the people, if he apprehends that it will impair his own influence, or threaten his comparative estimation in the community. To the sincere and enlightened patriot, it is of no consequence whether the equal rights of his fellow citizens are secured and her popular institutions promoted in connection with his own personal aggrandizement, or by the knowledge and the abilities of others around him. Let the ambitious citizen, who resists the diffusion of education and mental culture, or fails to propagate them throughout the whole population of the State till they reach the utmost extremities, beware lest he be found chargeable with promoting the same cause among the people, as is dearest to the heart of the despot, who sees in their illumination the overthrow of his selfish and capricious sway.

        The education of the people necessary to preserve our social institutions.

        "A government like ours, which guarantees equal representation and taxation, trial by jury, the freedom of

speech, and of the press, of religious opinion and profession, not only depends for its energy and action but for its very existence upon the will of the people. And are the rights of mankind and the obligations of civil society, generally, understood or respected by the ignorant? Has property, or reputation, or life, when left to depend upon the wisdom of ignorance or the forbearance of passion, ever been accounted safe? And where is human character usually found the most degraded and debased? Is it where schools and the means of education abound, and where the light of knowledge never illumined the human intellect? If then, the habits, notions and actions of men, which naturally result from the ignorance of letters, from the force of superstition, and the blind impulses of passion, are utterly incompatible with a rational liberty, and every way hostile to the political institutions of freedom, how high and imperious is the duty upon us, living under a government of the freest of the free, a government whose action and being depend upon the popular will, to seek every constitutional means to enlighten, and chasten, and purify that will? How shall we justify it to ourselves and to the world, if we do not employ the means in our power in order to free it from the severe bondage of ignorance and passion, and place it under the mild control of wisdom and reason?"

        These are the sentiments of a committee of congress in their report on popular education in the year eighteen hundred and twenty-six. They are cardinal truths upon which the security and success of every free government must forever rest. The education of which we speak is not that of academies and colleges. The numbers trained in these institutions must be comparatively small. They are absolutely indispensable to fillup up certain departments of service for the complete organization of a State. As well might we think to leave out some of the wheels of a clock, as to omit them from the constitution of society.

As few, however, are required in comparison with the whole population, to fulfill the purposes to which they must necessarily be provided, so it is but few who are in circumstances to bear the expenses of education so extensive. The wisdom of Providence is exhibited, in making the supply coextensive with the demand. The man who thinks they are unnecessary has need to learn yet the first rudiments of civil society.

        Can only address the educated.

        But the education which is exclusively the subject of these letters, is derived from primary schools, such as have already been described in the best perfection they can attain, both moral and physical. All that I have said or can say is to the educated only, since access to one who knows not letters is closed against this, as well as all else that issues from the press. He may indeed "hear of it by the hearing of the ear," but it will be to him as a distant and confused sound, the import of which he can little estimate.

        The helplessness of ignorance.

        Let us place up to the eye for our consideration the thousands, may I not say the hundred thousands of people, old and young, that cannot read. With this prospect under our view a little time only, could we convey in competent expressions the reflections which it would excite in our bosoms? A wilderness of minds springing into life, and advancing through its tract of years, untaught, untutored, groping their way in darkness, except where a few rays break in upon them from the floating information of the time.

        Social conditions which ignorance brings about.

        Let us look into the dwelling of many a family, into which a book has never entered. A throng of children is presently before us. They are growing up in all the wilderness of nature. Their expression is marked with no traits of gentleness or the mild affections to engage the eye; no lineaments denoting intelligence made interesting with variety of thought. An inquisitive and wondering gaze indicates that the emotions and ideas excited in them are

vague and indefinable. The indurated muscles and sharpened features, manifest the want of a humanizing influence within. The veins swell not with a free and expanding flow, illumined and sweetened by the genial and diversified actions of the heart. How shall it be otherwise, since no culture of the mind, or the affections has ever softened the original asperity of nature, and the countenance is the index of the few accidental thoughts and unmitigated dispositions that reign within? No system appears in the household of a mother, who in like manner was cast upon existence without a moulding or directing hand. She too was left to take the path which might offer to an eye untaught to discriminate, and to pursue it whithersoever its random course might lead. To her offspring she has imparted life. Her instincts have impelled to her to appease the cravings of their appetite, and to guard them from instant danger. The father has never been qualified to teach his children, or train them to a system of principles and conduct. He too was destitute of the knowledge requisite for their instruction, himself having never learned. In the rising race no respect for parents appears; no affectionate regard for their warning voice. No control of the passions is discoverable in words or actions, no self-denial, no quick compliance with the directions of a mother, nor of a father, unless from apprehended wrath which may burst into an incalculable storm. Who of us has not observed in the children of such circumstances, a ferocity and uncertainty at which the spectator recoils with indefinable apprehension for the consequences. Their motives to action are the feelings of the moment. These succeed each other with caprice unchastened by a wisdom which knows their native and growing violence. Their menacing impulses strike the ear from any chord in all the wide diapason of the passions. Even in their sports a jarring and discordant harshness is felt with sensations at once painful and portentious. Their resentments give

evidence of revenge conceived, repressed perhaps by the fear of a power to revenge with superior force. In grief or joy, extremes still predominate, marked with sullen depression or violent transport. In intercourse they are gregarious rather than social. To strangers they look with suspicion; perhaps they fly with panic, suggesting anew whether Hobbes may not have been right in his inhuman doctrine, that "a state of nature is a state of war." To infant minds placed in the moral desert, no God occurs as the creator of the world, the disposer of events, an object of reverence, gratitude, love, obedience, or fear. Dismal superstitions crowd their thoughts of an invisible world. Witchcraft and wandering ghosts often fill their conversations with horror and their bosoms with dismay. Conscience knows not its proper office, and becomes hardened in insensibility, after being long ridiculed for its superstitious fears. The true God is scarcely known to them as their heavenly Father, whose presence may encourage them in goodness, deter them from evil, and console them in distress. No Saviour is understood in his proper character, radiant with the beams of mercy. No gospel of peace can find access into the bosom of one who cannot read its messages of grace, and who is surrounded by others equally excluded from them. No Spirit is known as a monitor of good, to soften the flinty heart, to dissolve it in the penitence of guilt, to enamour it with the beauties and glories of the divine nature, and assimilate it to the pure and blissful atmosphere of the skies. To one thus destitute of opportunity and education, heaven is out of sight, and hell but a note in language, to which his voice and his ear have been turned to give force to folly, or to vent the violence of the passions.

        To some this may appear an overwrought picture of the consequences resulting from the want of education. These, however, are its proper fruits, and will be found exhibited in fact in portions of the country, where most of the population

have long been destitute of knowledge with its enlightening and meliorating influences. To such issues human nature tends when wholly left to itself. Doubtless numbers exist, who, ignorant of letters, with minds never opened by information and moral improvements, are amiable in intercourse, and of high worth as members of society. From the influence of vicinage, and a peculiar action of circumstances, they have retained much perhaps of the primitive stock from which they have descended, or by the attractions of surrounding excellence, they have framed themselves to its habits by the example of a well instructed and virtuous community. It is happy for them, that though without knowledge themselves, they enjoy many of its blessings, intermingled as they are with others who diffuse around them its genial and elevating force.

        The darkest crimes spring from ignorance.

        It has long been ascertained, that from the uneducated part of a people offenders of the darkest hue come forth to fix the eye of society upon their deep depravity, and the enormity of their crimes. This has been confirmed by the concurring observation of judges and barristers, who have been attentive to the subject, both in Europe and America. Exceptions will certainly occur, and especially in communities where education has consisted merely in the mechanical processes of learning to read and write and cypher, with no moral influence upon the heart, but such as perverts and hardens it. This but illustrates and evinces the importance of reforming education itself, lest it prove a culture productive of briers and thorns, instead of fruits and harvests.

Yours most respectfully,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER X.

Fellow Citizens,

        Value of even a little education.

        The picture of families placed either by circumstances or choice beyond the reach of education, cannot but be

painful to every humane and considerate bosom. It seemed necessary to dwell upon it, that the importance of the subject may be adequately felt.

        Among such as have enjoyed the privileges of a very limited education only, what multitudes of minds have risen up by the energies of native genius, broken away from the shackles of narrow circumstances, placed their names high on the rolls of eminence, blessed their country with the fruits of their enterprise and even enriched the world with their productions. Among the children of our own State, hundreds if not thousands may exist, in whose bosoms God has implanted susceptibilities of distinguished virtue, and high capacities of usefulness.

                         The marble buried in its native mines,
                         Conceals the beauty of its clouds and lines;
                         The sculptor's polish can each feature give,
                         And even make the rugged marble live.
                         Thus genius in the night of darkness born,
                         May wind unnoticed her resounding horn.
                         Like the stout traveller straying from his course,
                         She errs the more from her exhaustless force.
                         Young Edwin wandered in his native dell,
                         And woke the music of his simple shell.
                         With morning dawn he left his lowly shed,
                         And led in wonder, sought the mountain head,
                         His thoughtful mind unlettered would explore,
                         And muse in sadness that he knew no more.
                         At length a stranger to his longing eyes,
                         Bade the bright visions of the world arise;
                         To his attention all his lore expressed,
                         And roused the genius kindled in his breast.

        Talents hidden away from lack of opportunity.

        Who can tell the talent that lies buried in all that multitude of minds, which for want of education must sink back into existence, unproductive and unknown? Who can conjecture how much there may be of glowing ardor which, promoted into action, might soar to loftiest flights,

or penetrate with keenest scrutiny into the secrets of nature; would decorate life with fairest ornaments, or save our country in the critical hour; might diffuse happiness through society by deeds of benevolence, unite their fellow men in its enterprise, or propagate truth and virtue around them like the waves that enlarge their circles on the lake? How many are there who may be formed with qualities to shine with the most beautiful tints, and the brightest lustre. How many, who with powers elicited, might adorn their country with fabrics of beauty, of comfort, of taste and health, and high enjoyment? Who of us can tell but that in the bosom of some obscure little cottager there lives a spark which once kindled into a flame, might enlighten and warm the universe? Of such as these generations have already existed upon our soil, and disappeared beneath its surface as though they had never been. They were presented to us by Providence with a munificent hand.

        Quotes Gray's Elegy.

                         "But knowledge to their eyes, her ample page,
                         Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll;
                         Chill penury repressed their noble rage,
                         And froze the genial current of the soul.

                         "Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast
                         The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
                         Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
                         Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.

                         "The applause of list'ning senates to command,
                         The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
                         To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
                         And read their history in a nation's eyes."

        Condition of other countries.

        The literary production of other States, the inventions and enterprises of their people, show how large a proportion of genius is educed out of obscurity and inaction, and made efficacious, where the stimulating and expanding

influences of education are universally felt. Just as large a proportion would become conspicuous here, could each rising generation enjoy the same privileges.

        We provide for the animal part of children; not the spiritual.

        We occupy a soil ample in extent. Our toils are perpetuated to render it productive. Our families are spreading themselves more extensive over the surface. With strenuous effort and incessant cares we make provisions for their animal subsistence, but their minds are left to starve and dwindle. Their intellect languishes, and the value of their being is principally known through the appetites and passions. And is it possible for any man to believe that our happiness and the greatest excellence of our nature properly consist in mere animal pleasures? Are these the proper objects of creatures made superior to the brutes, and endowed with powers of indefinite improvement? Even a single individual left to himself naturally grows in thoughts and resources. By communication with a few his knowledge becomes increased. But how contracted must be that man's information, who has been limited to the suggestions of his own mind, whose range of view has been circumscribed to a few miles around a single spot, and whose intercourse with his fellow men has been but little more extensive.

        This must be for the most part the condition of such as have never learned to read. It is when the thoughts, the discoveries, the resources, the different circumstances of men over the face of the earth, and their inventions in the arts, are treasured up in the most valuable publications, and their virtues and vices, their original disadvantages, and their methods of conquering difficulties, of extracting good out of evil, of converting the unformed and irregular materials of nature into powerful means of utility, wealth and enjoyment, that any single mind can know the little it can effect by its own individual powers, compared with the vastness of what it is to accomplish by the combined ingenuity and activity of our race through different nations

and successive periods of time. The information we gain by the ear and the eye only, is limited to what we think as individuals, and the few with whom we converse. The knowledge we acquire by the press is commensurate with the world.

        Let us use all moral and physical power to bring light to the people.

        Shall it not be our first and glorious purpose, upon which all our powers moral and physical, shall be directed to break down the walls that shut in our people from the light of day? Can a greater work be achieved than to disperse the darkness through which the hundred thousand infant minds in our State are groping their way into existence, and which without our steadfast resolve and united action, must continue to enshroud them through the whole of life? To their offspring too, without an effort, it must descend with the inheritance of their estates through succeeding generations. It is for you, in whom are the springs of power, to connect with your own names the merit and the lustre of this achievment. Time will soon snatch from you the opportunity of appropriating it to yourselves. Commence the work and a new era is marked in the history of our State and in the career of its prosperity and character through future time. In providing for the education of the people by some plan within our power with wisdom and perseverance, nothing can be questionable. The subject speaks for itself. To neglect it, especially at the present day, and in the present condition of our country, can scarcely fail to carry an emotion of revolt if not painful reprehension into the secret bosom of every considerate man. Let us advance to the subject with confidence that some plan is within our power, to which no longer time is necessary than for digesting its operations and arranging its order. Placing our eye upon the purpose, and believing that what has been done by so many others may be done by us, we shall discover the means we can enlist for its accomplishment. Men know not their own powers and energies till they put them forth

into action. Parental affection, benevolence, patriotism, the interest of every individual, viewed with a reflective eye, all unite in urging upon us the imperious call which sounds in our ears from every hamlet, town, neighborhood, family, and from the remotest recesses of the State. Interwoven with the obligation to protect life, liberty, and property, is the right of successive generations to the instruction and discipline essential to their perpetuity and substantial enjoyment.

                         "This sacred right is fruitlessly announced,
                         This universal plan in vain addressed,
                         To eyes and ears of parents, who themselves
                         Did in the time of their necessity
                         Urge it in vain; and therefore like a prayer
                         That from the humblest roof ascends to heaven,
                         It mounts to reach the State's parental ear;
                         Who, if indeed she own a mother's heart,
                         And be not most unfeelingly devoid,
                         Of gratitude to Providence, will grant
                         The unquestionable boon.
                         "So shall licentiousness and black resolve
                         Be rooted out, and virtuous habits take
                         Their place and genuine piety descend,
                         Like an inheritance from age to age."

I am, fellow citizens,
Your very obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

LETTER XI.

Fellow Citizens,

        The University could not take the place of a central school for teachers.

        In two or three well written pieces published some time since in one of the weekly prints, after proposing a law for borrowing funds necessary for the provision of schools for the State, the writer recommended to prepare teachers for such schools, by availing ourselves of our university,

for their education. It is possible that some may be of the opinion that by these means the establishment of a central school and the expense of its maintenance may be superseded.

        Before closing these letters I would crave your indulgence while a few considerations are presented to evince the inexpediency of this mode of institution.

        College education spoils a youth for primary teaching.

        The system of education in colleges is modelled for forming their members to the liberal professions, or to literary or scientific occupations upon the largest scale. The education of grammar schools is framed with reference to these special ulterior attainments. To prepare and qualify a man for the arts and methods of primary schools is so entirely different in its nature, that no course of studies and employments can be fitted for both. This is so eminently true, especially in our own present state of society, that to educate a young man in a college, is to disqualify him almost with certainty for the permanent business of an elementary schoolmaster. The liberal professions, and the tuition of grammar schools, are open to all who have collegiate education, and talent largely cultivated is ever in demand, incessantly growing with the growth of our population. Society is made up of all professions, that by combination every individual may be readily supplied at will with all that is desirable for his convenience or his necessities, in the greatest perfection and upon the best terms. Hence the division of labor among carpenters, smiths, merchants, farmers, masons, lawyers, literati, miners, cabinet makers, ministers of the gospel, physicians and others. It is a received principle in common life, that the education of a youth for some of these professions, would not qualify but unfit him for others. If a youth be destined to the business of a shoemaker, it would be absurd to teach him the art of making wagon wheels. Nay even if we would have him to be a

carpenter, we should not place him as an apprentice to one who makes sideboards and bureaus. If he is to be a millwright we do not teach him to make watches. To educate a youth in a college is to spoil him for the occupation of a primary schoolmaster. After having prepared him in this manner, a far greater difficulty still remains, and it is of our own creation. It consists in restricting him for the business for which he is intended. He will soon be tired of being an abcedarian, if he can teach Virgil and Homer, or hope for distinction in one of the liberal professions. His tastes, his desires, his habits, the scope of his mind, his expense and modes of living, have been formed entirely at a variance with the ends proposed.

        To be eminently successful in his business, he must be happy in it, and this is impossible if appetites and enjoyments be established in him, which circumstances different from those of his occupation, alone can gratify. No man is most efficient in that which he is able to do, whose secret bosom is discontented with his condition, hankering for what he deems the privileges of another for which he is no less qualified.

        The plan of the central school tries to provide schoolmasters for life; this could not be done in another school.

        It enters as an essential part into the system here proposed, that the men who are taught in the central school shall be professionally schoolmasters for life. If we educate them in academies and colleges, no restrictive obligations could permanently hold them to this vocation, except such of their number as were of the lowest rank in ability. We should put them into the college, candidates for the profession of schoolmasters, and through the influence of association, and doubtless of persuasion, if they really possessed the capacities for which they had been selected out of the community from which they came they would come out with their eye directed upon what a new taste would teach them to estimate as higher prospects. The views and habits of such men as we wish, should be of substantial utility and worth, and entirely fit them for their

proper business in its peculiar forms, and principles, and ends. In colleges, much if not a greater part is taught, which is wholly aside from these, incurring the consequence of much time lost, and expenditure of funds upon misdirected discipline, which to them and to us are of principal value. If to these considerations, enough surely to determine us upon this point, we add another which is inevitable, that the expenses of collegiate education must be far greater than in a central school, a resort to such a mode of preparing teachers for primary schools, cannot but appear ineligible, and wholly to be discarded.

        The influence of education on society.

        To some of us it may still appear strange that a supply of schoolmasters in the numbers and with the discipline here implied, should be thought so necessary as to call for popular and legislative action. Let us reflect then that man is a being susceptible of a variety of character, which to us is infinite, nor is it possible to estimate the force of education in moulding him to these diversities. The nations of the earth are distinguished from one another by characteristics no less striking than the contrasts and singularities of individuals most dissimilar. Their disparities are seen in manners, customs, institutions, religion, government, laws, and modes of life and intercourse. For these differences they are indebted to the circumstances in which they originally commenced their history, and to the events and complicated influences, moral and physical, which have modified their career. These have constituted the basis of education to the individuals who compose them, and when their several characters have become established, it is by education that it is perpetuated or changed. By this every rising generation embibes the sentiments, imitates the habits, and transmits the distinctions derived from its predecessors. Would you alter the character of a whole people? It cannot be done but by educating their springing progeny to the system you would prefer. Would you make them unchangeable?

They must be trained from infancy to the opinions and habits of their forefathers with the overflowing current of time. Would you prepare a people never accustomed to popular government, for living under a republican constitution? Reconcile them to place their children universally under the tuition of freemen who, in the office of school masters, will wisely and faithfully conduct their education to such an issue, and if there be any method of accomplishing your wishes it is this. Do any of us admire, as we will regret, that the southern republics of our own continent cannot advance, with constancy, and prosperity, in the same career of rational liberty as ourselves? The solution is seen in the education which forms their children and youth not to the customs and opinions of civil freedom in the exercise of the elective franchise, but to such as are incompatible with it. The invincible laws of nature are now instructing them in the arts of freedom. If they listen not to her precepts, and submit not to her discipline, these laws know no change, and success is hopeless. How would you insure their speediest attainment of the inestimable boon? The scheme is visionary, but the end would be effected, could you furnish and secure a reception among them of a competent body of well qualified and faithful school masters, into whose hands the whole education of their children should be spontaneously and unreservedly committed.

        Were it an object to bring European nations to live in tranquility under civil constitutions like our own, the same process, were it practicable, would assure the same result. Manners are formed, and predilections most steadfastly fixed, while the young are growing from infancy to manhood. The triteness of a proverb is its commendation, and it is one which has been universally sanctioned since its first happy expression by the poet:

                         " 'Tis education forms the common mind,
                         Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined."

        Missionaries depend on the work of the schoolmaster.

        What means have the missionaries of the cross found most effectual, after all the trials which these devoted men have made for evangelizing heathen nations, and for the abolition of idolatry with its inveterate corruptions and cruelties? All other methods they have learned to relinquish in despair, and to depend exclusively on the agency of the schoolmaster to extirpate the bitter roots of paganism, and sow the seeds of christian civilization.

        To this human nature is known to yield, though intrenched in prejudices once deemed invincible, and girded with prescription as with armour of proof. This has proved a line of length and power to reach even the Hotentot, and the New Zealander, in the dark caverns of their brutality, and restore them to the primitive distinctions and glories of humanity, from which they seemed to have once sunk to an irrevocable depth. Would we then secure the best enjoyment, and most assured permanency to our free institutions, and to the people in their richest fruits, it must be effected by the power of education in the hands of those who themselves have well learned, and will faithfully administer it, upon its proper principles.

I am, fellow citizens,
Your very obedient servant,

J. CALDWELL.

1833

• 1. CAUSES WHICH RETARD SCHOOLS.
• 2. THE CAUSE OF EMIGRATION.
• 3. VALUATION OF PROPERTY AND TAXES ASSESSED, 1833.
• 4. COST OF PUBLIC PRINTING 1814-1833.
• 5. STOCK IN BANKS OWNED BY LITERARY FUND.
• 6. USE OF LITERARY FUND.
• 7. VALUATION OF PROPERTY AND TAXATION, 1815 AND 1833.
• 8. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS.
• 9. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 10. GOV. SWAIN'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.
• 11. WHY SCHOOLS WERE NOT ESTABLISHED.
• 12. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.
• 13. REPORT AND RESOLUTION OF COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION.
• 14. OBJECTION TO CHARTERING DENOMINATIONAL SCHOOLS.
• 15. "OLD FIELD" ON THE NECESSITY FOR SCHOOLS.

1. CAUSES WHICH RETARD SCHOOLS.

        Mr. Hinton, from the Joint Select Committee on Internal Improvement, submitted the following Report:

        The Joint Select Committee to whom was referred the Memorial of the Convention on Internal Improvement, have had the same under consideraton, and respectfully submit the following Report:

        Advantages of internal improvements.

        Thrift of other States lacking; intellectual progress retarded by poverty.

        They concur in the feelings and sentiments expressed by the memorialists, and believe that an economical system of Internal Improvements would promote the interest and elevate the character of North Carolina. With a fertile soil and a climate adapted to a great variety of valuable productions, with mineral resources entirely unequalled in any other portion of the continent, with an industrious and intelligent population, the State has lagged behind her sisters in everything calculated to increase the happiness of the people or to throw a lustre on our institutions. At present, there is not a single class of citizens, which can be considered in a prosperous condition. A few are wealthy, and many are in comfortable circumstances; but the thrift displayed by other States is not visible in our borders, improvement in agriculture and mechanic arts is not even attempted, and intellectual advancement is retarded by poverty and listlessness.

        No good markets of easy access.

        North Carolina people can not compete with other markets.

        Example of other States.

        No section of the State enjoys a cheap and easy access to a good market. If the labors of the planter are blessed with a rich return, his profits are consumed by the time and expense of getting his crop to the merchant. In summer our rivers are too shallow for the smallest craft, and when swelled with rains of winter, they are dangerous and uncertain in their navigation; so that the farmer is constrained to the expensive and wearisome transportation practised by our forefathers. The cost of this mode, in comparison with artificial means, (as canals and railroads,) the committee are unable to estimate; they can

only refer the General Assembly to the experience of other countries, and a few facts, far more instructive and eloquent than their own theories. The Eastern part of North Carolina is supplied with flour from the neighborhood of Lake Erie. When this country was a wilderness, that market was furnished by the farmers of James River and the more western counties, and the change must be attributed to the canal of New York. If similar works were constructed in this State, not only would the northern article be driven out of use, but our produce would compete with the New Yorker in the foreign market. The same market will apply to other agricultural productions. Our soil is as good as that of the north, our climate much better, and our people as intelligent as their northern brethren. It then appears that the sum paid by the inhabitant of North Carolina, for reaching a place of sale, is not expended by the citizen of other States. This must inevitably create a disproportion in the relative profits of industry, and cause a wide difference in the aspect of the opposite sections of country. But it has been said that the State is poor, and that her population is too scattered to sustain costly works. To this, it may be answered, that the western and Northern canals have frequently traversed regions less populous than ours, and less productive. They kept the youth of the country from emigration, and the facility of obtaining a ready market brought into existence thousands of fine farms and laid the foundation of many flourishing villages. But the committee need not dwell on the advantages of artificial means of internal communication. The splendid results which have followed the bold enterprise of the other States, are well known, and will have their due weight with the Legislature.

        Home markets should be encouraged by direct trade to our own harbors.

        Another object of Internal Improvement should be steadily kept in view, to wit: the building up of cities and towns in our territory. The committee do not attack the freedom of trade. The people should be allowed to carry

their produce where the best price can be obtained, whither they are led by feeling and inclination. But there is a great difference between the privilege of unrestricted commerce, and the conferring of advantages on foreign markets. While the one should be cheerfully granted the other should be proudly banished from our Legislation. The anxiety of towns in neighboring States to get possession of our trade, proves its value and importance. The gain arising from the purchase of our products, and the furnishing our people with the necessaries and luxuries of life, must be large, and if possible should be kept in our own State and enjoyed by our own citizens. There are ports and harbours in North Carolina, equal, if not superior in many respects, to those of Virginia and South Carolina; and if a system of Internal Improvement be commenced, to these points our trade should be directed. Such a policy is called for by interest, and should be sanctioned by pride and feeling.

        Advantages of cities; centers of commerce and intellectual life.

        Internal improvements will unite all the people of the State.

        From the days of Romulus to those of Peter of Russia, cities have been considered indispensable to States and Empires. N. York is within sight of the shores of Connecticut; but it cannot be pretended that this metropolis is not infinitely more useful to the State, whose name she bears than to the one just mentioned. If cities should arise on our eastern coast, the taxable property there collected would materially assist our financial operations; otherwise, our friendly neighbors, already much richer and more powerful than ourselves, will enjoy the benefit of wealth produced by the exchange of our productions. Towns are not only the seats of monied capital and varied enterprise, but in them is found the focus of genius and intellect. Thither converge the rays of mental light; there they burn with the brightest flame, and produce the most powerful effects. Should this happen in North Carolina, a more glorious era will commence. While the wealth and enterprise of our merchants will excite industry,

and bring to light the latent resources of the State, and promote noble improvements, a higher tone will be given to our public councils, men of learning will create a taste for scientific and literary pursuits, and our character will be regarded with pride and satisfaction.

        This is further recommended, by the expediency of uniting the different parts of the State into a harmonious whole, possessing one interest actuated by one feeling, and ardently bent on one object--the honor and happiness of North Carolina. If the mountaineer could be brought in contact with the Lowlander, if dealings could take place between them, if the rights of hospitality could alternately be performed, geographical division would be forgotten, and civil animosity would subside.

        No appropriation for any specific plan now.

        Though the committee are thoroughly convinced of the utility of Internal Improvement, and though their anticipations of the future are of the brightest description, yet they fear that precipitate movements might be attended with disastrous consequences. The public mind is aroused, men of intelligence are investigating and explaining the subject, and the current is decidedly in favor of the patriotic cause. Caution, prudence, and enlightenment of the public mind, will render it irresistible; and, therefore, they deem it advisable not to make appropriations for any specific plan during the present session. Besides, the whole State should be surveyed by competent engineers, the routes designated by the memorial, as well as others, estimates of the cost of particular works should be made in order that the ensuing Legislature may have data on which it may act, and not commence projects, whose end and importance is not understood. The committee, therefore, recommend the passage of the accompanying bill.

--Legislative Documents, 1833.

2. THE CAUSE OF EMIGRATION.

        Necessity of some measure to prevent emigration.

        To the Honourable General Assembly of North Carolina, The following memorial is respectfully submitted to your serious consideration, to wit: While the subscribers, citizens of the Borough of Halifax, feel a deep interest in the welfare of the people of North Carolina, and a deeper solicitude for the elevation of her national character, to the level of her sister states, they can perceive no means, by which an end so desirable, can be affected, but by an elevation of her general prosperity; whereby her native sons of genius, of which she can boast as many, as any State in the Union, may find sufficient inducement to remain on her salubrious and fertile soil, if properly improved, to erect monuments of genius, and of patriotism, to her honour and her glory; it being a fact incontrovertable, that many of the brightest stars in the galaxy of American genius, are native born North Carolinians, forced to seek a clime more congenial to their temperaments, mainly, because, sufficient importance in intellectual, and physical improvements, has not been felt by the State generally.

        Prosperity and intelligence can be aided only by system of internal improvements.

        That the general prosperity, and intellectual improvement of our people, cannot be elevated by any other means, than by an inlightened system of internal improvements and publick education, her geography, and the history of our sister States, amply prove.

        Such a system should promote trade and agriculture.

        By a general improvement system, we wish to be understood as not confining ourselves exclusively to improvements facilitating trade and commerce, but also to agriculture; by draining and reclaiming the low and marshy lands, by which the agricultural productions of our State will be increased two, if not fourfold, and the health of our climate, rendered superior to any in the Union, which in a greater degree than any other considerations, will prevent

the annual drains of our population, in the form of emigrants to States, more favoured by nature.

        Best to combine private and public funds.

        Position of State retrograding.

        Plan proposed to raise funds.

        The most eligible mode of effecting works of internal improvement which presents itself to our minds, is, by combining private with publick interest, and that no work shall receive aid from the publick treasury, until threefifths or two-thirds of the estimated cost of such work, shall have been paid, or secured to be paid, by individual subscription. The wisdom of this course is to be seen, in the past history, of all of the works of internal improvement which have been commenced in this State, not one of the many commenced having been completed, within our knowledge, and the commencement of all having been so unwisely and improvidently located, with perhaps a solitary exception, that what little has been done is entirely useless, except to deter us from further efforts: and what can we promise ourselves, but similar failures, if works of improvement are undertaken by the funds of the State alone, in which all have an equal interest, and all are equally entitled to first improvements and when a combination of interests may be made to defeat all works of general utility, at least until those of a purely local interest shall have been built up, and such a profligacy in the expenditure of the publick money, thereby incured, as will frustrate once more, and in all probability forever, the whole scheme of internal improvement, and thus we shall be compelled to remain, just as we have a long time remained, in a retrograding position. Wherefore be it resolved, that it is the opinion of the subscribers hereunto annexed, that the Legislature ought and is hereby requested, to raise an internal improvement fund, immediately by loan or other wise, to be appropriated to the aiding of such works of internal improvement, as may be proved of sufficient utility by the subscription of private capital, to an amount such as to induce the Legislature, or its authorized agent to subscribe the remaining two-fifths,

or two-thirds of all internal improvement stocks, as in its wisdom it may consider most conducive to the general improvement of the State, both as to roads and canals, and to the reclaiming of our vast waste lands.

        All of which we respectfully submit to your consideration, and pray your concurrence, holding ourselves under the direction and control of the Legislature and the laws of North Carolina alone.

        Signed and subscribed to, this 14th day of December, A. D. 1833, and in the year of our Independence, 57.

        Thos. Marshall, Sylvester Smith, Jos. L. Simmons, Richard Ferrall, Wm. H. Pope, Benj. A. Pope, Willoughby W. Jones, James M. Vaden, A. H. Litchford, Henry Garrett, F. S. Marshall, Aquilla Womble, B. F. Marshall, Jas. Simmons, J. J. Daniel, Henry Wilkes, G. W. Owens, Robert A. Burton of F. C., W. H. Daniel, R. J. Hawkins, T. M. Pierce, J. Jamieson, Thomas Ferrall, Allen S. Webb, E. H. Eure, Wm. H. Brown, M. A. Willcox, Jas. Frazier, J. H. McLemore, Charles A. Webb, Tho. K. Thomas, Benj. Harris, J. H. Harwell, M. L. Bishop, Henry A. Whitehead, G. W. Barnes.

--From Unpublished Legislative Documents, 1833.

3. VALUATION OF PROPERTY AND TAXES ASSESSED, 1833.

        

County.	Assessed Value of Land in 1815.	Assessed Value of Land in 1833.	Free Males 21 to 45 in 1830.	Slaves 12 to 50 in 1830.	Land Tax in 1833.	Poll Tax in 1833.
Anson	$509,548	$537,571	1,245	2,519	$342.98	$707.64
Ashe	211,321	270,139	867	253	161.98	210.60
Brunswick	516,189	289,277	559	1,715	303.10	427.52
Buncombe	669,069	652,610	1,904	904	446.29	527.91
Burke	840,481	800,023	1,843	1,956	557.44	714.22
Beaufort	810,819	605,040	1,154	2,283	483.31	646.16
Bladen	554,276	435,645	634	1,583	347.66	416.80
Bertie	1,350,096	995,809	788	3,510	770.79	808.03
Craven	1,787,931	691,646	1,138	3,298	1,116.06	833.97
Carteret	385,131	276,016	724	836	223.87	293.28
Currituck	343,473	232,185	765	1,243	203.84	377.51
Camden	412,618	272,539	712	1,093	238.18	339.34
Caswell	786,946	635,938	1,200	3,191	445.60	825.51
Chowan	645,360	497,921	446	1,994	363.99	458.72
Chatham	1,063,085	917,533	1,360	2,539	612.15	733.02
Cumberland	1,293,805	942,721	1,392	2,600	801.82	750.50
Columbus	167,964	175,231	390	493	111.78	166.01
Cabarrus	640,274	534,016	938	1,174	370.08	397.06
Duplin	729,097	550,812	953	2,216	421.97	595.78
Davidson		794,904	1,444	979	*	455.53
Edgecombe	1,926,572	1,524,986	1,104	3,711	1,092.57	905.22
Franklin	916,713	716,220	758	2,421	517.86	597.66
Guilford	1,186,254	1,099,833	2,314	1,373	674.10	693.16
Gates	544,444	472,163	636	1,789	307.12	455.90
Granville	1,161,446	901,545	1,389	4,488	657.39	1,104.88
Greene	549,244	382,964	414	1,450	310.63	350.44
Halifax	2,061,540	1,569,893	1,237	4,953	1,165.67	1,163.72
Hertford	830,081	606,206	717	1,843	472.60	481.28
Hyde	813,287	238,615	656	1,011	482.18	313.40
Haywood	201,916	203,225	546	149	121.88	130.66
Iredell	892,458	732,678	1,582	1,918	512.30	658.00
Jones	711,020	399,702	385	1,599	406.00	373.00
Johnston	846,865	632,947	1,011	1,841	489.02	536.18
Lincoln	1,285,198	1,349,608	2,428	2,613	756.93	947.71
Lenoir	724,996	333,491	526	1,961	415.11	467.56

        * Included in Rowan.

County.	Assessed Value of Land in 1815.	Assessed Value of Land in 1833.	Free Males 21 to 45 in 1830.	Slaves 12 to 50 in 1830.	Land Tax in 1833.	Poll Tax in 1833.
Moore	$359,029	$305,914	792	822	$232.02	$303.44
Macon		180,360	643	231	101.73	164.32
Montgomery	519,637	442,762	1,192	1,212	334.75	451.96
Mecklenburg	1,309,334	1,222,811	1,984	3,678	776.85	1,064.46
Martin	587,503	491,236	796	1,627	334.45	455.53
New Hanover	1,293,399	998,902	835	2,845	826.33	691.84
Nash	703,034	518,871	645	1,774	402.40	454.78
Northampton	1,528,862	1,335,054	831	3,647	864.30	841.87
Onslow	605,153	416,192	696	1,581	379.41	428.08
Orange	1,917,993	1,738,122	2,257	3,797	1,101.83	1.138.16
Person	511,745	477,787	770	2,196	293.27	557.61
Pasquotank	496,342	461,425	971	1,418	280.76	449.14
Pitt	1,399,719	961,499	1,014	2,707	810.05	699.55
Perquimans	563,021	445,351	706	1,371	324.53	390.48
Rowan	2,176,720	1,389,009	2,022	3,063	1,250.15	955.98
Randolph	891,207	712,392	1,483	727	537.00	415.48
Rockingham	729,472	654,992	1,177	2,134	419.75	622.47
Robeson	504,103	423,264	954	1,200	286.75	404.96
Richmond	463,992	474,871	820	1,827	283.56	497.64
Rutherford	942,914	836,377	1,841	1,735	577.44	672.29
Sampson	769,301	528,104	1,139	2,009	442.76	591.83
Surry	841,226	738.335	1,613	961	510.14	483.92
Stokes	899,669	903,039	1,779	1,441	538.12	605.36
Tyrrell	332,014	247,141	496	671	208.14	219.40
Washington	437,512	227,072	443	887	253.83	250.04
Wilkes	457,253	397,843	1,329	737	305.73	388.41
Wake	1,721,800	1,415,659	1,649	4,158	975.62	1,091.72
Warren	1,045,425	930,121	603	3,701	589.62	809.16
Wayne	1,144,620	770,431	927	1,818	655.74	516.06
Total	53,521,513	42,916,633	68,566	125,474	31,601.28	36,479.82

        The assessed value of land in 1815 was that laid by the United States for direct tax. The assessed value in 1833 was that laid by State assessment. The free males 21 to 45 (1830) and the slaves, 12 to 50 (1830) is from the Census of 1830. The land and poll tax for 1833 was that laid for State purposes only.

        In 1830, the U. S. Census gave North Carolina a population of 68,566 free males 21 to 45 years of age, and a slave population of 125,474 between the ages of 12 to 50. According to law this number of persons were liable for poll taxes. In 1833, three years after the Census was taken, only 54,074 free polls were listed for taxation and 96,864 slave polls. There were thus 14,492 free polls and 28,610 slave polls unlisted for taxation in 1833, based on the Census figures of 1830--a total of 43,102 polls unlisted.

4. COST OF PUBLIC PRINTING 1814-1833.

        

1814--	$1,309.39
1815--	1,348.00
1816--	1,180.20
1817--	1,168.50
1818--	1,541.92
1819--	1,446.00
1820--	1,706.18
1821--	1,404.99
1822--	1,819.50
1823--	1,437.35
1824--	1,550.22
1825--	1,444.32
1826--	1,434.74.
1827--	1,313.69
1828--	1,671.71
1829--	1,779.29
1830--	1,560.90
1831--	1,563.20
1832--	1,925.68
1833--	1,999.26

--From Comptroller's Statement, Dec. 7, 1833.

5. STOCK IN BANKS OWNED BY LITERARY FUND.

        A statement showing the aggregate number of shares of Bank Stock owned by the State of North Carolina and by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund on the 1st of November, 1833.

        

Shares of Stock of the State Bank of North Carolina, owned by the State and dividends unappropriated	2,768
Shares of Stock by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund	282	3,054
Shares of Stock of the Bank of Newbern, owned by the State, and dividends unappropriated	155
Shares of Stock dividends appropriated to the Fund for Internal Improvement	1,304
Shares of Stock dividends appropriated to the Literary Fund	359
Shares owned by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, and purchased with the cash belonging to that Fund	141	1,950
Shares Stock of the Bank of Cape Fear owned by the State, and dividends unappropriated	10
Shares of Stock dividends appropriated to the Fund for Internal Improvement	1,358
Shares of Stock dividends appropriated for the Literary Fund	704
Shares owned by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, and purchased with the cash belonging to that Fund	50	2,122
Aggregate number of shares		7,131

--From Statement of Treasurer in 1833.

6. USE OF LITERARY FUND.

        The following statement shows the debit of the public Fund to the Literary Fund, at the periods stated, viz:

        

On the first day of December, 1832, the balance against the Public Fund was	$14,125.05
1st January, 1833	24,547.69
1st February, 1833	66,016.75
1st March, 1833	12,982.49
1st April, 1833	12,742.73

        On the first day of May, the Literary Fund had been reimbursed and a balance of $24,230.21 stood to the credit of the Public Fund. Since that time, there has been no occasion to use the money of the former, to answer demands on the latter.

--From Report of Public Treasurer, 1833.

7. VALUATION OF PROPERTY AND TAXATION, 1815 AND
1833.

        Loss of revenue by fraudulent practices.

        Comparison of present land values with 1815.

        The great loss of revenue, and the fraudulent practices growing out of the present mode of listing and assessing property for taxation in this State, were brought to the attention of the Legislature in the last annual report from this department. Since that time some pains have been taken to ascertain the amount of the evil, where it exists and the remedy. Under the existing law passed in 1819, "every person bound to list lands shall return his list upon oath, as it respects the number of acres and shall affix the value of each tract of land, including the improvements thereon, not less than the value affixed to the same by the assessors under the last act of Congress, providing for the assessment of the lands of the United States--(January, 1815). In any event, then, the valuation on the tax list, should be equal to that of 1815, and higher where an appreciation in the value has occurred since that time, either from improvements on the land or otherwise. The aggregate valuation of the lands in North Carolina at the period referred to, was, in round numbers, fifty three and a half million dollars. Since that time and up to the first of the year 1833--1,249,758 acres of land have been entered and patented in the State, making an increase, by that number of acres, of the amount now liable to pay tax.--These lands estimated at the average in 1815, and added to that valuation, make an aggregate of more than fifty six millions of dollars. Hence it is manifest that the assessment of 1833, upon which the tax received this year was collected, ought at least to be equal to that sum, yielding a nett tax of more than thirty-one thousand dollars; and if the assessment were made strictly according to the requirements of the act of 1819, it must necessarily be greater, unless reduced by the Board of Appeal constituted by that act.

        How much too low is the valuation of lands?

        Much land not listed at all.

        But let us compare this result with the actual assessment in 1833. According to the clerk's returns, and the tax collected thereon, the aggregate valuation of the lands in North Carolina is less than forty three millions--showing a deficit in the valuation, at the lowest estimate, of more than thirteen millions; the nett tax accruing upon which would be near eight thousand dollars, or about one-third of the whole tax at present collected on real estate. It is a fact worth noting in this place, that the land tax has been gradually and invariably diminishing for every successive year since the year 1820, when the present rate of taxation was adopted. From the data collected on this subject, a table has been compiled, which it is believed, embraces all the information worth the attention of the Legislature. It shows the valuation in each county in 1815 and 1833, in the aggregate, and the average per acre--the number of acres at each period--the number entered since--the aggregate valuation of the whole and the nett amount of tax that would arise therefrom. Notwithstanding the immensely depreciated rate at which it is given in, in some of the counties it will be seen that the average rate of giving in throughout the State in 1833, does not fall very short of the average valuation per acre in 1815--the average rate at the former period (1815) being $2.69; at the latter $2.27. This arises from the fact that much of the land is not listed at all and, in several of the counties, that which is listed is rated at a higher valuation per acre than was fixed upon it in 1815. It will also be perceived that although about a million and a quarter acres of land have been entered since 1815, still the quantity now given in for taxation is less than at a former period by more than a million of acres; and estimating the whole surface of the State at 32,000,000 acres, only about three-fifths of it are taxed.

        County taxes decreased by low assessment; amount of loss.

        So far, the evil complained of relates only to the public revenue or State tax. Let us examine its bearing upon

the other revenues in the State. It must be recollected that the County taxes are all levied upon the same list and assessment as is the State tax; and that of course the evil extends alike to them. From authentic statements procured from fifty five counties, it is ascertained that the average land tax paid throughout the State for county purposes, amounts to twenty six cents on the hundred dollars value, and that the average poll tax paid in like manner, for the same purposes, amounts to sixty cents on the poll. These rates of taxation applied respectively, to the amount of the deficit in the assessment of real estate, and the number of polls listed in 1833, will exhibit a loss of revenue in the former, of more than thirty-four thousand dollars--making together about sixty thousand dollars; which, with the loss to the public revenue, swells the amount to upwards of seventy five thousand dollars--a sum of money more than equal to the whole of the public revenue, at present collected by the sheriffs and paid into this office. This is a startling result; but that it is not exaggerated, the facts upon which it depends, will show. Indeed, it is confidently believed, that its correctness would be proved in the fullest manner, could a fair and equitable system of listing and assessing property be adopted and carried out efficaciously.

--From Report of Public Treasurer, 1834.

8. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS.

        The committee on Internal Improvements, to whom were referred sundry documents and schemes relating to the Internal Improvements of this State, having had the same under consideration, beg leave to report:

        Present policy will annihilate our population.

        That the subject matter to which they relate involves considerations of State policy, inseparable from the general good, and, when taken in connection with the individual welfare of our citizens, their situation presents a state of things which nothing short of a liberal course of legislation can arrest, the consequent evils of a course of policy which the experience of the past now demonstrates, have had, and if persevered in, will have a tendency to annihilate the population of the State.

        Example of other States.

        When we look abroad into the policy of the several States of this Union, it is apparent that such as have attained to any degree of pre-eminence of character, that such distinction has been acquired in ratio with the facilities of accumulating wealth, by the industry and enterprise of their citizens; and it is equally apparent that the State that has adopted that system of policy, which in its tendency hath promoted agriculture and husbandry, has produced in the moral and intellectual condition of its society, improvements characteristic of an enlightened and enterprising people.

        What the State may expect from an apathetic course in regard to internal improvements.

        The evidences which the pages of history furnish for our example, of the causes that have produced the decline and ultimate ruin of such governments as have persued a contrary policy, should be regarded by the State of this Confederacy as admonitory of the certainty of its fatal consequences.

        A people falling into that state of apathy, which generates a spirit unfriendly to enterprise, have ever been found to degenerate in the most abject state of slavery.

It matters not whether such a people be a self governed community or not, the inculcation of such principles will sooner or later produce a disregard even for the government of their own choosing.

        Why some countries are ignorant.

        When a people shall lose a proper respect for the character of the State which gave them birth, they that moment cease to be patriots, and become the fit subjects for a system of feudal vassalage. Let it be asked why are some nations overrun with ignorance and barbarity, whilst others flourish with learning and sciences? But what should most attract our attention is, that the same people have in different ages been distinguished by these opposite characters. Is it not because the one has neglected, whilst the other has paid a proper regard to a policy, which placed in the hands of the citizens the means of acquiring wealth and the comforts of life, whereby culture and a due regard for the improvements of the mind upon human institutions are appreciated and cherished by the great body of the people? Nothing is more apparent, then, where this system is pursued, knowledge, virtue, patriotism and wealth never fail to ensue; but where it is not, ignorance and a want of knowledge of our own worth become inevitable.

        Comparison of North Carolina with other States.

        Why people are emigrating.

        Upon comparing the present languishing condition of the agricultural resources of North Carolina with the improved and prosperous condition of even the most inconsiderable member of the Union, the picture portrays the contrast, characteristic of a community worn down by the hand of adversity, in colours too strong to be concealed. That in North Carolina, it is apparent the reward of labor has ceased to be a stimulus to industry and enterprise; that agriculture has ceased to yield to the land owner a compensation equivalent to the expense attending the transportation of his surplus produce to market. The consequent result of this state of things is, that real estate throughout the country has so depreciated in the

hands of farmers, as to be considered not to possess a fixed value estimatked upon its products. Hence our citizens are daily abandoning the places of their birth for situations in other States less healthy, and often not superior in fertility of soil; but which, by the improvement of those States, rendered so by the fostering aid of Legislative patronage, the facilities to wealth and the means of acquiring the necessaries of life, the profits of labor hold out stronger inducements to agricultural pursuits than is to be found in North Carolina. Nor does the evil stop here. The tide of emigration, which never ebbs, not only carries with it a great portion of the enterprise and prime of our youth, but much of the productive and most valuable description of the State's wealth. These are facts of "ominous import," which should admonish us to guard against the fatal issue with which they are pregnant. Can it be our interest so to shape our policy as to render our State the mere nursery for the Western and Southwestern States? Surely not. We not only thereby lessen the political influence of the State in the councils of the General Government, but we evidently weaken the ties of patriotism of our citizens to the land of their nativity.

        Nine-tenths of all the land now for sale.

        The social relations of family connections evidently constitute the most lasting cement of the political permanency of any country. Indeed, what else is it but the social ties of family connections, when rendered happy and prosperous by their own industry, that stamps a value upon society? Or will it be contended that the present scattered condition of the family connections of North Carolina has a tendency to increase either the happiness or the devotion of its inhabitants to the interest of the State? Go into any neighborhood, and inquire of the seniors or heads of families, "how many children they have raised, and in what State do they reside?" and in nine cases out of ten, the answer will be, "I have raised some six or eight children; but the major portion of them

have migrated to some other State;" and adds the parent, "I am anxious to sell my lands, to enable me to follow them." Thus, it will appear that the lands of nine-tenths of the farmers of the State are actually in market; and what does it arise from? Evidently from the fact, that the distance to, and expense of sending the staple products of the soil to market, so far lessen the profits upon agricultural labor, that the farmer has no inducements to effort. Therefore, it is that all our farmers are land sellers, and no land buyers.

        The remedy for these conditions.

        The cause of these evils is apparent; but no less so, than is the remedy. Throw open the agricultural interest of our State to the action of trade or commerce; open its wide spread avenues, by constructing railroads from the interior of our fertile back country to markets within the State, at least, so far as nature in the distribution of her favors has rendered them feasible; connect by railroads the rivers of the State at given points, whereby the produce of their fruitful valleys may be sent to an export market. This done, and it will reflect to the State all the substantial benefits to be derived from an export depot--such at least as will locate a capital within its influence, equal to the amount of exports.

        By concentrating the commerce of the State to one point, it will remove an evil, which but few are apprised of. The produce should be received at the export depot in sufficient quantities so as to furnish a cargo, without subjecting the shipper to the increased expense arising from delay, a privation in the outset which often renders the voyage unsuccessful. Hence the necessity of adding to the aggregate quantity of export articles at the shipping port.

        Present conditions the fault of the Legislature.

        Advantages of railroads.

        Prejudice against railroads.

        From the laggard progress in our internal improvements, it would seem as if inquiry had yet to discover what constituted the true policy of the State, as if its principles were too mysterious for the perception of the

common mind. But such is not the fact. The fault lies in the Legislature, and, it would appear, from the past, that the people are much more ready, when called upon to sanction any measure of legislative enactment, having for its object the advancement of the public good, than hath been found in the General Assembly to adopt such measures. The people are always prepared to decide upon measures connected with the public welfare; but what uncommon attribute of intellect does it require to decide upon the advantages which the rail road has over a common five horse dredge wagon? The one is capable, with a steam locomotive engine, of transporting from 40 to 50 tons, and the other, under the most favorable circumstances, will carry little exceeding a ton and a half. Yet the opponents to a liberal system of internal improvement say that the present is not the proper time to commence these improvements, that the people are yet uninformed upon the subject, of the use of rail roads. Now, these reasons, if reasons at all, imply a fact which your committee is unwilling to admit, viz: that the people are not sufficiently informed of the advantages which rail roads possess over dredge wagons to decide upon the expediency of adopting rail road communications. The proposition thus presented, is made to appear before the people in a false shape. Let it be asked, what are the true points involved in the inquiry? Is it not apparent that when the case is stripped of the veil of mystery which envelopes the proposition, that it presents but two simple questions, namely: first, the advantages of rail roads; and, secondly, the ways and means of acquiring the required funds to effect these improvements? The expediency then of the State becoming interested in rail roads is not involved in what the enemies of a general system, adopted by the State, may be pleased to call an improper time to commence the good work. In this light the subject has ever been unkindly treated; which has had a tendency

to prejudice the public mind against the introduction of one of the most important improvements of inter-communication which the present enlightened age has discovered for the use and general benefit of man.

        State should aid the promotion of wealth.

        In the contemplation of this highly interesting subject, the only inquiry is, as to the manner of acquiring the funds for the accomplishment of the work, and whether the end will justify the means. The proposition, thus considered, presents a full and entire view of the whole case. The utility and practical use of rail roads will be admitted by all. Their direct effect upon the landed interest of the country is also admitted. The action they necessarily produce to enterprise and the mechanic arts and the commerce of the country, all tend to stimulate industry in a degree only to be realised by such like improvements. These considerations constitute some of the advantages to be derived from commercial intercommunications of the country. They show that it is labour which developes the resources of any country. Should it not then be an object with the Legislature to promote, by such means as shall be found within its control, the industry and enterprise of the State with a liberal hand?

        In what age or era has it been shown that prosperity has attended any nation, whose government did not foster its national wealth by promoting the individual wealth of its citizens?

        Why money is scarce.

        It is a mistaken idea, as many suppose, that banks or the monied institutions of the country will of themselves render what is called "money plenty." Money must circulate by means of the products of labor or else it will ever be scarce, and the community poor. The fact is money, whether in a metalic or paper form, possesses little else than a distributive, and not that representative character of property, as is generally supposed. It is its convenience in facilitating traffic between man and man, that confers a value upon paper medium, and not its representative character.

        Money borrowed, which is wasted, or not usefully invested, operates injuriously to the borrower, and at the same time affords no benefit to the community. It is so much thrown into circulation unrepresented by either labor or property: which results in the same bad effect that arises from overtrading.

        The policy of North Carolina should be to increase the products of her soil, by increasing the reward and wages of labor. The one is a consequent upon the other. In the same ratio that labor is rewarded, will prosperity attend the community, & vice versa. It should, therefore, become a matter of inquiry with the Legislature of the State, whether our course of Legislation hath been in accordance with these established principles.

        Legislature has delayed action for thirty years.

        Our course of reasoning upon this subject for the last 30 years has been to evade rather than to investigate its merits; whilst the doctrines promulgated against a general system of improvement have unhappily had a serious and deleterious effect upon the public mind.

        Principles inimical to, and at variance with what should constitute the policy of the State by becoming interested in any project of internal improvements, having been so repeatedly reiterated, and again echoed and reechoed from the forum of the Legislative hall to the public ear, that popular opinion had gone far in rejecting the well established principles in political economy, that the "wealth of States consists in the wealth and prosperity of the citizens.

        People at last see the folly of the past course of legislation.

        But your committee hath the gratification to perceive that this important subject has in a great degree undergone the inquisitorial examination of the people, whose decision in all matters of public interest has ever been found in unison with the general welfare.

        The people now perceive that they have endured a state of privation, which sad experience shows to be a downward course, and when longer forbearance would be but

an aggravation of the evil. But the people, knowing their interest, with a voice not to be resisted hath proclaimed aloud that the period has arrived when something ought, something can, and when something must be done to arrest the progress of our down hill march.

        Individuals can not raise the necessary funds.

        Individuals must have State aid.

        Public expectations have become awakened, all eyes have been turned upon the present session of the General Assembly, and now look with patriotic solicitude for the anticipated favorable result of its deliberations. With regard to the ability of individual efforts to accomplish the desired results of public improvements, there can be no difficulty in perceiving that they cannot raise the required funds. Our citizens subjected as they evidently are, and have ever been, to an expense almost equal to the market value of a great portion of their surplus produce in getting it to market, must be ill prepared to engage in enterprises, which from their importance should be justly considered undertakings of State magnitude. It is therefore, apparent, that if the improvements of the State are to be effected at all, they must be by the aid of the State, and not by private companies. The expression of public opinion by the people, in their recent numerous primary meetings, has given ample testimony of what the public expectations are with regard to the two-fifths principle. The unanimity of the Internal Improvement convention, held in November last in Raleigh, in which 44 counties were represented, and of which were but five dissenting votes to the magnificent scheme recommended by that body to the consideration of the General Assembly, should be viewed as conclusive as to the sentiments of the people upon the subject.

        Recent Convention and its recommendation ought to be adopted.

        To defer the commencement of these undertakings under the imposing circumstances they have been submitted to the General Assembly, would doubtless be viewed by the people as tantamount to a rejection of the principles recommended, and so ably sustained by that patriotic and enlightened assemblage of citizens.

        Sentiments of the people have been ascertained.

        It will be recollected that the delegates composing the general Convention, which sat in Raleigh in November last, were appointed by the citizens of their respective counties, under all the forms at least of an election. It can hardly be supposed then, that they would have recommended a measure which they supposed would not be sanctioned by their constituents. But, in addition, to all this, we have the fact that all the internal improvement conventions and county meetings that were held in various sections of the State during the last summer, recommended the two-fifths and three-fifths principle. The sentiment of the people upon the point therefore, cannot be questioned.

        State should subscribe two-fifths of the stock.

        In compliance, therefore, to the will of the people, your Committee are of the opinion that the two-fifths principle should be recognized in the future policy of the State; and that where a scheme shall be projected by individuals embraced in either of the main routes, recommended by the Board of Internal Improvements, the State ought to subscribe for two-fifths of the stock, under such restrictions and under such conditions as the Legislature shall prescribe by law.

        Applications for incorporation or railroad companies show interest.

        The great number of applications to the present General Assembly for the incorporation of rail road companies may be considered to be a fair test of the entire public confidence in rail road communications; and whilst the strong feelings of sectional jealousy, which are manifested upon the subject, should be regretted, yet the consequences to be apprehended can but result in laudable rivalry.

        No foundation in reason why the State should not lend its influence.

        The reasons that have been advanced against the credit of the State being used in raising or creating a fund for objects of internal improvement appear to your committee to be without foundation. The objects of legislation should be such as relate to the advancement of common welfare: the improvements of our common country is a legitimate subject of general concern, and is embraced in the powers retained by the State Government in the management of

its municipal affairs; in the well being of which, all grades and discription of citizens have a deep and undivided interest; and, as such, the subject should invoke the undivided attention and solicitude of the General Assembly. In every other State except North Carolina, internal improvement is made a primary object of State patronage; but why it should be considered by the Legislature of North Carolina an object unworthy of its patronage and fostering care, is a fact which inquiry is yet to discover and explain. It is no reason against a thing, to presume it may be abused; for, upon this hypothesis, it might be argued that legislation itself may be abused, and therefore, such a provision is improperly retained in our constitution.

        What other States are going to do.

        It is worse than absurd to argue that the work proposed may not be worth the money expended in constructing it, and therefore, it would be impolitic for the State to engage in such like enterprises. What has been the result of such investments in our Sister States? Do we find that they have abandoned the policy? Surely not, but, on the contrary, continue to engage in more extensive undertaking. South Carolina and Tennessee have now in contemplation a scheme to connect by rail roads, the trade of the two States, so as to make Charleston the shipping port for all Tennessee. Nay, the scheme embraces all north Alabama, a part of Kentucky and Ohio. So have Virginia and Georgia embarked in the internal improvements of their respective States, and with prospects of success.

        Report of Board of Internal Improvements.

        In reference to the Report of the "Board of Internal Improvements," the committee view the plans and suggestions it contains to be of pre-eminent importance to the State. It contemplates improvements which, if carried into execution, their advantages would more than equal the scheme, magnificent as it is. The committee, therefore, would recommend the organization of a Board of

Internal Improvements, to consist of four members, one of whom, should act in the capacity of superintendent of public works, and who shall be allowed three dollars a day, in addition to his expenses, for his services in attending to the duties assigned to him as superintendent.

        It will be recollected that the laws relating to the several navigation and other incorporated companies, were enacted at the time when there existed a regular Board of Internal Improvements: consequently these laws were all predicated upon the existence of a board, and requiring the Board of Internal Improvement to attend to the interest which the State held in these companies.

        New Board necessary.

        In addition to these reasons, there are others which render the organization of a new board necessary. It is essential that the State should be furnished with a topographical engineer, for the purpose of making the surveys and estimates of the routes contemplated by the several companies incorporated at the present session, as well as the routes proposed by the Board of Internal Improvement. An engineer can no doubt be procured from the topographical bureau of the United States Government by applying to the President. In which event these surveys and estimates can be made at an expense only of the cost of the camp equipage, and such other charges as may be necessary for the accommodation of the engineer and the required attendants, etc. The whole amount would not probably exceed from 1000 to 1500 dollars. The State of South Carolina has appropriated for a similar object, and under similar circumstances, one thousand dollars.

        Your committee, therefore recommend the bill accompanying this Report, to be passed into a law. All which is respectfully submitted.

J. SEAWELL, Chairman.

--From Legislative Documents, 1833.

9. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.

        To the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina.

        The President and Directors of the Literary Fund, in obedience to the Act of Assembly requiring them to "cause to be kept by the Treasurer for the State, a regular account of all such sums of money as may belong to the said fund; of the manner in which the same has been applied and vested; and to make an annual report thereof to the Legislature, with such recommendations for the improvement of the same as to them shall seem expedient" respectfully Report:

        Receipts for the year.

        That the receipts of this corporation for the year ending on the first day of November 1833, have been as follows (viz)

        

Amount of tavern tax for 1833	$2,737.28
Amount of auction tax for 1833	675.64
Amount of cash received 1833 on entries of Vacant land	6,279.43
Amount of dividend received State Bank and Bank of Newbern	18,180.00
Amount of dividend Cape Fear Navigation compy	566.14
	$28,438.49
Add to this sum the amount reported by the Public Treasurer to the last General Assembly to have been due to the Literary Fund, on the 1st day of November 1832	88,586.32½
Making an aggregate of	$117,024.81½

        Fund now idle.

        During the present year no expenditures have been made from this fund for any purpose; and for obvious reasons, the Board has declined to exercise the authority given by the third section of the act creating this corporation,

"to vest any part or the whole of the fund in the stock of any of the Banks of this State, or in the stock of the Bank of the United States." The entire fund has therefore been idle and unproductive during this period.

        Ask the meaning of the act of 1825.

        The President and Directors have had some difficulty in determining the construction, which ought to be given to the act of incorporation; and as the question involved is one of much importance, they beg leave to refer it to the consideration of the Legislature. The Second Section provides that the Literary fund shall consist "of the dividends arising from certain bank stock owned by the State, the dividends arising from stock owned by the State, in certain navigation companies; the tax imposed by law on licenses to the retailers of spiritous liquors & auctioneers; the unexpended balance of the agricultural fund, which by the Act of the Legislature is directed to be paid into the Public Treasury; all monies paid to the State for entries of vacant land excepting the Cherokee lands, the sum of $21,090, which was paid by the State to certain Cherokee Indians for reservations to land secured to them by treaty, when the said sum shall be received from the United States by this State; and of all the vacant and unappropriated Swamp land in the State, together with such sums of money as the Legislature may hereafter find it convenient to appropriate from time to time." The third section declares that the President and Directors shall have authority "at all times to change, alter and dispose of the real and personal estate, belonging to the said fund, in such manner and upon such terms as may in their opinion be best calculated to improve the value thereof."

        Question as to he swamp lands.

        An Act passed at the same Session, prohibits the entry of Swamp lands. Has the Act of Assembly in question transferred the Swamp lands to this corporation with authority to dispose of them? or merely a right "to all

monies paid to the State" on account of them, as in the case of other vacant and unappropriated lands?

        The Board entertain the opinion that the former is the true construction. The grant is express "of all the vacant and unappropriated Swamp lands," and not to "all monies paid to the State," as in the former instance. If a right to the latter merely is intended, there was no necessity for any reference to the Swamp lands, all the unappropriated lands except the Cherokee lands being included by the other form of expression. The corporation neither owns nor has authority to acquire any "real estate" other than these lands, so that the "power to alter, change and dispose of the real and personal Estate," given by the third section, is by any other construction entirely nugatory, so far as it relates to the former species of property.

        Swamp lands only hope of establishing schools.

        The act above referred to, passed at the same Session of the Legislature to prohibit the entry of these lands accords well with this construction. The Legislature seems at that period for the first time, to have been duly sensible of the great importance of this portion of the public domain, and it must have been upon this "real estate" alone, that any reliance could have been placed, or even hope entertained for the accumulation, within any reasonable period, of a sufficient, "fund for the support of common and convenient schools for the instruction of youth in the several Counties of this State."

        Schools can not be established with a fund of $100,000.

        Having arrived at this conclusion, it becomes the duty of the Board in connexion with the subject, "to make such recommendations to the Legislature for the improvement of the fund as seem to them expedient." It is apparent that no general good could be effected by an attempt to establish common and convenient schools in every County in the State, with a fund amounting to little more than a hundred thousand dollars. There is at present no opportunity afforded for an investment in the stock of any Bank in this State or of the United States.] though it is probable

this state of things will not long continue. In the meantime, they entertain the opinion that their attention may with great propriety be directed to the improvement of that part of the fund which consists of real estate, and that a portion of the money in the Treasury may well be set apart for this purpose, leaving the remainder to be invested in such stocks, as the Legislature may direct.

        Value of the swamp lands.

        The Governor in his recent Message to the General Assembly has stated the extent, and made some general remarks with respect to the value of the Swamp and Marsh land in the State. A minute and interesting description of the entire region, over which they extend, was given to the Board for Internal Improvements in 1827, by Mr. Nash, then Civil Engineer for the State. He concludes his report on this subject by observing that "North Carolina possesses a mine of wealth in her Swamp lands, which if rightfully managed may be made a Source of great and lasting revenue. Instead of being the abode of reptiles and howling beasts, the receptacles of stagnant waters, which spread disease and death through the country for one third of the year, these now loathsome marshes and dismals may all be converted into fruitful fields and made the delightful habitation of man."

        The Board have taken much pains to ascertain the correctness of the description given by this gentleman of the several tracts of country surveyed by him, and to test the general accuracy of his estimates. Various publications on the subject have been consulted, the maps belonging to the Executive Department attentively examined, and much information has been obtained by an extensive correspondence with gentlemen residing in the eastern section of the State. These enquiries have produced the conviction that the subject is one of great importance, and well worthy the interest it has excited in the public mind. The general fertility of the soil is universally admitted, the extent of the surface has been ascertained

by actual Survey, and the effect of the anticipated improvement upon the health of the adjacent country cannot be otherwise than salutary.

        Work of reclaiming lands; method proposed.

        The important enquiry however remains to be answered, In what way and by what means can this work be most advantageously performed? This has been the subject of much reflection with the Board, and they have been unable to devise any general system of improvement with which they are entirely satisfied. They believe, however, that an experiment may be made without either hazard or expense to the fund, which they have in charge, which will afford the most satisfactory information by which to determine the propriety of entering upon a general system of improvement. They propose to select a single tract of sufficient extent, and offer the requisite inducement to reclaim it, to individual effort and enterprise. With this view, they recommend as the first object of attention, the work which has been the subject of such frequent discussion in the Legislature, the improvement of the Swamp land in Hyde County, by draining Matamuskeet Lake. The lake is represented by Mr. Nash to be 20 miles in length from East to West, and 8 or 9 miles wide from North to South, and to cover an area of 120,000 acres. It is elevated from 7 to 10 feet above the level of Pamlico Sound from which it is distant four miles and has at its greatest depth 9 feet of water. He estimates that a canal forty feet in width, and eight feet in depth, may be excavated along the line of a canal already existing of the width of twelve and depth of four feet, by the expenditure of $8000, and that it would have the effect to lay bare and sufficiently dry for the purpose of cultivation 60,000 acres of land, of great fertility. In addition to this, the lands of the riparian proprietors would be secured from inundation, and thus greatly enhanced in value, and the healthfulness of a neighborhood increased, which is believed to be more densely populated than any settlement

of equal extent in this or perhaps in the Southern States.

        Inland waterway New Bern to Norfolk.

        There is another object which may be obtained by draining this lake or reducing its waters, which recommend it still more forcibly to public patronage. The distance from the lake to Alligator river is but four miles. If a Canal be cut from the North side of the former, to the Pamlico Sound and from its Southern margin to Alligator river, which it is believed may be effected without much difficulty, a direct communication will be opened between Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds. The Dismal Swamp Canal is already in successful operation, and the improvement now proposed will afford a channel of communication between Norfolk and Newbern, of great importance, not only to the immediate Section of country through which it will pass but to a large portion of the Atlantic Coast. Within the last two months, a company of enterprising gentlemen have established a line of steamboats between Elizabeth City (near the point of connexion between Pasquotank river and the Dismal Swamp Canal) and Newbern. It is in contemplation to extend this line from Newbern through the Clubfoot and Harlows. Creek Canal to Beaufort and thence along the coast by Wilmington to Charleston, S. C. Through the Canal connecting Mattamuskeet Lake with Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds, a hundred miles would be saved in distance between Elizabeth City and Newbern, and the dangerous navigation of the lower part of Albemarle Sound avoided. This improvement would constitute a link of the great chain of internal communication, which has for so many years attracted the attention of some of our most distinguished statesmen. The facilities of intercommunication which it would afford in time of peace would greatly promote the convenience, and advance the prosperity of that section of the State; but if at any time the fleet of an enemy should cut off all intercourse with our seaports a safe and direct

inland navigation of the character proposed as a means of defence, would be of incalculable value, not only to North Carolina, but to the Union.

        Legislature ought to provide for draining Mattamuskeet Lake.

        It seems to be matter of surprise that the Legislature had not been induced, long since, by the obvious advantages which must result from the successful prosecution of such an enterprise, to offer the entire body of land which might be reclaimed, to the first individual who would drain the Lake. The Board entertain the opinion however, that if the General Assembly concur with them in the construction they have given to the Act creating this fund, and Sanction the course which they propose to adopt, liberal and enterprising individuals will be willing to incur the hazard of such an undertaking, upon terms much more favourable to the State if successfully prosecuted, and attended by no public loss should it fail.

        Recommendations.

        They therefore respectfully recommend to your honorable body to authorize the President and Directors of the Literary Fund to loan upon good security, to any number of individuals, not exceeding thirty, who will associate themselves, and shall be incorporated for the purpose of engaging in the work, a sum of money, not exceeding 30,000 dollars, to be applied by the said individuals to the accomplishment of the projected enterprise. The money to be repaid at the expiration of five years from the period at which the loan shall have been obtained, without interest. The lands when reclaimed, to be sold and the proceeds, after the repayment of the $30,000 dollars loaned, to be equally divided between the corporation and the individuals concerned. The Canals to be joint property, and reasonable rates of toll to be allowed for the transportation of produce upon them. By this plan the Literary Fund, for the use of the capital employed, and the land surface of the lake, which in its present condition is destitute of value, would receive one half of the amount of tolls levied on the canals, and the individuals

under whose direction the work shall be performed, the remaining half as a compensation for their attention and the hazard incurred.*

        * The following letter accompanied this report to the Assembly:

To the General Assembly of North Carolina:

        GENTLEMEN--I transmit herewith the annual report required by law to be submitted to the Legislature, of the proceedings of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund.

I have the honor to be, gentlemen,
With high considerations,
Your obedient servant,

DAVID L. SWAIN.

--From MS. Records Literary Board.

10. GOV. SWAIN'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.

        Literary fund too small to establish schools.

        Sparse population likely a difficulty that can not be overcome.

        Internal Improvements first.

        The report of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund which will be submitted to your consideration at an early day, will shew the result so far as it has been tried of the only attempt we have yet made to establish schools for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters, paid by the public, as may enable them to instruct at low prices. The aggregate amount of the fund is, at present, too small, to justify our entering upon any general system of education. Indeed, were this fund much larger, it may well be doubted whether the period has yet arrived, when it can be judiciously expended, for the promotion of the wise and benevolent purposes contemplated by the founders of the government. The sparseness of our population presents great, perhaps, insuperable difficulties. When, as the result of a wise and liberal system of legislation, the inlets upon our coast shall receive the improvement of which they are susceptible, when our great natural highways, the rivers connected with them, shall assume that condition in which Providence designs they shall be placed by our hands, when these channels of communication shall be intersected by railroads and canals; and as the natural consequence of this state of things, agriculture shall receive her appropriate reward, we shall have laid the foundation of a school system, as extensive as our limits, and as enduring as our prosperity. A few individuals will not have been selected and cherished as the peculiar object of public patronage; but the general character of the country will be elevated, and thousands now too poor to afford the blessings of education to their children will find this, though the most important, but one of many advantages incident to our improved condition of life. Extended commercial facilities will stimulate to agricultural exertion;--increased

production afford the means of education; and the diffusion of knowledge operate as the most certain preventive of crime. A more liberal scheme would be better suited to the condition of older and richer communities, and I trust the day is not very distant when it will be so to ours.

--House Journal, 1833.

11. WHY SCHOOLS WERE NOT ESTABLISHED.

        More money expended on legislators than for all other purposes.

        The apathy which has pervaded the legislation of half a century is most strikingly exhibited by the fact, that the mere expenses of the General Assembly have ordinarily exceeded the aggregate expenditures of all the other departments of the Government, united to the appropriations which have been made, for the purposes of Internal Improvement. That government can not be wisely administered, where those who direct the expenditure of the public treasure, receive more for this service than the amount of their disbursements.

DAVID L. SWAIN.

--From Message to Legislature, 1833.

12. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.

        Senate.

        George C. Mendenhall, of Guilford; George Phillips, of Ashe; Duncan McCormick, of Cumberland; William R. Hall, of Brunswick; William E. Smaw, of Beaufort; Herod Faison, of Northampton; Thomas W. Norman, of Granville, and A. W. Mebane, of Bertie.

--Senate Journal, 1833-34.

        House.

        J. B. Jones, Currituck; Thos. J. Pugh, Bertie; William L. Kennedy, Beaufort; Cullen A. Blackman, Wayne; Archibald Monk, Sampson; George Boddie, Nash; John H. Montgomery, Moore; William A. Graham, Hillsborough; John E. Brown, Caswell; R. H. Alexander, Salisbury; William McLean, Cabarrus; Alanson W. Moore, Rutherford; Harrison M. Waugh, Surry.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 142.

13. REPORT AND RESOLUTION OF COMMITTEE ON
EDUCATION.

        Wednesday, December 18, 1833.--Mr. Mendenhall, from the committee on Education and the Literary Fund, made a detailed report thereon, accompanied by the following resolutions, to wit:

        Swamp lands belong to Literary Board.

        Resolved, That, in the opinion of this Legislature, all the vacant and unappropriated marsh and swamp lands in this State were, by the law passed in 1825, actually transferred, and do now belong to the Literary Fund of this State.

        And whereas there are large tracts of marshy and swampy lands, belonging to said Literary Fund, which, from their situation, cannot be of advantage or become in any manner available without draining the same, and the draining said lands being by law placed beyond the reach of individual enterprize; and whereas it is believed to be an act of justice to the citizens and a prudent course to be pursued, that an attempt be made to drain said lands, or a part thereof: Therefore it is further

        Swamp lands to be drained.

        Resolved, That the president and directors of the Literary Fund be empowered, and they are hereby authorized to expend of said fund any sum not exceeding thirty thousand dollars in the draining of any of the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands belonging to said Literary Fund, which they may deem advisable Which were read the first time and passed, and, on motion of Mr. Meares1

        1 William B. Meares, New Hanover.

        2 This resolution was defeated. See later proceedings.

--Senate Journal, 1833-34, p. 59.

        Swamp lands now property of Literary Board.

        The Report.--The Committee on Education and the Literary Fund to whom was referred so much of his Excellency, the Governor's message as relates to that subject, and also the report of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund--Report, that they have examined the law establishing the Literary Fund of this State, and considered of the question presented in the Governor's message, with much care and attention; and your Committee are all clearly of the opinion and well satisfied that whatever might have been the intention of the framers of the law of 1825, still the law itself does give and has transferred not only the proceeds of the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands in this State to that fund, but that the land itself is by law conveyed and is now the property of the Literary fund, set apart by law for the establishing of Common Schools.

        Literary Fund has gradually increased.

        Your committee perceive by a reference to years past since the said fund was created, that there has been a slow and gradual increase of the same, and in no three years together has the increase from all sources been so great as that of the past year, which has been entirely owing to a dividend of a part of the stock in the Banks of Newbern and the State Bank of North Carolina on shares belonging to the Literary Fund.

        No plan of schools can now be established with funds in hand.

        Anxious to establish schools; Literary Fund should be increased first.

        Your Committee were anxious to recommend some method both of which the number of children in the State now without the means of education could be properly ascertained; and also if possible to devise some plan by which a course of Common Schools should be commenced throughout the State for the benefit of those who are unable to procure a common education. But in reviewing the extent of Territory within our limits, and the population it contains with a due regard not only to the amount of available funds, but also to a proper and prudent management of the same so as to answer the, wise and benevolent purposes intended by the law creating the Fund.

Your Committee believe they would be doing injustice to the intention of the framers of the law, and the object they had in view to recommend any plan or course of expenditure so as to diminish the principal sum in the support of schools--Although your Committee believe there is an anxious solicitude on the part of all (and on the part of none more than each member of your Committee) to impart instruction from the bounties of the State, to those unable to obtain the benefit of schools, and to strew, as it were, in broad cast, the benefits of education into every Cottage throughout the country, and to bring the means within the reach of every poor man's door; still your Committee are constrained to say that the only wise and safe course the Legislature can pursue is to forbear engaging in any general plan of establishing Common schools until any course which can be adopted can be supported by expending the interest and no more, in carrying on the same, otherwise the influence and benefits of the system must be partial in its effects and short in its duration.

        Swamp lands considered.

        Lands ought to be drained, thereby increasing the Literary Fund.

        Plan considered.

        Appropriation recommended.

        Your Committee have duly considered the plan, recommended by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund in their report in regard to the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands of this State, with reference also to the quantity mentioned in the Governor's message, and as one great object and desire on the part of your committee is, if possible, to devise ways and means to increase the amount of the Literary Fund, until the annual interest arising therefrom will be sufficient to justify an undertaking so desirable, of so much importance and of so much general usefulness to the younger Classes of society, hundreds of whom though poor are children of much promise. Your Committee are therefore of the opinion that the most probable means of increasing the principal amount of the fund, is to effect the draining some of the lakes or swamp lands in this State, and thereby become enabled

to bring into market a considerable quantity of the most valuable property now belonging to the Fund, and which must remain wholly unavailable, and worthless until some such enterprise is accomplished; and your Committee are induced to believe, from information derived in various ways, that the lands when thus drained, will be of a highly fertile character, and will command the highest prices for Cultivation; perhaps from five to fifteen or twenty dollars per acre. Your Committee have, therefore, been brought to believe that, although it might and would be far better to accept the plan recommended by the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, rather than suffer those extensive bodies of vacant and unappropriated swamp lands to remain untouched by public and placed as they are beyond individual enterprise; but your Committee think that from the examinations and surveys already made, the prospect of success in an attempt to drain those lands is now clothed with sufficient certainty, or at least probability, to render it unadvisable for the State to part with so large a portion as one half of all the lands which might be drained by the plan recommended; and therefore, your committee under all the circumstances, believe it the far preferable course for the attempt to be made at the instance of the Public, and the expense of the Literary Fund at once, which, upon the lands being laid bare by draining, would increase the capital of that Fund to an amount which, in the opinion of your Committee, would well justify the hazard of the undertaking. Your Committee, therefore, think the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, who, by law, consist of the Governor, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the Speaker of the two Houses, and Treasurer of the State should be invested with power to appropriate any sum not to exceed $30,000 to be expended in draining any of the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands in this State, which in their estimation,

may be deemed most advisable, and most likely to result to Public advantage.

        Your Committee, therefore, ask leave to report the accompanying resolution upon the subject, and recommend its adoption.

GEO. C. MENDENHALL, Chairman.

--From Legislative Documents, 1833.

        Plan to drain swamp lands fails in Senate.

        Wednesday, Jan. 1, 1834.--On motion of Mr. Pugh1

        1 Dameron Pugh, Hyde.

--Senate Journal, 1833-34, p. 88.

        Motion to reconsider vote on swamp land resolution fails.

        Thursday, Jan. 2, 1834.--A motion was made by Mr. Stedman1

        1 Nathan A. Stedman, Chatham.

--Senate Journal, 1833-34, p. 92.

        Friday, Jan. 3, 1834.--Mr. Cooper1

        1 Jesse Cooper, of Martin, on death of David Latham.

        Whereas it is desirable by the free white citizens of North Carolina, that public schools should be established throughout the State; therefore

        Resolution to limit sessions of Legislature to forty days and thus increase school fund.

        Resolved, For the purpose of carrying this grand object into effect, on the best and safest principles, a joint select committee, consisting of ten members from each House, be raised, for the purpose of inquiring into the expediency of limiting the sessions of the General Assembly to forty days; and that they have leave to report by bill or otherwise.

        Laid on table.

        Which was read, and, on motion of Mr. Brittain2

        2 Mark Brittain.

        3 Never taken from the table.

--Senate Journal, 1833-34, p. 93.

14. OBJECTION TO CHARTERING DENOMINATIONAL
SCHOOLS.

        Bills introduced to charter two denominational schools.

        Wednesday, December 4, 1833.--Mr. Battle1

        1 William H. Battle, of Franklin.

        2 William R. Hargrove, of Granville.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 166.

        Both bills referred to the committee on education.

        --Thursday, December 5, 1833.--The bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor Institution in the county of Wake, was, on motion of Mr. Kittrell1

        1 Pleasant W. Kittrell, of Anson.

House Journal, 1833-34, p. 168.

        Saturday, December 7, 1833.--The bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School, was, on motion of Mr. Hargrove, referred to the committee on Education.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 170.

        Report of Education Committee on School Charters.--The Committee upon Education to whom were referred the bills to establish a Literary and Manual Labor institution in the County of Wake and the bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School,

having had the same under consideration, beg leave respectfully to make their report.

        Bills and amendments reported.

        They recommend that said bills be passed into laws with the following amendments, to wit: That the bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy, etc., be amended by striking out that part of the bill in the third section: "The Presbytery of Orange shall elect such trustees" and inserting the words, "remaining and surviving trustees;" and by adding a clause subjecting the real estate which may be possessed by said corporation to taxation as other real estate, except five hundred acres upon which may be erected the buildings for literary purposes. And that the bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor Institution in the county of Wake be amended by striking out the name of Joseph Spurgon and inserting the name of Josiah Wiseman, and by adding a clause pertaining to the taxation of real estate, as in the other bill.

        Report of the committee.

        Objections to schools on constitutional grounds.

        Your committee are aware that apprehensions are entertained that if these bills be passed into laws a class of individuals in their corporate capacity may have conferred upon them privileges, if not incompatible with our Constitution and Bill of Rights, yet inconsistent with the freedom and genius of our institutions. These bills having no object but to found and establish institutions to promote learning and disseminate knowledge, it would seem to us, that no just apprehension could well be entertained.

        Principles of the bills already sanctioned by the Legislature.

        It appears, from the legislation of the State heretofore, that the principles of these bills have been clearly sanctioned, if not transcended. An act was passed in the year 1796, entitled an act to secure property to religious societies or congregations of every denomination, which act authorized any religious society to select trustees who were empowered and vested with full and ample authority to purchase and hold in trust for such religious society any lands, houses, or tenements, and to receive donations of any nature or kind whatsoever for the use and benefit

of such society. And by an act passed in the year 1809, amendatory of the act of 1796, the trustees were enabled to sue and be sued, plead and be impleaded. These acts were manifestly passed to enable the several religious societies of this State to advance and promote religion. The aim and intent of these bills are to diffuse the blessings of an education and a knowledge of the mechanic arts.

        Ravenscroft Academy bill of 1831 similar to these bills.

        In the year 1831, an act was passed to incorporate the Ravenscroft Academy in the town of Fayetteville, which embraces principles analogous to these bills. Your committee conceive that, if this act remains upon your statute book and these bills are forbidden to be passed, upon that contingency, there would then be established by law a set of men entitled to exclusive privileges and emoluments, which is forbidden by the Bill of Rights.

        State can not establish schools; should encourage the denominations to do so.

        Your Committee are aware that the State can not at this time, without imposing an exceedingly onerous burden on the people, comply with the 41st Section of our Constitution, which imperatively requires that a school or schools shall be established by the Legislature for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters paid by the public as may enable them to instruct at low prices. To effect this noble purpose, the instruction of the youth of our State, associations of individuals, whether of the different denominations of Christians or not, have asked of us the common privilege of incorporation, which has been so freely bestowed by the Legislature on associations of individuals for inferior objects.

        The bills will aid in diffusing knowledge; no religious denomination given preference by them.

        The Committee beg leave to submit another remark: that as all political power is vested in and derived from the people, it becomes the duty of the Legislature to diffuse information and knowledge amongst the people. And it does appear to your Committee that this duty can be performed to a great extent by passing these bills into laws and enacting others of a like character. In doing so, we are not impugning another section of our Constitution

which forbids the establishment of one religious church in this State in preference to any other.

        All which is respectfully submitted.

R. H. ALEXANDER,1 Chairman.

        1 Mr. Alexander represented the borough of Salisbury in House of Commons, 1833-34.

--From Unpublished Legislative Documents, 1833-34.

        Wednesday, December 11, 1833.--Mr. R. H. Alexander, from the committee on Education, to which was referred the bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School, reported the same with sundry amendments. The said bill was further amended on motion of Mr. Daniel, read the second time and passed--Yeas 95, nays 34. The yeas and nays called for by Mr. Wiseman.

        Vote in the House on the second reading of the Greensboro Manual Labor School bill.

        Those who voted in the affirmative were Messrs. R. H. Alexander, Barco, Barringer (D. M.), Battle (William H.), Blackman, Brandon, Brower, Burgin, Calvert, Cansler, Carter, Clement, Coleman, Corpening, Cotten, Courts, Daniel, Dawson, Edmonston, Ennett, Fisher, Gillespie, Graham, Grier, Guinn, Hardee, Hardison, Hargrove, Houghton, Hawkins, Henry, W. Horton, Irion, Irvine, J. B. Jones, Wm. Jones, Wesley Jones, J. D. Jones, Kennedy, King, Kittrell, Latham, Leonard, Lilly, Locke, Lyon, Macklin, Malloy, Marsteller, Martin, Mixon, Moore. Monk, Montgomery, Mullen, Murray, McCleese, McGhee, W. McLean, McLeod, McNeill, Outlaw, Phelps, Poindexter, W. Potts, Powell, Peebles, Rand, Register, Relfe, Riddick, Roberts, Saunderson, Seawell, Shepard, Sloan, Smallwood, J. L. Smith, C. Smith, Stephens, Tatham (Latham?), Thomas, Thompson, Tillett, Watson, Waugh, Weaver, Welch, Whitehurst, Willey, Williams, Wilson, Witcher, Wyche, Ziglar--Yeas 95.

        Those who voted in the negative were Messrs. G. H.

Alexander, Allen, Allison, Boddie, Brown, Bynum, Cherry, Cloman, Cromwell, Dodson, Foreman, Foscue, Grady, Guthrie, Hammond, Harper, J. Horton, Houlder, Jasper, Ro. Jones, Judkins, Ledford, Leffers, Long, Pierse, J. W. Potts, Pugh, Raper, Settle, Smithwick, Stockard, Taylor, Wadworth, Wiseman--nays 34.

        Vote on Wake Forest Institute Bill.

        Mr. R. H. Alexander, from the committee on Education, to which was referred the bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor School in the county of Wake, reported the same with Sundry amendments. The amendments were concurred in. The bill was further amended on the motions of Mr. Daniel and Mr. McNeill, and read the second time and passed--Yeas 91, nays 36. The yeas and nays were demanded by Mr. Edmonston1.

        1 On the vote on this bill the division was practically as on the other bill, except that Messrs. Edmonston and Hawkins, who voted in the affirmative on the Greensborough bill, voted in the negative on this bill.

--House Journal, 1833-34, pp. 177 and 178.

        Greensboro bill passes third reading; Wake Forest bill recommitted.

        Monday, Dec. 16, 1833.--The bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labour School was read the third time and passed, and ordered to be engrossed.

        The bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor School in the county of Wake, was, on motion of Mr. Roberts, recommitted to the committee on Education.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 187.

        Report on recommitted Wake Forest bill.

        Recommended amendments be stricken out.

        The Committee upon Education to whom was referred a bill to establish a literary and manual labor institution in the county of Wake beg leave to report:

        As to the bill recommitted to them, they have decided that the amendments which were offered and passed in the House be stricken out and that the bill be passed as

originally reported. Your committee having heretofore offered their reasons in favor of the passage of these bills, or ones similar in principle, deem as an useless waste of time again to repeat them.

        All of which is submitted.

R. H. ALEXANDER, Chairman.

--Legislative Documents, 1833-34.

        Wake Forest bill Passes House on third reading.

        Wednesday, Dec. 18, 1833.--Mr. R. H. Alexander, from the committee on Education, to which was referred the bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor School in the county of Wake, reported the same with sundry amendments. Mr. Settle moved that the said bill be indefinitely postponed. The question thereon was decided in the negative--Yeas 32, nays 90. The yeas and nays1

        1 The vote was practically the same as on the second reading of the Greensborough bill.

        2 Benjamin Settle, Rockingham.

        The said bill was read a third time, amended, passed, and ordered to be engrossed.

--House Journal, 1833-34, pp. 191 and 192.

        Greensboro bill passes Senate.

        Saturday, Dec. 21, 1833.--A message from the Senate, informing that they had passed the engrossed bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School1.

        1 The passage of this bill, as well as the bill for the Wake County school, was also resisted in the Senate. See the following pages.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 198.

        Wake Forest bill passes Senate; amendments.

        Tuesday, Dec. 24, 1833.--A message from the Senate informing that they had passed the engrossed bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor Institution in the county

of Wake, with amendments, and asking the concurrence of this House. The amendments were read and concurred in.

--House Journal, 1833-34, p. 201.

        Vote on the Greensboro school bill in Senate, second reading.

        The engrossed bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School, was read the second time, and amended on motion of Mr. Skinner of Perquimans, and Mr. Mendenhall, and passed--Ayes 31, noes 25. The ayes and noes being demanded by Mr. Mendenhall, are as follows, to wit:

        Those who voted in the affirmative, are Messrs. Beard, Brittain of Burke, Caldwell, Clayton, Elliott, Faison, Foy, Gavin, Hinton, Howell, Hussey, Jones, Kendall, Klutts, McCormick, Martin of Richmond, Martin of Rockingham, Meares, Mendenhall, Moore, Morris, Morrison, Murchison, Sherard, Shuford, Skinner of Perquimans, Skinner of Chowan, Spaight, Stedman, Stone, Vann.

        Those who voted in the negative, are Messrs. Arrington, Brittain of Macon, Dobson, Edwards, Flowers, Hall, Harrison, Hoke, Kerr, Lindsey, Mann, Matthews, Melvin, Montgomery, Moye of Greene, Moye of Pitt, Nash, Phillips, Simmons, Sitton, Skinner of Pasquotank, Smaw, Vanhook, Walton, Wilder.

--Senate Journal, 1833-4, p. 61.

        Vote on Greensboro bill on third reading.

        The engrossed bill to incorporate the Greensborough Academy and Manual Labor School, was read the third time.--Mr. Hoke moved to amend the bill by adding the following proviso at the end thereof, to wit: "Provided that all donations which may be made to the said society shall be applied to the education of poor children." Which amendment was not agreed to. Mr. Sherard moved that the further consideration of the said bill be postponed indefinitely; which was not agreed to--Ayes 28, noes 31.

The ayes and noes being demanded by Mr. Sherard, are as follows, to wit:

        Those who voted in the affirmative, are Messrs. Samuel L. Arrington, Nash; Mark Brittain, Burke; Benjamin S. Brittain, Macon; Otway Burns, Carteret; Wm. P. Dobson, Surry; Weldon N. Edwards, Warren; Hardy Flowers, Edgecombe; Wm. R. Hall, Brunswick; James Harrison, Jones; Daniel Hoke, Lincoln; James Kerr, Caswell; Daniel Lindsey, Currituck; Ephraim Mann, Tyrrell; Isham Matthews, Halifax; Robert Melvin, Bladen; Wm. Montgomery, Orange; Wyatt Moye, Greene; Alfred Moye, Pitt; Enoch Nash, Camden; George Phillips, Ashe; Gabriel Sherard, Wayne; Luke R. Simmons, Columbus; Wm. Sitton, Haywood; Jos. M. Skinner, Pasquotank; Wm. E. Smaw, Beaufort; Robert Vanhook, Person; John Walton, Gates; Hillory Wilder, Johnston.

        Those who voted in the negative, are Messrs. John Beard, Jr., Rowan; Jos. P. Caldwell, Iredell; John Clayton, Buncombe; Josiah Collins, Washington; Henry B. Elliott, Randolph; Herod Faison, Northampton; Edward C. Gavin, Sampson; Charles L. Hinton, Wake; Shadrach Howell, Robeson; John E. Hussey, Duplin; Edmund Jones, Wilkes; Reuben Kendall, Montgomery; George Klutts, Cabarrus; Duncan McCormick, Cumberland; Alexander Martin, Richmond; Robert Martin, Rockingham; Wm. B. Meares, New Hanover; A. W. Mebane, Bertie; George C. Mendenhall, Guilford; Matthew R. Moore, Stokes; Wm. A. Morris, Anson; Washington Morrison, Mecklenburg; Duncan Murchison, Moore; Thos. W. Norman, Granville; Martin P. Shuford, Rutherfordton; Henry Skinner, Perquimans; Jos. B. Skinner, Chowan; Richard D. Spaight, Craven; N. A. Stedman, Chatham; Thos. G. Stone, Franklin; John Vann, Hertford.

        Mr. Montgomery moved that the further consideration of the said bill be postponed until tomorrow; which was not agreed to. The question then recurring on the passage

of the bill the third time, it was decided in the affirmative, and a message sent to the House of Commons, asking their concurrence in the amendments.

--Senate Journal, 1833-4, pp. 62 and 63.

        Wake Forest bill in Senate, on second reading.

        The engrossed bill to establish a Literary and Manual Labor Institution in the county of Wake, was read the second time. Mr. Skinner, of Perquimans, moved to amend the bill by striking out the following words, to wit: "except five hundred acres on which the building shall be erected for the purposes contemplated in said act;" which amendment was agreed to. Mr. Spaight moved further to amend the bill by inserting after the word "politic" in the first section, the following words, to wit: "for the purpose of educating youth, and for no other purpose whatever;" also after the word "donor," in the same section, to insert the following words, to wit: "to the purposes hereby declared"; which amendments were agreed to, and the bill, as amended, was read the second time and passed; and was subsequently read the third time, amended on motion of Mr. Spaight, and passed--Ayes 29, noes 29--the speaker1

        1 William D. Moseley, Lenoir.

        Wake Forest bill on third reading in Senate.

        Those who voted in the affirmative, are Messrs. Beard, Caldwell, Clayton, Collins, Elliott, Faison, Gavin, Hinton, Howell, Hussey, Jones, Kendall, McCormick, Martin of Richmond, Meares, Mebane, Mendenhall, Moore, Morris, Morrison, Nash, Norman, Shuford, Skinner of Perquimans, Skinner of Chowan, Spaight, Stedman, Stone, Vann.

        Those who voted in the negative, are Messrs. Arrington, Brittain of Burke, Brittain of Macon, Burns, Cooper, Dobson, Edwards, Flowers, Foy2,

        2 Thomas Foy, Onslow.

Moye of Greene, Moye of Pitt, Phillips, Pugh3

        3 Dameron Pugh, Hyde.

--Senate Journal, 1833-4, pp. 67 and 68.

15. "OLD FIELD" ON THE NECESSITY FOR SCHOOLS.

From the Western Carolinian.

        North Carolina a century behind other States.

        Use of Literary Fund.

        People must learn to spell internal improvements before we shall have them.

        Mr. Editor: In your last paper I observed a piece taken from the 'Family Lyceum,' which contains a great deal of matter upon the subject of the School Funds in the different States. What a mirror is it to the eyes of a North Carolinian? We see from that, that she, upon this, as upon all other subjects of importance to her citizens, is almost a century behind her sister States. True, she has a small school fund, but how is it applied? Do we use it for the purpose of bringing within the reach of the children of the poor, the means of education? No, but we borrow from it, from year to year, to pay our members of Assembly? How humiliating this must be to the pride of every public-spirited citizen. The State of N. Carolina borrowing money to pay her members of Assembly, from a fund set apart for the education of the poor! Shame upon our law-givers. Can we expect to compete with our sister States, in the march of improvement now going on, while many of our citizens remain ignorant even of the alphabet? Can we expect to arouse them to the importance of internal communication, by means of Canals, or Rail Roads, while they remain ignorant even of the names of these mediums of conveyance? Surely not. A child must crawl before it can walk.--Our citizens must learn how to spell Internal Improvements before they can comprehend the meaning of the term.

        Time to begin some system of schools.

        I have thrown out these desultory remarks, in the hope, Mr. Editor, that some person more able than I am, would urge the importance of some system of Common Schools, to the citizens of our State. It is high time we were thinking upon the subject.--It is one of vital importance to our welfare.

OLD FIELD.

--In Raleigh Register, Aug. 13, 1833.

1834

• 1. TAXATION AND REVENUE SYSTEM.
• 2. FRIENDS ASK FOR REPEAL OF CERTAIN SLAVERY LAWS.
• 3. JOHNSTON COUNTY FREE SCHOOL LAW REPEALED.
• 4. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.
• 5. ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS ON EDUCATION.
• 6. HOUSE REPORT ON EDUCATION.
• 7. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 8. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 9. McQUEEN'S EDUCATION BILL.
• 10. THE STANDARD'S COMMENT ON McQUEEN'S BILL.
• 11. THE STAR ON FREE SCHOOLS.

1. TAXATION AND REVENUE SYSTEM.

        Treasury gradually running in debt each year.

        Property assessed too low.

        The revenue system of the State is radically defective, and requires both revision and amendment. For some years past the disbursements from the Public Treasury have exceeded the ordinary receipts, and we have been gradually consuming the principal of a productive fund which had been accumulated by the economy of preceding years. The investments which have been made in the stock of the Bank of the State of North Carolina, leaves it no longer in our power to pursue this exhausting process, and we are compelled to provide other means to defray the expenses of the Government. This it is believed may be effected without any increase of the present rate of taxation, if provision is made to secure a fair valuation of real estate, and to ascertain the number of individuals legally liable to poll tax. The Government of the country should never hold out temptations to its citizens to do wrong. Such however is the manifest tendency of the most important principles of our fiscal system. In practice, whatever may have been the theoretical speculations of the law giver, every owner of real estate assesses the value of his own free hold, and it follows as a necessary consequence, that the individual, who is honest under all circumstances, contributes his fair proportion to the maintenance of the Government; while he who is less conscientious receives a direct reward for his iniquity.

        Many slaves not listed for poll tax.

        Amount of revenue out of which the State is defrauded.

        The same objection applies with still greater force to the regulations under which the poll tax is levied. All slaves over twelve and under fifty years of age are subject to a capitation tax. If every slave holder in the community were entirely disposed to do so it is no very easy task to ascertain accurately the proportion of his slaves who are over twelve and under fifty years of age. Records are rarely kept of the ages of those born upon our estates,

and we have still greater difficulty in ascertaining the ages of such as have been acquired by purchase or inheritance. He, however, who is not scrupulously honest, may satisfy his conscience by very superficial inquiries, when they agree with his interest; and the individual who is entirely beyond the influence of moral coercion may commit fraud with impunity. Attempts to detect crimes of this character, are rarely made; and if they were more frequent, success, in the nature of things, is nearly impossible. A single example will suffice to establish the correctness of these remarks, and shew the extent to which the revenue is defrauded. The aggregate number of slaves in this State, in 1830, was 246,462. At least one half of these, by every authorized principle of computation, were between the ages of twelve and fifty years, and at the rate of twenty cents each, should have contributed to the public treasury 24,646 dollars. The entire amount of poll tax derived in that year, from this source, and from the same rate of taxation imposed on every free male between the ages of twenty-one and forty-five, in a population less than half a million was $28,211.35 exclusive of the six per cent. commissions retained by the Sheriffs for collection. It is confidently believed that if a fair mode for the valuation of lands were provided, and a proper system of accountability were devised with respect to the poll tax, that the amount of revenue derived from these sources would be increased one-fourth, and that this reform alone would enable the Public Treasurer to meet the ordinary expenditures from his department. With respect to the tax on slaves, a simple, easy and efficient remedy would probably arise from abolishing the discrimination of ages, and imposing a tax on each. In practice it will be found no more burthensome, and the process more simple, to give in the whole number of slaves at ten cents, than to ascertain the number of those between twelve and fifty, who are subject to twenty cents; and those who now misrepresent

the ages of their slaves, without the fear of detection, will find it much more difficult to conceal their number.

        Poll tax too high in proportion to other taxes.

        I have therefore ventured to express the opinion, that too large a proportion of the public burthen is imposed upon those who are subject to a poll tax only, and that the range of taxation should be extended. Subsequent reflection has satisfied me entirely of the correctness of the position. The poll tax on the day laborer and the capitalist is precisely the same; and it sometimes happens that the latter, like the former, is subject to no other species of contribution. In the one case it is an onerous imposition; in the other, a tax a thousand fold greater might occasion no sensible inconvenience. It seems at least to be worthy of consideration, whether pleasure carriages, and other articles of luxury, and especially collateral inheritances, should not be brought within the operation of our revenue laws.

--From Governor Swain's Message, Nov. 1834.

2. FRIENDS ASK FOR REPEAL OF CERTAIN SLAVERY LAWS.

MEMORIAL AND PETITION

        Of the Religious Society of Friends, convened at New Garden, in Guilford County, North Carolina, in the Eleventh month, 1834.

        To the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, Respectfully sheweth--That your Memorialists, entertaining a hope that you will be disposed seriously to consider any subject connected with the great principles of Civil and Religious Liberty, affecting every class of citizens, respectfully present this Memorial.

        Duty of the Legislature to provide instruction for all classes.

        In this enlightened age and country, and before the Assembly to which your Memorialists now appeal, we deem it unnecessary to urge the incontrovertible arguments that might be advanced from reason and Religion, to prove that it is the indispensable duty of the Legislature of a Christion people to enact laws and establish regulations for the literary instruction of every class, within its limits; and that such provisions should be consistent with sound policy, tend to strengthen the hands of Government and promote the peace and harmony of the community at large.

        Your Petitioners consider it a high privilege, that they are subjects of a Government, mild in its form and professedly Republican; that the people have annually the choice of their Legislators--a circumstance that lessens the difficulty and delicacy of petitioning for the repeal of laws enacted by preceding Legislatures and encourages their hope of success.

        Ask repeal of laws prohibiting instruction of slaves; also the law to prevent negroes from preaching.

        Your Memorialists are therefore emboldened under a weighty concern of Religious duty, to petition the present General Assembly of North Carolina to repeal all those laws, enacted by preceding Legislatures of this State, against the literary instruction of Slaves, making it a

finable offence for any to be found to be teaching them to read. And they respectfully request your consideration of the repeal of the law recently enacted, prohibiting all coloured persons in this State, bond or free, upon the penalty of corporeal punishment, from public preaching, exhorting, &c. in their respective Religious Congregations or Societies. We consider these laws unrighteous, offensive to God and contrary to the spirit and principles of the Christian Religion; and your Memorialists believe, if not repealed, will increase the difficulties and danger they were intended to prevent.

        Friends encourage obedience of slaves.

        Your Petitioners, so far from using any measures, either publicly or privately, that would tend to increase their discontent with their situation, feel it their indispensable duty, upon all suitable occasions, to encourage slaves to obedience and faithfulness to their masters, as the most probable means of mitigating their sufferings, and ameliorating their present condition. We would exhort them in the language of the Apostle--

        "Servants be obedient to your Masters"--and we do exhort Masters to be kind to their Slaves, as, we have no doubt, such Christian usage would induce a reciprocity of kindlier feelings between them, and ultimately tend to increase the happiness of both, and also promote the harmony and prosperity of the Civil and Religious community. And may we not believe that the more we live in the spirit and in the practice of the precepts of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the more kind and gentle will be our treatment of every grade of our fellow creatures--for was not the harmonizing and evangelizing of the whole human family, one of the grand purposes for which this Religion was introduced into the world?

        Laws asked to encourage education of slaves.

        And lastly, your Petitioners would respectfully submit to your consideration, not only the repeal of those laws before mentioned, but the enacting of other laws and regulations for the general instruction of Slaves, in the

doctrines and precepts of the Christian Religion, and in so much of literary education at least, as will enable them to read the Holy Scriptures, which would undoubtedly tend to the improvement of their general character, and condition, and greatly lessen if not wholly remove, the apprehensions of danger from them.

        And may you be influenced by that wisdom which is from above, which is profitable to direct, and which the Apostle says, "is first pure, then peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits." That you may be enabled to enact righteous laws, the operation and execution of which may be a terror to evil-doers, an encouragement to those that do well, and to the praise of God; that violence may no more be heard in our land, but that Righteousness, which exalteth a nation, may so prevail, that the threatening judgments of Heaven on account of sin (which is a reproach to any people) may be averted; that you may so discharge all your various Legislative duties as to feel that peace that passeth all understanding; and may the Blessing of the Most High rest upon you, and be more signally and generally dispensed on the inhabitants of this highly favoured country. So prayeth your petitioners and peaceable Christian citizens.

        Signed on behalf, and by direction, of the aforesaid yearly meeting, by

JEREMIAH HUBBARD, Clerk.

--Unpublished Legislative Documents.

3. JOHNSTON COUNTY FREE SCHOOL LAW REPEALED.

        Wednesday, November 26, 1834.--Mr. Wilder1

        1 Hillary Wilder, of Johnston county. Josiah Houlder presented the bill in the House of Commons. James Tomlinson was the other Johnston member in the House.

        2 The act of repeal passed House of Commons Thursday, Nov. 27, 1834. See House Journal, 1834-35, p. 156.

--Senate Journal, 1834-35, p. 19.

4. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.

        Senate.

        Thursday, Nov. 20, 1834.--On Education and Literary Fund, Messrs. Samuel L. Arrington, of Nash; Hugh McQueen, of Chatham; John J. McMillan, of Bladen; Duncan McCormick, of Cumberland; Ephraim Mann1

        1 Died at Raleigh, Monday, December 1, 1834. Senate Journal, 1834-35, p. 28.

--Senate Journal, 1834-35, p. 8.

        House.

        Wednesday, Nov. 19, 1834.--Thomas C. Matthews, Pasquotank; Thomas J. Pugh, Bertie; John W. Potts, Edgecombe; Matthias E. Manly, New Bern; Archibald Monk, Sampson; George Boddie, Nash; Wm. Wadsworth, Moore; William A. Graham, Hillsboro; Littleton A. Gwyn, Caswell; William Foushee, Chatham; Michael Hoke, Lincoln; James H. Perkins, Burke; Harrison M. Waugh, Surry.

--House Journal, 1834-35, p. 139.

5. ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS ON EDUCATION.

        Friday, Nov. 21, 1834.--On motion of Mr. Monk1,

        1 Archibald Monk, Sampson.

        To find out amount of Literary Fund.

        Resolved, That the committee on Education be instructed to inquire into and ascertain the amount of the Literary Fund from all sources, exclusive of lands appropriated to that object.

        Resolved further, That said committee be instructed to enquire into the expediency of improving or disposing of a part or the whole of the Marsh and Swamp lands, lying in the eastern section of this State, appropriated to the use of common schools.

        Swamp lands.

        Resolved further, That said committee be instructed to inquire into the expediency of submitting some plan to ascertain the amount of latent claims to lands in this State, appropriated to the use of common schools.

--House Journal, 1834-35, p. 146-147.

        Monday, December 8, 1834.--On motion of Mr. McQueen,

        Inquiry how Literary Fund may be increased.

        Resolved, That the Committee on Education be instructed to inquire into the expediency of providing by legislative enactment, for the enlargement of the Literary Fund, and to examine the different sources of the public revenue, for the purpose of ascertaining whether or not, there by any of its branches which can be safely diverted from the object to which they are applied at present; and added to the Literary Fund.

        Present school facilities to be ascertained.

        Resolved further, That the Committee on Education be instructed to inquire into the expediency of providing by law, for the attainment of such information as will enlighten

the Legislature in regard to the present facilities for instruction, possessed by the people of North Carolina.

--Senate Journal, 1834-35, p. 42.

        Monday, Dec. 22, 1834.--Mr. Lockhart1

        1 William B. Lockhart, Northampton county.

        Literary Fund too small to establish system of education; thinks it advisable to establish chair of engineering at University.

        Whereas it appears from the report of the Treasurer of the Literary Fund, that the amount thereof is inadequate to the purpose of a system of general education; and whereas, the State of North Carolina, is destitute of native, civil and military engineers: Therefore

        Resolved, That the committee on Education be instructed to enquire into the expediency of appropriating a part of the Literary Fund, to the purpose of establishing a professorship of civil and military engineering, in the University of North Carolina, for the purpose of instructing native youths in those branches of education, so that the practical services of the professor or professors and students shall be devoted to making such surveys, as the Legislature may from time to time order and direct, with a view to the internal improvement of the State; and that the committee have leave to report by bill or otherwise. Whereupon the said resolution was read and adopted.

--Senate Journal, 1834-35, p. 67.

        Appropriation to drain swamp lands.

        Resolved, That the Committee on Education be instructed to enquire into the expediency of making an appropriation from the literary fund for the purpose of draining a part of the marsh or swamp lands now devoted by law to the literary fund.

        Resolved further, That said Committee be instructed to report a bill directing the manner in which said lands shall be disposed of when drained and the purposes to which the proceeds shall be applied1.

        1 Introduced by James A. King, of Iredell.

        In House of Commons, Dec. 26, 1834. Read and adopted.

--Unpublished Legislative Documents.

6. HOUSE REPORT ON EDUCATION.

        The Committee on Education to which was referred several resolutions pertaining to the resources of the Literary Fund, and the best means of improving the same, have considered all of said resolutions.

REPORT.

        Present condition of Literary Fund.

        That their attention was first directed to the amount of the fund for common schools from all sources as provided by the act of the General Assembly of 1825. That act creates a corporation under the name and style of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund: to which is transferred as a fund "for the support of common and convenient schools," the dividends arising from the stock held by the State in the Banks of Newbern and Cape Fear, which have not been before set apart for internal improvement; the dividends arising from stock of the State in the Cape Fear, the Roanoke, and Club Foot and Harlows Creek Canal, Navigation Companies; the tax derived from retailers of spirituous liquors and auctioneers; the unexpended balance of the agricultural fund; (excepting the Cherokee lands) the sum of twenty-one thousand and ninety dollars due from the federal Government on account of reservation of lands, purchased by this State from the Cherokee Indians; and of all the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands in this State, together with such sums of money as the Legislature may thereafter appropriate.

        From these various sources divers sums of money have been raised, which the President and directors of the literary fund, under the direction of the aforesaid act of 1825, have invested chiefly in the purchase of stocks in the Banks of this State, and from the statements furnished in the last annual report of the Public Treasurer, the available

funds of the corporation appear to be as follows:

        To wit:

        Statement of the amount of the fund.

        

1200 shares of stock in Bank of the State of North Carolina		$120,000
Cash		19,403.99½
50 shares of stock in Bank of Cape Fear		5,000.00
141 shares of stock in Bank of Newbern	$14,100
On which there have been dividends of 25 & 20 per centum	6,345
Less 20 per cent on each share	2,820
	$ 9,165
282 shares of stock in the State Bank of N. C., $28,200		4,935.00
On which dividends of 50 and 20 and 10 per cent have been received equal to $22,560		5,640.00
		$154,078.99½

        The total amount therefore at the close of the last fiscal year 1st Nov. 1834 was the sum of one hundred and fifty four thousand and seventy eight dollars, ninety nine and one half cents. In addition to the Bank Stock mentioned above, as belonging to the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, they are entitled to the annual dividends of profit on seven hundred and four shares in the Bank of Cape Fear and on three hundred and fifty nine shares in the Bank of Newbern, the latter however have ceased to yield any profits and may be omitted in any future estimates. During the last year nothing has been paid to this fund from the stocks of any of the Navigation Companies included in the act of 1825. Its increase in the next year may be reasonably estimated as follows, to wit;

        Estimated increase for next year.

        

For entries of vacant lands	$ 5,000
Tavern and auction tax	2,800
Bank dividends of profits	10,000
Navigation Companies	500
Total	$18,300

        The receipts from entries of vacant lands may be expected to diminish, but it is believed that under the able management of the President and directors, the active capital of this corporation may enlarge at the rates of from $15,000 to $20,000 per annum.

        Swamp lands belong to Literary Board.

        Number of acres of swamp lands.

        2nd. Your Committee concur in the opinion of the President and directors, as expressed in their report of the last year, that the vacant swamp lands are conveyed to them by the act of 1825 in fee simple. As however they are only a quasi, and not a real corporation having no individual rights as corporators it is competent for the legislature to repeal the act creating them or any part of it. This has partially been done by the acts of 1826 and 1830, allowing entries of these swamp lands to be made in particular situations. But all not thus subject to entry are the undoubted property of the corporation and even those which may be entered, do not cease to be so, until an actual entry. It is possible that some portions of this extensive territory, embracing according to estimate, one million and a half of acres, belonging to the funds for common schools, might be as appropriately disposed of, by throwing it open to entry as by any other method. Being unable however from present information, to designate such parts they deem it more proper to authorize the President and directors to dispose of such portions as can be ascertained to be arable by sale, and they report the accompanying Bill for that purpose.

        No appropriation to drain swamp lands; bill recommended.

        Your Committee have no means of certifying what portion of these lands are claimed by secret titles of individuals. This can be only partially ascertained by surveys

and examination of the register's books of the counties in which they are situate. Nor do they deem it advisable at present to make an appropriation to drain any portion of them, as they deem it highly important to be first informed not only as to the costs of draining, and the quantity of land to be reclaimed thereby, but whether the wealth of individuals or that of the fund for common schools would be most promoted by the particular works to be undertaken. By the passage of the Bill herewith reported it is believed that a large addition may be made to monies of this fund; which in the space of nine years have increased to such an amount, as by simple interest on its present principal, to afford salaries adequate to the support of at least one competent teacher in every county.

        All of which is respectfully submitted.

WILL. A. GRAHAM, Chm.

        Additional cash to Literary Fund.

        Since the completion of their report the Committee have learned that the cash on hand amounts now to $24,000, which has been invested in 240 additional shares of stock in the Bank of the State of N. C.; the whole fund is therefore, $178,078.99½.

        Letter about cash.

        Dear Sir,--Will you be good enough to append the above as a note to the report of the committee on Education, the fact was not learned until last night, the blank at the end of the note you can fill up by adding to the sum total, mentioned in the report, the difference between $24,000 and the cash reported on hand.

Very respectfully, your obedt. servt.,

WILL. A. GRAHAM.

Col. White.

        Literary Board to sell lands.

        A Bill to authorise the President and Directors of the Literary fund to sell certain portions of the swamp Lands.

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of

North Carolina and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the Governor of this State, as President of the Literary Fund shall have full power and authority to appoint agents in any of the counties in which swamp lands, of the Literary Fund, are situated, to contract for and sell such parts of the said land, as the board may think it expedient, to bring into market, and that said agents may conduct such sales either by public auction or private contract, according to the direction of said President, nor shall any title be passed until a deed shall be executed by him, under the great seal of the State.

        Commission on sales.

        And be it further enacted, by the authority aforesaid, that the said President and Directors of the Literary Fund, shall and may allow such commissions on the amount of sales or such other compensations to the agents aforesaid, as they may deem a fair equivalent.

        In House of Commons Jan. 9, 1835. Engrossed and examined.

        Bill fails.

        In Senate Jan. 9, 1835. Read the first time and on motion of Mr. Montgomery (of A) ordered to lie on the table.

--Unpublished Legislative Documents, 1834.

7. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.

MONDAY January 13th 1834.

        A meeting of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund was held at the Executive Office, at 7 Oclock P. M. Present,

        Directors present.

        David L. Swain Govr. & Prest.

        Chief Justice Ruffin

        Mr. Speaker Moseley

        ----Alexander

        W. S. Mhoon, Pub. Treasurer.

        Secretary.

        William R. Hill was on motion of Ch. Justice Ruffin appointed Secretary.

        Public Library.

        The President submitted to the consideration of the Board the Acts of Assembly creating the Bank of the State of North Carolina, and the Resolution requesting the Board to take the necessary measures for the purchase, preservation and management of a Public Library for the State.

        It was thereupon Resolved

        Statement of fund by treasurer.

        That the Public Treasurer be requested to prepare and lay before the Board a detailed statement of the condition of the Fund, exhibiting the amount of cash now on hand, & the amount which will probably accrue in time to meet the payment of subscriptions to the Stock of the Bank of the State of North Carolina.

        State bank stock to be bought.

        That the Public Treasurer be requested to subscribe in behalf of the Fund for such an amount of stock in said institution, as in his opinion may be done, without embarrassment to the Public Treasury; and that he avail himself if practicable, of the advantages secured by the charter to those stockholders who pay their subscriptions in advance.

        Catalogue of books for State Library.

        It was further Resolved

        That the President be requested to open a correspondence with such gentlemen at the north, as he may deem advisable,

in order to procure catalogues of the best editions of the works proper to be placed in the State Library, and to ascertain the terms upon which they can be procured.

        And then the Board adjourned subject to the call of the President.

SATURDAY August 9th 1834.

        A meeting of the President & Directors of the Literary Fund was held at the Executive Office this day.

        Present,

        David L. Swain, Presdt.

        Chief Justice Ruffin

        & William S. Mhoon Pub. Treasr.

        The following Resolutions were read and adopted.

        Library books.

        Resolved, that the President have authority to draw for so much of the funds appropriated by Resolution of the General Assembly at the last Session for the purchase of a Library, as shall be sufficient to pay for the Books purchased for the State from Victor M. Murphy, whenever the same shall be valued by a Bookseller.

        Resolved, further, that the President be also authorized to draw for the residue of said fund or any part thereof from time to time to pay for such Books as may be purchased through the agency of Messrs. Turner & Hughes & for the expenses of making the purchases & of transportation &c: and that he may advance thereout such sums, as he may think necessary, to Messrs. Turner & Hughes to make purchases with.

        The Board then adjourned subject to the call of the President.

STATEMENT OF THE PUBLIC TREASURER.

        In the year 1826, the unexpended balance of the annual appropriations for the increase of the Library was wholly appropriated. Since that period, the following Statement, exhibits the annual appropriations and expenditures.

        Library appropriations not spent.

        

Year.	Expenditures.	Appropriations.
1827	$ 76.57	$500.00
1828	53.00	500.00
1829	112.50	500.00
1830	100.00	500.00
1831	75.00	500.00
1832	--	500.00
1833	--	500.00
1834	--	500.00
	$417.00	$4,000.00

--MS. Records Literary Board.

8. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.

REPORT.

        To the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina.

        The President and Directors of the Literary Fund, in obedience to the Act of Assembly requiring them to "cause to be kept by the Treasurer for the State, a regular account of all such sums of money as may belong to the said fund, of the manner in which the same has been applied and vested; and to make an annual report thereof to the Legislature, with such recommendations for the improvement of the same, as to them shall seem expedient," respectfully Report:

        That the receipts at the Treasury, on account of the Literary Fund for the year ending on the first day of November, 1834, have been as follows, viz:

        Receipts of fund for the year.

        

The balance of cash in the hands of the Public Treasurer, as Treasurer of the Literary Fund, on the 31st Oct. 1833, as reported to the General Assembly of that year, was

$117,024.81½

        The receipts at the Treasury of money belonging to the Fund for the last year, that is, from the 31st Oct. 1833, to the 1st. Nov. 1834, amount to twenty two thousand three hundred and seventy nine dollars & eighteen cents, (22,379.18) viz:

        

Cash received for entries of vacant land	$5,499.36
Cash received for sundry auctioners tax on sales at auction	356.74
Cash received for Sheriffs, for tax on Tavern licenses	2,417.08
Cash received for State Bank of North Carolina for dividends of profit on stock owned by the President & Directors of this Fund (Dec. 1833)		564.00

Cash received for Bank of Cape Fear, do. do. (June 1833)	150.00
Cash received for State Bank of North Carolina for dividends of Capital, (Feb 1834)	5,640.00
Cash received for State Bank of North Carolina for dividends of Capital, (Sept. 1834)	2,820.00
Cash received for Bank of New Bern, dividends of Capital (Jan. 1834)	2,820.00
Cash received for Bank of Cape Fear, for dividends of profit appropriated to this fund (3 per cent on 704 shares, June 1834)	2,112.00	$ 22,379.18
		$139,403.99½
Deduct amount paid for 1200 shares in the Bank of the State of North Carolina		120,000.00
Balance 1st November 1834		19,403.99½

        Expenditures and balance.

        Of the foregoing sum, one hundred and twenty thousand dollars ($120,000) have been applied by the Treasury in payment for twelve hundred (1200) shares of stock, subscribed by him in the name of this Corporation in obedience to a resolution unanimously adopted by the President and Directors, on the 13th of January last.

        Small duties of the board.

        The Legislature having at the last Session adopted no measure in relation to any of the objects contemplated in the creation of the Literary Fund, the duties of the Board have been since that period confined within narrow limits:--attention to its preservation, and gradual accumulation, by vesting it in productive stock.

        Ask attention to former recommendations about swamp lands.

        The Board have no recommendation to submit to the Legislature, with respect to the improvement of the fund, which has not been the subject of discussion, at previous Sessions. In the discharge of this portion of their duty, they beg leave respectfully to suggest that the various plans for the improvement of the Swamp Land, contained in the Reports of the Board for the years 1827 and 1833, should be either adopted or disapproved. If it shall be considered, that no attempt upon the part of the public, to reclaim them, is expedient, it would seem to be obviously proper to subject them to appropriation, under the entry laws, or sell them, in the manner that the Cherokee lands have been disposed of, to the highest bidder. The opinions of the Board upon the whole subject, are so fully stated, in the Reports referred to, that nothing more is considered necessary or proper upon their part to direct attention to them.

        State Library.

        A Resolution adopted at the last Session of the General Assembly, made it the duty of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund, to ascertain the amount of the various sums set apart for the purchase of a State Library, which remained unexpended, to appropriate the aggregate amount to the purchase of a library, and to have the arsenal prepared for its reception.

        State Arsenal in no condition for Library.

        Steps taken to get books for Library.

        The necessary attention has been given to the subject, and the Resolution complied with as nearly as was practicable. Immediately after the adjournment of the Legislature, the arsenal was examined, and was found to be in a condition that would have required the expenditure of a much larger sum, to have rendered it a proper place for the preservation of books, than was supposed to have been in the contemplation of the General Assembly: Under these circumstances the Board determined unanimously, that a catalogue of such works, as would constitute a suitable Library for the State should be prepared under the direction of the President, that immediate purchases

should be made of a few rare works from the representatives of the late Judge Murphey, and that arrangements should be made with Messrs. Turner & Hughes, Booksellers of the City, to procure the rest of the books comprised in the Catalogue at as early a period, as a suitable Library room could be prepared in the new Capitol. The books purchased are deposited in the Executive office, and are subject to any arrangement, which may be prescribed as most convenient to the Legislature.

        The want of a good Library, even for a single Session, will be seriously felt. The art of Book making is known, however, to be in a much more rapid state of improvement in every respect, than any other which has been attempted in this Country. The delay even of a year will enable the agents that have been selected for this purpose to procure better editions than can be had at present, at diminished prices. The few books that have been obtained, are valuable, and will doubtless afford the members of the Legislature much information on many of the important subjects which will engage their attention.

DAVID L. SWAIN, President.

--Legislatire Documents, 1834.

9. McQUEEN'S EDUCATIONAL BILL.

        Clerk's entries on the original bill.

        A Bill to provide a fund for the establishment of free schools in the State of North Carolina.

        In Senate Dec. 20, 1834, read the first time and passed and on motion of Mr. Wilson1

        1 Jesse Wilson, Perquimans.

        In Senate Dec. 31, 1834, taken up and on motion of Mr. McQueen ordered that the further consideration of the same be postponed until tomorrow.

        In Senate, Jan. 5, 1835,--Read the second time, amended and on motion of Mr. Cooper2

        2 Jesse Cooper, Martin.

        School statistics to be collected.

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the Justices of the different counties of the State, who may be appointed by the county court, to take the list of taxes in the different Captain's districts thereof, shall in addition to receiving the usual list of taxes required by law: require each free white person, who may either render a list of taxable property for himself or another person, to render the number of children between the ages of five and fifteen years embraced in his own family or in the family of such other person as he may render such list for, who can read, the number of children who can both read and write, and the number which have received no instruction whatever, also the number of such children aforesaid as have been sent to school, and the compensation received by their Teacher, and for what length of time.

        2. Be it further enacted that it shall also be the duty of the magistrates who may be appointed to receive the list of taxable property in the different Captains districts, to make out a list of the school Houses occupied for the purpose of instruction in each Captains district, the number of pupils in each School House, the months of the year in which the School Houses have been usually occupied, the qualifications of the Teacher and the compensation he receives, so far as can be recollected.

        Statistics to be sent the Governor.

        Penalty for failure to give information.

        3. Be it further enacted that it shall be the duty of the Magistrates aforesaid to deliver these lists to the Clerk of the County Court, who shall transmit the same legibly written out and regularly authenticated to the Executive of the State immediately preceding the meeting of the General Assembly of the State, each Magistrate who receives the usual list of taxable property shall for his additional labor in making out the list aforesaid, receive such compensation as the County Court may direct, to be paid out of the Treasury of the County and for omitting to take such list shall be subject to the penalty of ten dollars.--That each free white person aforesaid who may render a list of taxable property for himself or for another person and shall refuse in addition thereto to render the list heretofore required in this act shall be subject to a penalty of ten dollars and that any clerk of the County court who may fail to transmit such lists aforesaid as may be delivered to him by the Magistrates herein before mentioned shall be subject to a penalty of twenty-five dollars.

        Clerks to report fines, etc.

        4. Be it further enacted, That it shall hereafter be the duty of the Clerk of the Superior Court and of the County Courts in the respective counties within this State to make out a regular list of the fines and forfeitures, which have been incurred in the Courts of their respective Counties during the year one thousand eight hundred and thirty-four, the manner in which these fines and forfeitures have been usually applied, and how far they constitute a branch

of revenue essential to the maintenance of the County police.--That they shall receive for making out and transmitting it to the Governor of the State such compensation as the County Court may agree to be paid out of the Treasury of the County, and for omitting the performance of this duty, shall be subject to a penalty of twenty-five dollars.

        Salaries of the county trustees to be reported.

        5. Be it further enacted, That the clerks of the County Courts in the different Counties within the State, shall transmit to the executive of the State immediately preceding the next meeting of the Legislature of the same, the amount of compensation annually received by the County Trustee and the County Treasurer in their respective Counties, for the services they perform, and what those services have usually been--and within those counties in which these offices are still in existence it shall be the duty of the Clerk of the said Counties, to state in his communication to the executive on this subject whether or not these offices are absolutely essential to the just administration of the financial concerns of the Counties, and where the office of County Trustee and County Treasurer have been dispensed with in any of the Counties within the State, it shall be the duty of the Clerks of the said Counties to state to the executive for the information of the Legislature whether or not, the abolition of the said offices has proved a serious detriment to the official operations of the County--and that the said Clerks for making such communication to the Governor of the State shall receive such compensation as the County Court may direct and for omitting the same shall be subject to a penalty of twenty five dollars.

        Expense of keeping poor to be reported.

        6. Be it further enacted, That it shall hereafter be obligatory on the Clerks of the Wardens of the Poor in the different Counties within this State; to make out a list stating the number of the Poor supported by their respective counties and the expense of supporting them during the year 1834--and shall in addition to this state

whether they are supported by letting them out to individual bidders, or in a Poor House and the comparative expense of the two modes of supporting them, that this list shall be transmitted to the Executive of the State, and by him shall be transmitted to the next Legislature of the same--and that the said Clerks of the Wardens of the Poor shall receive for making this communication to the Executive such compensation as the County Court may direct and for omitting the same shall be subject to a penalty of ten dollars.

        Laying off counties into departments with a view to location of public schools.

        7. Be it further enacted, That the Magistrates in the different Counties of the State shall at the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions of their respective Counties which shall be held after the first day of March next, seven Justices being present, order the County surveyor to lay off the Counties aforesaid into departments not larger than ten miles square and not smaller than four miles square, respect always being had in laying off such departments to the wealth and density of the population embraced in the tracts of country in which such departments shall be made.

        Three commissioners in each department to provide for the poor.

        8. And be it further enacted, That in laying off these departments, respect shall always be had to the future location of Public Schools within them; and that the Justices of the County Courts in different Counties within this State, shall at the term of the said Court which shall be held within their respective Counties immediately after the first day of March next, seven Justices being present choose three commissioners for each department of the Poor in said Counties whose duty it shall be to take charge of the poor in their respective departments and parishes and to provide for every case of pauperism which may arise in their respective departments after the first day of May in the year one thousand eight hundred and thirty four.

        Commissioners may impose tax for the poor.

        9. Be it also enacted, That the said commissioners shall meet in their respective departments at least four times in

each year, and then if it shall be necessary impose on the inhabitants of their said departments a tax proportioned to the value of their land and slaves, which tax shall be sufficient for the support of every pauper which may be presented to the said commissioners in their respective departments after the first day of May next, as a fit subject of public charity and which shall continue to be assessed as aforesaid by the Commissioners until the pauper or paupers for whose support it may have been imposed shall die or be otherwise removed from the poor list, and that in addition to this such a tax as the commissioners of the poor may direct shall also be imposed on each free male in the said departments who own neither land nor slaves which sum so levied shall also be applied to the support of the poor of the department in which the assessment shall be made.

        Proceedings of commissioners to be reported to the Governor.

        10. Be it further enacted that the aforesaid Commissioners shall at the usual meetings to be held in their respective departments, for the purpose of providing for the wants of the poor and inquiring into the condition of the same shall appoint a Clerk, whose duty it shall be to make an annual report of their proceedings to the Clerk of the County Court which shall be transmitted by him to the executive of the State for the information of the Legislature.

        Same tax as now levied for the poor to be levied continually.

        11. Be it further enacted, That the same sum which has been assessed for the support of the poor in the different counties of this State, for the year 1834 shall still continue to be assessed hereafter by the Justices of the County Court in like manner as it has hitherto been regardless of any diminution which may occur in the number of the poor on the poor lists of said counties produced either by deaths or removals from the said lists and shall continue to be applied to the support of such of the poor as may be found on the poor lists in the different counties aforesaid on the first day of May next agreeable to the ratios of

expense at which each pauper now on the poor list is supported.

        Excess of poor fund due to death to go to Literary Fund.

        12. Be it further enacted, That when any pauper who may be found on the poor lists in the different Counties in the State, on the first day of May, 1835 shall die or be removed from the poor list, the sum or sums which had been allotted for the support of said pauper or paupers under the assessment of 1834 for the support of the poor in the different counties within the State shall be considered a clear accession to the Literary Fund and shall be held by the Treasurer of the State for the use of the Literary Fund.

        13. Be it further enacted, That when the paupers who may be found on the poor lists in the different Counties in this State shall die or be otherwise removed from the poor lists, the sum which was assessed in the year 1834, for the support of the poor in said counties and which shall be assessed annually hereafter by the justices of the Counties regardless of the diminution of the poor on the poor lists of said counties by deaths or otherwise shall be considered a clear annual accession to the Literary Fund of this State, and shall be subject to the demand of the Treasurer of the Literary Fund.

        Fines under this act to go to Literary Fund.

        14. Be it further enacted, that the penalties incurred in the violation of any of the duties set forth in any clause or clauses of this Act of Assembly may be recovered of the person or persons violating the provisions of the same by the Chairman of the County Court in either of the Counties of this State, who may direct the County Attorney of either of the said Counties to issue a Scire facias to any person who may appear to be a delinquent under this act of Assembly, to show cause why the forfeiture should not be incurred, and it shall be the duty of the County Attorney in the different Counties in the State to appear in behalf of the State whenever such process shall be instituted and shall receive for his services the sum of four dollars in every prosecution where the penalty shall be recovered.

        15. Be it further enacted, That all penalties incurred in violation of any clause or clauses of the act of the General Assembly, shall be transmitted by the persons authorized to collect them to the Treasurer of the State, and shall be applied by him to the use of the Literary fund.

        A ten per cent tax on certain estates for the Literary Fund.

        16. And be it further enacted, that when any citizen of this State shall hereafter die, having an estate in land, slaves, or personal estate of any description and without lineal representatives to inherit the same, the estate so left shall be subject to a tax of ten per centum which tax shall be deducted from the estate by the administrator or Executor of the deceased and by him shall be paid to the Treasurer of the Literary Fund1.

        1 This bill was introduced by Hugh McQueen, of Chatham. It is printed in the laws of 1834-35.

10. THE STANDARD'S COMMENT ON McQUEEN'S BILL.

        Praise for the bill.

        Bill introduced too late.

        Mr. McQueen, of Chatham, has presented a bill in the Senate, to create a fund for the establishment of Free Schools in this State. The object of this bill, is one to which we are entirely devoted, heart and hand; there is no measure of internal policy in North Carolina which, in our view, involves consequences so important to the future well-being and true glory of the State, as the education of every son and daughter within her borders; and we should most sincerely rejoice to see some plan devised to effect it. But we fear Mr. McQueen's project cannot succeed,--at this session, particularly; its details are too elaborate to be carried through at the heel of the session,--when, too, a party in the Legislature seems disposed to consume its entire sittings in profitless harangues.

--Editorial, Raleigh Standard, Dec. 26, 1834.

11. THE STAR ON FREE SCHOOLS.

        McQueen's bill one of the most important ever before Legislature.

        Free Schools.--Several very interesting matters were presented to the consideration of the last Legislature, which, owing to a multiplicity of business and the crowded state of our columns, we were compelled to pass over with only a brief notice, with the intention, however, of recurring to them again so soon as our leisure and space would permit; and, in the prosecution of our design, we now proceed to offer a few reflections on one which is of the highest moment to the people of North Carolina. It is the bill, submitted by the Senator from Chatham, Mr. McQueen, proposing to provide a fund for the establishment of Free Schools in this State. This may be regarded as the most important measure, in many respects, which has ever been introduced to the attention of our Legislature; for it is, we believe, the first general system of the kind that has ever been reduced to a tangible form and acted on here. We have had, it is true, resolutions of inquiry again and again submitted to the Legislature on the subject; but this mode of inviting the attention of that body to the subject has uniformly failed to produce any substantial benefit; for where resolutions have been referred to Committees, instructing them to inquire into the expediency of doing thus and thus without submitting to them any digested plan to act upon, the result has been, with few exceptions, that they have reported against the measure submitted to them. But the bill alluded to, was so comprehensive in its character, as to bring up the whole subject of education to the attention of the Legislature, connected with a remedy for the growing wants of the people.

        Statistical informtion,

        Educational conditions never yet presented to the Legislature in such a way as to cause action.

        Thinks Legislatures have not known the number of children living in ignorance is the reason they have never yet acted.

        States which provide for reports on educational conditions.

        Information about fines, salaries of county trustees, etc.

        The first clauses of the bill proposed to provide such statistical information as would conduct the General Assembly to a correct knowledge of the present literary wants of the people; and this is a species of information which

is most imperiously required by the State of North Carolina; for notwithstanding we are all duly sensible that the people of this State are greatly in the rear of the population of most States as it regards the facilities of intellectual improvement; yet the wants of the people, in this respect, have not been presented to the Legislature in such glaring relief as to arouse it to anything like a profitable course of action on the subject. Can it be presumed for a moment that the Legislature would have so long indulged in a profound and listless apathy on the subject of popular education, if it had been sensible of the number living in ignorance and dying in darkness--of the number annually perishing under the highest penalties of the law merely because they were not trained from early life in the way in which they should go--of the number disgraced by receiving what may be termed the milder punishments of the penal code, from a perfect ignorance of their duties--and of the still greater number who have been doomed to exist as miserable outcasts from the social circle, from the same cause? The States of New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut, have, by legislative enactment, made express provision for the attainment of yearly information, for the Legislatures, respecting the number of school houses in operation within those States, the number of pupils in each school, and the compensation of the teachers. This is a provision which exists, too, in communities in which the blessing of popular education is largely and liberally diffused. How much more urgently is such information demanded in a State like North Carolina, where no effective provision has been made for the wants of the people?

        Salaries of county trustees could properly be devoted to schools.

        Change in the poor system.

        The next clauses of the bill introduced by Mr. McQueen, went to provide information for the Legislature respecting the amount of fines and forfeitures incurred in the Superior and County Courts in the different counties in the State, together with the manner in which they are usually appropriated, for the purpose of ascertaining whether or

not any part of this branch of the public revenue could be diverted from its present application, and turned to the support of free schools. Also to require of the Clerks of the County Courts to render to the Executive, for the information of the Legislature, the amount of compensation received by the officers of the different counties for extra services, and the annual salaries of the County Treasurer and County Trustees, in the different counties in this State, for the purpose of ascertaining whether these absorbents of the public funds could be safely and justly dispensed with, and the money consumed by them applied to the support of free schools. It is well known that many of our public officers, on offering their services to the public, profess their entire willingness to serve for the usual fees which are allowed by law, without any extra compensation; and it is well known that they could all live pretty comfortably without receiving compensation of this sort. If this be the case, we cannot divine what injury it would inflict on the public to seize a fund which is already drawn from the pockets of the people, and which answers no highly useful end, for the purpose of diffusing the blessings of education amongst the people of the country, which will augment our public strength and property, and enlarge the circle of our social enjoyments. It is also well known that the offices of County Treasurer and Trustee have been found to be merely sinecures in most counties and that they have been in many cases, dispensed with, on the ground that the Sheriffs could discharge all the duties performed by these officers, without conflicting with their other duties. If this be the case, it would seem right and proper these salaries should be applied to the support of popular education; and it would differ from ordinary taxation in this particular, that it would be taking a fund which is now easily spared by the people for one purpose, and applying it to an infinitely better purpose. It would be imposing no fresh tax upon the people.

        Details of the poor system proposed.

        The other provisions in the bill contemplate a thorough change in the poor system of the State. With this view, it proposes to make it the duty of the magistrates of the different counties to have the counties laid off into departments not larger than ten, nor smaller than four miles square, always having respect to the wealth and density of the population embraced in the respective tracts of country thus laid off. For each of these departments, a majority of the magistrates are required to appoint annually, three individuals to act as commissioners of the poor, who shall hold stated meetings for the purpose of inquiring into the condition of the poor within their respective districts, and be empowered to levy a tax on the inhabitants of the different districts, for the support of all subjects of public charity coming under their observation after the law shall go into operation. The poor, however, found on the poor list under the county assessment, are still to remain on the same list, and be supported after the usual mode, until removed by death or otherwise. But the bill provides that the same assessment should be annually made for the support of such poor as might be found on the poor list on the first day of May next, as was made in the year 1834, regardless of any diminution which might occur in the number of the poor on such list as aforesaid; and when any such pauper would die or otherwise be removed, his proportional share of the annual sum assessed for the support of the poor would become a clear accession to the Literary Fund; and when all who are now on the poor list, under the present assessment, shall have passed away, a sum equal to that which was assessed in the year 1834, would then become an annual fund for the support of free schools: That is, 1. Such poor as may be hereafter put upon the parish, shall be supported by a district tax. 2. Such poor as are now maintained by the county, shall continue to be provided for under the old system so long as they remain as a public charge. 3. The same sums which

were assessed by the different counties for the support of the poor within them, shall be annually assessed hereafter, notwithstanding the decrease and final extinction of the list. 4. When any pauper, who is supported under the present assessment, shall die, etc., his proportional share shall go as a contribution to the fund for the support of free schools. 5 When there shall no longer remain a pauper on the list under the existing system, the whole amount assessed for the support of the poor in 1834, shall continue to be assessed annually and applied exclusively to the support of free schools. 6. Each department laid off as above stated, to have a school located in it, to be supported in such way as the public authorities of the State may hereafter direct.

        Certain estates to be taxed.

        The last clause in the bill provides that the estates of all persons who may hereafter die in this State without lineal representatives to inherit their property, shall be taxed 10 per cent for the use of the Literary Fund.

        Convention question settled; Legislature can now find time to consider plan for schools.

        There are many other details embraced in this bill. But we only take occasion to glance at its most prominent features, for the purpose of calling public attention to it; and we sincerely hope that the people will give the subject the most serious consideration, as we conceive it to be vitally connected with the best interests of North Carolina; and now that the Convention question, which has so long proved a bone of contention in the councils of the State, to the exclusion of calm deliberation on everything else, has been settled, we hope the Legislature will hereafter convene with the determination to erect, upon a firm basis, a system of popular education, which will enlighten our people and give durability and strength to our free institutions.

        Bill ordered printed in the laws.

        The late session was not very propitious to the fate of a measure so novel in its character, and so important in its principles. It came in after the political resolutions and the Convention bill, and of course had necessarily to give

place to them. But it was only lost in the Senate by a majority of 6 votes, after an explanation of its principles by Mr. McQueen, in a speech of about an hour's length; and immediately after the bill had been disposed of, the Senator from Burke, Mr. Carson, rose in his place, and moved that the bill be printed and appended to the Laws of the State, and that the remarks of the introducer of the bill be published along with it. The first part of the motion prevailed unanimously; but Mr. McQueen would not consent to the last. We hope, however, that he may yet be prevailed upon by the importance of the subject, to write out his remakrs for the press, that the people may have the benefit of the useful information and cogent arguments which they contained. A stronger recommendation than the order taken upon the bill and remarks by the body to whom they were submitted, could not be given; for we believe it is the first time that either a bill or a speech received such a distinguished mark of approbation by our Legislature.

--The Raleigh Star, Jan. 22, 1835.

1835

• 1. THE NEW CONSTITUTION SHOULD PROVIDE FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
• 2. GOV. SWAIN'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.
• 3. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.
• 4. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 5. THE USE MADE OF LITERARY FUND 1835.
• 6. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 7. CHARTER FOR NORTH CAROLINA BIBLE SOCIETY REFUSED.

1. THE NEW CONSTITUTION SHOULD PROVIDE FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

        Does not believe the franchise should be further limited.

        Mr. Editor: An important period in the history of our State is at hand. In the exercise of our legitimate rights, we are to determine whether a Convention shall be formed to amend our present Constitution. It is impossible that any reflecting mind can regard such an event with indifference. Several amendments were determined on by the last Legislature, as the basis of the call. Some of them are heartily concurred in; to one at least, I ventured to object, some time since, through the medium of the Register. The genius of our Government, as well as true policy, must ever frown indignantly upon any retrenchment of franchise.

        Question of public schools so far neglected in discussion of constitutional changes needed; the lack of schools draining State of wealth and population.

        My object, however, at this time, is not so much to repeat any disapproval of what has been done, as to again call the attention of the public mind to what has been omitted,--the importance of PUBLIC SCHOOLS. If we are to be preserved from the evils of anarchy, and the chains of Despotism, the means of general and wise information must be afforded without delay to the whole American people. The want of this, is daily draining our native State of its wealth and best population: and if the system of neglect is persisted in, it will eventuate in the destruction of our political and religious liberties.

        Subject of schools should be discussed in election of delegates to the Convention.

        Education before internal improvements.

        Let, then, the subject of Public Schools be freely and dispassionately discussed during the ensuing canvass for representatives in the Convention. Let it be required of the successful candidates, when convened in solemn council, that the immediate organization of one or more of these Schools, to be established in each county of the State, constitute the first act of their deliberations, and presented in due form for ratification. Reflection and experience will prove, that such a measure is of more vital importance

to the best interests of the State, than equal representation itself. We may talk and legislate our life-time, on the benefits of internal improvements, and the blessings of a representative government; but nothing can be permanently effected until the mass of our population have their minds so enlightened as to be able to perceive the importance of the one, and justly to appreciate the value of the other.

        Believe me, your editorial labors cannot be better directed than in pressing this subject home to the hearts and judgments of your fellow citizens. Your aid is seriously invoked.

March 4th, 1835.

D--.

        Patriotic duty of the statesman to stand for the universal diffusion of knowledge.

        [We concur entirely in what our correspondent suggests above; and shall take great pleasure in lending our feeble aid in carrying out his enlightened views. As despotism is based upon ignorance, so liberty rests upon education and intelligence, as constituting the superstructure upon which the temple of freedom is erected. We conceive it to be the first and paramount duty of every statesman and patriot, to direct his efforts towards the universal diffusion of the blessings of education in our whole country: But, as it was the patriotic aspiration of Henry the 4th of France, that he might "see the day when every Frenchman would have a fowl to put in his pot," so it is more especially our ardent desire to witness that glorious era when every son and daughter of suitable age in North Carolina, shall have the spelling-book placed in its hands,--and be taught, through its agency, an American's duty to his God, his obligations to his country, and his rights and responsibilities as a Freeman. We hope our correspondent D--, having put his hands to the plow, will not turn back; but lend his efficient aid in the great cause to which he has so opportunely directed our attention.--Ed. Standard.]

--Raleigh Standard, March 13, 1835.

2. GOV. SWAIN'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.

        Crops abundant emigration still large.

        To much the larger portion of this State, the past year has been a season of more than ordinary prosperity. The production of articles necessary to the sustenance of human life, has been abundant and our great agricultural staple has commanded a higher price than has been known for many years. Our citizens, always distinguished for prudence and economy in the management of their domestic affairs, aided by the fortunate circumstances referred to, are at present probably less involved in pecuniary difficulties, than at any previous period of our history. Notwithstanding these clear evidences of the comparatively prosperous condition of the community, the tide of emigration continues to flow in a copious and steady current to the new States and Territories of the West, and we are thus losing many of our most wealthy, enterprising and intelligent citizens. It is not surprising that the universal and laudable disposition strikingly characteristic of the American people to acquire a permanent interest in the soil, should prompt removals from an old and densely populated country, to sparsely settled regions where good land may be acquired at low prices. That these causes have in many instances produced emigration from the State, is admitted; but we deceive ourselves, if we suppose that the evil is to be attributed to them alone. In general salubrity, variety of climate and consequent variety of productions, average fertility of soil, and wide extent of sea coast, North Carolina is scarcely exceeded by any of her sister States. Other causes, therefore, than natural disadvantages, have in a greater or less degree affected the growth and prosperity of the State. A very slight acquaintance with the facts, will suffice to show that a large proportion of the citizens who have removed from our borders within the last ten years, have contributed to augment

the population and resources of States more densely peopled than our own. With regard then to the latter class, and to those who are liable to be influenced by similar considerations hereafter, it becomes important to inquire, what causes have produced the evil, in order that you may ascertain whether a remedy can be devised within the legitimate range of your powers.

        Small provision for education; no internal improvements.

        When we consider that we have but a single collegiate institution in the State, but few respectable academies and that no adequate provision has been made to diffuse even the elementary principles of education among the poor; that there is not a single work of Internal Improvement in progress, and no fund that deserves the name provided for the future development of our resources, it ceases to be a matter of surprise that even our younger sisters munificently provided for in all these respects by the bounty of the general Government, should outstrip us in the generous contest for physical and intellectual improvement. It is but natural under such circumstances the young, the ardent and the enterprizing among our own citizens should sever the ties that bind them to their native homes, and seek for affluence and distinction under better auspices. It affords me no pleasure to present this picture of our condition. It would indeed be the source of extreme mortification if I regarded it as proceeding exclusively from our own supineness and neglect. That we have done less than we might and ought to have done for the accomplishment of these great purposes is in my estimation, certain; but that our exertions have been constantly retarded by the system of federal legislation adopted with regard to us is not less manifest. * * * *

        Injustice done the State in her early history.

        Why schools have not been established.

        The injustice sustained in the settlement of our revolutionary claims, embarrassed our efforts towards improvement, at the period of all others the most important, the commencement of our political existence; and the tariff and land systems subsequently adopted, far from relieving,

tended but to increase our difficulties. Thus stripped of resources, the history of our State legislation during the first half century of our political existence, will exhibit little more to posterity than the annual imposition of taxes amounting to less than a hundred thousand dollars, one-half of which constituted the reward of the legislative bodies by which they were levied, while the remainder was applied to sustain the train of officers who superintend the machinery of government. The establishment of schools for the convenient instruction of youth, and the development and improvement of our internal resources by means beyond the reach of individual enterprise, will seem scarcely to have been regarded as proper objects of legislative concern.* * * *

        The State should have her proportion of the sales of public lands.

        With a Treasury barely sufficient to meet the current expenses of the Government, without resorting to loans, it would be idle to recommend the adoption of any measures connected with the general improvement of either the physical or intellectual resources of the country. My opinions on these subjects have been repeatedly communicated to the General Assembly, and are too well known to all classes of the Community, to justify repetition. To attempt to accomplish anything with regard to either, without first having provided a competent fund for the purpose, would have no other effect than to disappoint the excited hopes of the public and postpone further efforts to an indefinite period. A just proportion of the revenue, accruing from sales of public lands, would enable us to enter upon a system of measures which could not be otherwise than productive of the most auspicious results. Without it, judging from past experience, little expectation can be entertained that an adequate fund for the purpose will be provided by the government in time to meet the growing exigencies of the country.

--House Journal, 1835, pp. 99, et seq.

3. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.

        Senate.

        Hugh McQueen, Chatham; John Gambill, Ashe; John Exum, Wayne; Geo. H. Alexander, Tyrrell; Wm. W. Cooper, Gates; Cornelius Dowd, Moore; Benjamin Sharpe, Edgecombe; Matthew R. Moore, Stokes.

--Senate Journal, 1835, p. 8.

        House.

        John B. Muse, Pasquotank; Robert C. Bond, Halifax (town); Macon Moye, Pitt; James W. Howard, Jones; Simon G. Jeffreys, Franklin; Owen R. Kenan, Duplin; Peter R. Lilly, Montgomery; W. A. Graham, Hillsborough; L. A. Gwyn, Caswell; John Clement, Rowan; Michael Hoke, Lincoln; E. J. Erwin, Burke; Thos. L. Clingman, Surry.

--House Journal, 1835, p. 108.

[These committees made no reports on public education during the session.]

4. REPORT OF LITERARY BOARD.

        To the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina.

        The President and Directors of the Literary Fund, in obedience to the act of the Assembly requiring them to cause to be kept by the Treasurer of the State, a regular account of all such sums of money as may belong to the said Fund: of the manner in which the same has been applied and vested; and to make an annual report thereof to the Legislature, with such recommendations for the improvement of the same, as to them shall seem expedient respectfully Report:

        Receipts for the year.

        That the receipts at the Treasury on account of the Literary Fund for the year ending the first day of November 1835 have been as follows, viz:

        

The balance of cash in the hands of the Public Treasurer as Treasurer of the Literary Fund, on the 31st of October 1834, as reported to the General Assembly of that year was	$19,403.99½
The receipts at the Treasury Department of the money belonging to this fund, for the last year, that from the 31st of October 1834 to the 1st Nov. 1835, amount to twenty nine thousand six hundred and seventy dollars and seventy two cents (29,670.72) and consist of the following items viz Cash received from the Bank of Newbern for dividend of 10 per cent of the capital on 141 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared Aug. 1834	$ 1410.00
Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 3½ per cent profit on 704 shares of stock appropriated to this fund declared in Jan. 1835	2464.00

Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 3½ per cent on 50 shares of stock appropriated to this fund, and declared as above	175.00
Ditto received from the Cape Fear Navigation Company for dividend No. 10 of 2 per cent declared May 28th 1831, received Jan. 1835	566.14
Ditto State Bank of North Carolina for dividends of 2 per cent profit on 282 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared November 1834	564.00
Ditto State Bank of North Carolina, for dividend of 8 per cent capital on 282 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared March 1835	2256.00
Ditto Bank of Newbern of dividend of 15 per cent capital on 141 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared April 1835	2115.00
Ditto Cape Fear Navigation Company for dividend No. 11 on the shares owned by the State and appropriated to this fund	650.00
Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 5 per cent profit on 704 shares of stock appropriated to this fund declared in May 1835	3520.00
Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 5 per cent profit on 50 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared as above	250.00

Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 1 per cent on 704 shares of stock appropriated to this fund, declared in July 1835	704.00
Ditto Bank of Cape Fear for dividend of 1 per cent on 50 shares of stock owned by this fund declared as above	$50.00
Ditto Bank of the State of North Carolina, for interest on advance payments, made on 1200 shares of stock in said Bank subscribed for in behalf of this fund in May 1834	3106.86
Ditto Ditto for interest on advance payment of the 4th instalment on 240 shares of stock subscribed for in behalf of this fund in Jan. 1835	93.70
Ditto received from the Bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividend of 2½ per cent on 1550 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared in June 1835	3875.00
Ditto Ditto for dividend of 2½ per cent profit on 40 shares of stock owned by this fund subscribed 2nd Oct. 1835 declared as above	100.00
Ditto Ditto for dividend of 2½ per cent profit on 76 shares of stock owned by this fund, subscribed 15th July 1835, declared in June 1835	190.00
Ditto for entries of vacant lands	4541.30

Ditto for sundry Auctioneers for tax on sales at auction	546.84
Ditto from Sheriffs for taxes on retailers of spirituous liquors	2,492.88
Which added to the balance above stated	29,670.72
makes the aggregate sum of	$49,074.71

        Expenditures.

        The disbursements from the Literary Fund during the foregoing period, are as follows viz.

        

The sum paid Charles Dewey Cashier of the Bank of the State of North Carolina for 240 shares of stock subscribed for on the 5th Jan. 1835	$24,000.00
This sum paid do. for interest on deferred payment of do.	398.47
This sum paid William R. Hill for his services as Secretary to the Board of Directors of the Literary Fund for the year ending 31st Decr. 1834	20.00
This sum paid Charles Dewey Cashier of the Bank of the State, for 110 shares of stock subscribed May 4th, 1835	11,000.00
This sum paid ditto for interest on deferred payment of ditto	342.67
This sum paid ditto for 76 shares of stock subscribed 15th July, 1835	7,600.00
This sum paid ditto for interest on deferred payment of ditto	321.66
This sum paid ditto for 40 shares of stock subscribed for on the 2nd October 1835,	4,000.00

This sum paid ditto for interest on deferred payment of ditto	224.83
Making an aggregate amount of		$47,907.63
Which deducted from the amount above stated, leaves a balance in the hands of the Public Treasurer as Treasurer of the Literary Fund on the 1st day of November 1835, of		1,167.08

        Sources of increase

        The annexed table marked A. exhibits a statement of the several species of stock belonging to the Literary Fund, and of stocks the dividend of which were appropriated to it, by the act creating the corporation. The profit arising from the stock referred to, the tax accruing from sales at auction, the tax paid by retailers, of spirituous liquors, and sums paid for entries of vacant land, are at present the only source of accumulation. These may be estimated to produce during the next year, the sum of twenty thousand dollars, which under a standing Resolution of the Directors, will be vested in stock of the Bank of the State, at every period when the cash in the Treasury will be equal to the payment of ten shares. Small as these sources of revenue seem to be they are constantly increasing and if permitted to accumulate for a few years, will realize the liberal and extended views, of the enlightened statesmen to whom we are indebted for the foundation of this charity.

        Swamp lands unproductive.

        The Swamp lands nominally the property of this Board, are entirely unproductive and must continue to be so, until the Legislature shall either determine upon permitting them to be improved by some of the means which have been suggested, in the various Reports heretofore submitted upon the subject, or dispose of them by sale or entry. If neglected many years longer, there is much reason to apprehend that these lands will be greatly diminished in value, from the trespasses daily committed upon them. They were originally covered with immense forests, of the

finest timber, now constantly becoming scarcer, and consequently of greater value, and no plan has yet been devised either to punish or prevent them.

        Work of collecting a library.

        The Resolution adopted by the General Assembly in 1833, directing the Board to purchase a Library for the State, has been partly complied with. In addition to the purchase of a portion of the Library of the late Judge Murphey as stated in the last Report, a few valuable books for the legislative department of the Library have been purchased through the agency of Turner & Hughes Booksellers of this City, and are deposited in the executive office, for the use of the members of the General Assembly. A good law library which besides being an indispensable part of a Public Library, was greatly needed by the Supreme Court, and will be a most important acquisition to the judicial branch of the Government, has been purchased under the direction of Judge Gaston in New York. The boxes containing these books were received a few days since but as there is no place provided for the preservation of the books under such circumstances as to admit of convenient reference, the boxes have not been opened. A complete catalogue of all the works purchased is in preparation but may not be completed in time to be submitted to you before your adjourment.

DAVID L. SWAIN, President.

A.

        Resources of the fund.

        

Shares of stock owned in the Bank of the State of North Carolina	1666
Shares of stock owned in the Bank of Cape Fear	50
	1716
Shares of stock owned in he Bank of Newbern	141
Shares of stock owned in the State Bank of North Carolina	282
	423

Shares of stock owned by the State in the Bank of Cape Fear the dividends of which are appropriated to the Literary Fund	704
The State Bank of North Carolina has divided among their stock holders on each share of $100	$88
The Bank of Newbern in like manner on each share of capital stock	$70

--MS. Records Literary Board.

5. THE USE MADE OF LITERARY FUND, 1835.

        Statement of State revenue and expenditures.

        

Total amount of cash in Treasury, 1st Jan., 1835	$ 81,796.32
To which add amount of members receipts	5,285.00
	$ 87,081.32
This amount transferred as above stated from William S. Mhoon to S. F. Patterson, is the only available fund now in the Treasury, but in the course of the fiscal year ending on the 31st of Oct. 1835 there will probably be received on account of taxes collected by Sheriffs	70,000.00
Dividends of capital in State Bank, 5 per cent on 3050 shares	15,250.00
Dividends of Bank of Newbern, 10 p. ct. 1959 shares	19,590.00
Dividends of profits in Bank C. Fear, 7 p. ct. 2122 shares	15,854.00
Dividends of Bank of the State 2 p. ct. 1500 shares	3,000.00
Tax on stock owned by individuals in Bank of the State and Bank of Cape Fear	3,000.00
And from all other sources	7,224.68
	$220,000.00

        The demands on the Treasury during the same period may be ascertained as follows:

        

For the Legislature	$40,000
Judiciary	20,000
Treasury	2,525
Comptroller	1,000
Secretary of State	1,200
	Pensions	1,000
Adjutant General	200
Public Printer	900
Redemption of Treasury Notes	3,000

Contigencies	5,175
State House	75,000
		152,000.00
Amt. estimated to be in Treasury, 21st October 1835		68,000.00
Of this there will be due to the Literary Fund	40,000
To the fund for Internal Improvement	18,000
		58,000.00
		$10,000

        Why it was necessary to use the fund.

        When by the act of 1825, certain branches of the revenue were set apart to constitute the Literary Fund, no additional taxes were imposed, nor was any other source of revenue provided to supply the place of that which was then withdrawn from the Public Treasury. The State, at that time, was receiving considerable dividends on Bank stock, and had afloat 220,000 dollars of Treasury notes, which enabled the Government to get along very well for several years without the sums thus withdrawn. But when these sources of revenue failed, and the Treasury was called on to pay a large amount of Treasury notes, a resort to the Literary Fund became necessary to defray the expenses of the Government and to redeem the Treasury Notes presented for payment.

--From Treasurer's Report, 1835.

6. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.

SATURDAY, January 3d, 1835.

        A meeting of the President & Directors of the Literary Fund was held in the Executive Office this day.

        Directors present.

Present

• David L. Swain President,
• Chief Justice Ruffin,
• Treasurer Patterson
• Mr. Speaker Moseley &
• Mr. Speaker Alexander.

        On motion of Chief Justice Ruffin the following Resolutions were unanimously adopted.

        Resolution to invest funds in State Bank.

        Whereas it is in their opinion the duty of this Board to invest the Literary Fund in stocks yielding interest as speedily as may be after monies belonging to said Fund may be received by the Treasurer, so that the same may accumulate and be improved for the State as much as possible; And whereas by an Act of the General Assembly passed in the year 1833 the Board is authorized and required to invest the said fund by subscribing for stock in the Bank of the State of North Carolina, then created; and a part of the stock reserved by the charter of said Bank to be taken for the State, yet remains unsubscribed for by the Public Treasurer in the name of the State or by him as the Treasurer of this Board on behalf of the State and a considerable sum of money, namely the sum of twenty four thousand dollars ($24,000) or thereabouts, part of the Literary Fund, is now in the hands of the Treasurer unappropriated and lying in Bank in deposite & idle: Therefore

        It is Resolved by the Board: First that the Treasurer be and he is hereby requested and directed to subscribe forthwith for as many shares in the said Bank as the said sum now in hand will pay for, on behalf and in the corporate

name of this Board: Secondly that as monies belonging to the said Fund arising from profits or dividends on Bank Stock, entries of lands or otherwise shall come into his hands hereafter, he shall whenever he shall have thereof as much as one thousand dolars, subscribe from time to time, for other shares in the said bank to the value and amount of the said sum or sums then held by him and forthwith pay for the same, until all the stock reserved to the State shall have been subscribed for on behalf of the State by him, either as Public Treasurer or as Treasurer of this Board or until the period within which such subscriptions may lawfully be made, shall have expired; and that he report to the Board from time to time, such subscriptions as he shall make under the authority hereof and also the number of shares owned by the Board and the State of the Fund generally.:--

        Compensation of the Secretary.

        Resolved that the Secretary be allowed the sum of twenty dollars for his services for the year ending on the 31st December last.

        The Board then adjourned subject to the call of the President.

THURSDAY 19th March 1835.

        A meeting of the President and Directors of the Literary Fund was held at the Executive office this day.

        Members present; new Secretary.

Present

• Governor Swain
• Chief Justice Ruffin,
• Treasurer Patterson.

        Mr. William R. Hill late Secretary of this Board having resigned his appointment, William T. Coleman was appointed Secretary in his stead and thereupon the Board adjourned subject to the call of the President.

DAVID L. SWAIN
S. F. PATTERSON.

        Copy of a letter from the President of the Board to Gavin Hogg, Esq.

RALEIGH, 10 Aug. 1835.

        About Supreme Court Library.

        MY DEAR SIR: You are aware that I am anxious before I go out of office to lay the foundation of a respectable library for the State, and more particularly for the Supreme Court. Mr. .......... was kind enough a short time since to open a correspondence for me on the subject of a law library with Necklin and Johnston. He submitted to them a catalogue of English Reporters and requested them to inform me for what sum they could fill it, either with English or American editions. I have received a reply from them which does not communicate the information which I desire. Many of the works they inform me are not to be procured in Philadelphia and they do not venture an estimate of the prices of such as can. Under these circumstances will you do me the favour, to apply to N. & J. for the catalogue, and select from it such books as you may deem most important, and as can be obtained for $1250 or $1500 and direct Mr. Turner who will be instructed to call on you for this purpose to buy them.

        I wish you to understand that I have no disposition to impose this task upon you, unless the state of your health will admit of your entering upon it without pain or inconvenience, and that it will, I wish you to be governed exclusively by your own judgment whether to buy at all, what to buy, and the particular edition to be selected.

        Richard Pheney of London commenced some time since the publication of a uniform edition of all the English Reports, which from a specimen I have seen must be greatly superior to any other. Whether the work is in progress or has been abandoned, I have no satisfactory information. If any considerable portion of it has been executed, I should prefer that arrangements should be made at once to import it which can be done for the State

free of duty. If you determine to have a purchase made in Philadelphia which as I before said, I submit entirely to your discretion I will remit the necessary fund the moment I am notified of your disposition with respect to it. I do not of course propose to devolve upon you any other trouble than to direct Mr. Turner, in what manner he shall effect my intentions.

Your friend and Servt.
G. HOGG, ESQ.

D. L. SWAIN.

RALEIGH 10th Aug., 1835.

        Instruction to Turner.

        DEAR SIR: I have just written to Mr. Hogg now in Philadelphia on the subject of a law library for the Supreme Court. Messrs. Necklin and Johnston will inform you where he can be found. Do me the favour to be governed entirely by my letter to him, and the instructions he may give you with respect to a purchase. A draft will be transmitted to you at any moment that I may be advised that it is necessary.

Yours very respectfully,
MR. H. D. TURNER.

D. L. SWAIN.

        Copy of a letter from the President of the Board to Judge Gaston.

SALEM.

MY DEAR SIR:

        (No letter in the Record Book.)

JUDGE GASTON'S REPLY.

NEW YORK, October 7th 1835.

        Judge Gaston's purchase of books for library.

        MY DEAR SIR: In pursuance of the instructions contained in your letter from Salem, I have purchased for a Library of the Supreme Court, law books from Messrs. Gould Banks & Co. to the amount of $1361.75 cents. They will be forwarded by the earliest opportunity to Petersburg under the superintendence of Mr. James Donaldson Merchant of this City. There are some books which I wanted

and could not obtain here, which possibly I may obtain at Philadelphia. If I do you shall be advised of it. You will be pleased to forward the amount of the purchases from Gould Banks & Co. to them through Mr. Donaldson immediately. I think that I have bought on very fair terms, and recommend the house as one fit to be employed on future occasions.

        I expect to leave this for the South on Wednesday the 14th inst. As I shall make some stay at Philadelphia and Washington, I shall not probably be at Raleigh before the 24th of the month.

        I pray you to believe me, very truly

Your friend and obedt. Servt.
Governor SWAIN.

WILL. GASTON.

EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT,
RALEIGH 20th Nov. 1835.

        Payment of Judge Gaston's bill for books.

        MY DEAR SIR: Allow me to ask that you will do me the favour to hand over to Gould Banks & Co. the enclosed draft on the Bank of the United States, in payment of books purchased of them by my friend the Hon. William Gaston as agent of the State of North Carolina. My Absence from this City on a journey to the western section of the State undertaken on account of the serious indisposition of my youngest child is my apology for not having made this remittance at an earlier day. The draft is for thirteen hundred and sixty one dollars and seventy five cents, for which sum you will please direct them to transmit me a receipt.

I am very respectfully
Your Obt. Servt.
MR. JAMES DONALDSON.

D. L. SWAIN.

NEW YORK Oct 24th, 1835.

His Excellency
David L. Swain,
Raleigh, N. C.

        Books shipped from New York.

        We have sent a Bill of Lading to James Donaldson, Esq. shipped to you via Petersburg, Va. care of Messrs. Kevan & Hamilton by packet Schr. Helen, three Boxes Books purchased from us by Judge Gaston, under your direction for the State of North Carolina, amt. of invoice $1361.75, for which please forward your Draft.

        We have sent a Bill of Lading to James Donaldson, Esq. Merchant of this City that he might have the books insured if instructions have been left with him so to do no such instructions having been given us, and they are considered at your risk.

        The three Boxes will be found to contain all the Books in the Bill rendered Judge Gaston except volumes 1 & 2 Conway Reports which we are now reprinting and vol. 1 & 2 Masons Reports which are out of Print but if possible we will procure and forward them with the volumes of Cowans Reports in the course of two weeks.

        We take the liberty to solicit your Excellency's order for supplying the continuation of such Reports as we have sold you, from time to time as they are Published and also what further additions to your State Library as may be needed. We remain with much respect

Your Excellencys Obt. Servants,

GOULD, BANKS & Co.
Per A. N. Bell.

NEW YORK, Novr. 25, 1835.

        Receipt for payment for books.

        $1361.75. Received from the Hon. D. L. Swain a check on the Cashier of the office Bank of State payable to our order for thirteen hundred and sixty one dollars in full for Bill of Books purchased Oct. 12th last.

GOULD BANKS & Co.

--Ms. Records Literary Board.

7. CHARTER FOR NORTH CAROLINA BIBLE SOCIETY REFUSED.

        Society founded in 1813.

        Asks to be allowed to hold property.

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the present and all future subscribers to an Institution established in the year 1813 in the City of Raleigh, for the gratuitous dissemination of the Holy Scriptures to the poor of this Country, and to the heathen, be and they are hereby incorporated by the name of and under the style of "The Bible Society of North Carolina," and by that name, and style, shall have perpetual succession, a common seal, and power to take and hold property real and personal, to any amount not exceeding in value at any time, the sum of three thousand dollars, over and besides their Bibles and Testaments, and to make conveyances for the same, for the benefit of the said Society, and by that name and style, may sue and be sued, implead and be impleaded, and they shall have power to make such bylaws for the good government and regulation of the said Institution, not contrary to the constitution and laws of this State, or the laws of the United States, as the members of the said Society, or a majority of them, may from time to time ordain and establish.

        Election of officers.

        And be it further enacted, That the members of the said Society or so many of them as do attend shall be, and they are hereby empowered, on the third Monday in December next, and on the same day of the same month, in every year thereafter, at some place by them to be appointed, to elect so many managers of the said Institution, as they may find necessary and proper, to transact the business thereof, which managers shall continue in office, until the next annual election.

        And be it further enacted, That the managers aforesaid, shall have power to appoint a Treasurer from time to time with such tenure of Office, upon such conditions, and with

such power to collect, preserve and appropriate the funds belonging to the Society, as to the said managers shall seem proper, and if at any time, the said Treasurer shall fail, or refuse to account for, or pay to the said managers or order, any money in his hands belonging to said Society, to recover such money from him, by motion, upon ten days previous notice, before any court of record, having jurisdiction thereof.

        Repeal of charter, how done.

        And be it further enacted, That it shall be lawful for the General Assembly, to repeal this Charter at any time they may think fit, and proper to do it, provided such repeal does not take effect until twelve months, after the ratification of the act which declares said repeal.

        This act shall be in force from and after the ratification thereof.

        Engrossed and Examined.1

        1 This bill passed the House; not considered by the Senate.

        Fails.

        In Senate, Jan. 8, 1835: Read the first time and ordered to lie on the table.

--Legislative Documents, 1835.

1836-37

• 1. GOV. SPAIGHT'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.
• 2. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.
• 3. DONALDSON ACADEMY ASKS STATE AID.
• 4. ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS ON EDUCATION.
• 5. LITERARY FUND: RECEIPTS.
• 6. LEGISLATION ON SWAMP LANDS AND LITERARY FUND.
• 7. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.
• 8. CITIZENS OF FAYETTEVILLE ON ECONOMIC CONDITIONS.
• 9. RECEIPTS, DISPOSITION AND INVESTMENT OF THE SURPLUS REVENUE.
• 10. EDUCATIONAL CONDITIONS 1836.
• 11. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON SURPLUS REVENUE.

1. GOV. SPAIGHT'S MESSAGE ON EDUCATION.

        Statement of the amount of the Literary Fund.

        In conformity with the requisitions of the Constitution, the General Assembly in 1825, passed the Act creating the Literary Fund, and providing for its accumulation. That fund now consists of 1942 Shares in the Capital Stock of the Bank of the State of North Carolina, 50 shares of that of the Bank of Cape Fear, 141 Shares Bank of Newbern, and 283 Shares in the State Bank of North Carolina. The par value of the two first descriptions of Stock would be $199,200; but as both of these Stocks are above par, selling at a premium, the first at a high one, their value may be fairly estimated at the sum of $39,000 more, say $238,200, which, with the cash on hand, amounting to $3,845.09, makes $242,045.09. The value of the two latter Stocks cannot be properly estimated, it depending upon what claims may still exist against these institutions.

        A guarded suggestion.

        The advantages of education and the benefits resulting from its general diffusion among the people, it would be unnecessary for me to press upon the consideration of an enlightened legislature. It is for you to determine, whether in order to obtain the objects intended by the creation of the fund, at as early a period as practicable, without encroaching upon the principal, you will provide for its increase by the appropriation of other means. These suggestions are made that the matter may receive your mature deliberation, and the people experience those great benefits at an early day, which the wisdom of our fathers ordained they should enjoy.

--House Journal, 1836, p. 256.

2. ASSEMBLY COMMITTEES ON EDUCATION.

        Senate.

        William D. Moseley, Lenoir; Matthew R. Moore, Stokes; John C. Taylor, Granville; George F. Davidson, Iredell; James Kerr, Caswell; H. G. Spruill, Washington, and Stephen Fox, Mecklenburg.

--Senate Journal, 1836-37, p. 20.

        Mr. Moseley excused.

        Mr. Moseley prayed to be excused from serving on the Committee on Education and the Literary Fund, and he was excused accordingly; whereupon, the Speaker an-announced that Mr. McCormick1

        1 Duncan McCormick, Cumberland.

--Senate Journal, 1836-37, p. 63.

        House.

        Thomas S. Hoskins, Chowan; Herod Faison, Northampton; James George, Edgecombe; Abner Neale, Craven; Joseph M. Gillespie, Bladen; Robert B. Gilliam, Granville; Oliver K. Tuton, Robeson; William A. Graham, Orange; L. A. Gwyn, Caswell; William D. Crawford, Rowan; William S. Harris, Cabarrus; M. Patton, Buncombe; William Horton, Wilkes.

--House Journal, 1836-37, p. 268.

3. DONALDSON ACADEMY ASKS STATE AID.

        To the Hon. the General Assembly of North Carolina,

        The Memorial of the Trustees of Donaldson Academy and Manual Labor School respectfully represents,

        Incorporated in 1833.

        That they were incorporated by an Act of the Legislature in 1833 and soon after entered upon the duties assigned them by the Charter. These duties, highly important in themselves and greatly enhanced by extraneous circumstances, were well calculated to excite interest in the execution.

        $14,000 subscribed for school by individuals; $10,000 realized.

        Intended operations necessarily limited.

        To your Memorialists was committed the Guardianship of a High School of the first order, intended professedly for the whole community, of every order and condition, embracing a school untried in this region, to be made competent to meet the public expectation yet without public Patronage. Your Memorialists however, cast themselves upon the munificence of an enlightened community and obtained subscriptions to the amount of $14000; from the avails of which a site was purchased on Hay Mount, a pleasant Hill overlooking the town of Fayetteville. On this site buildings have been erected and a school has been opened under the superintendence of an able, efficient and experienced Instructor and judging from an experiment of three years your Memorialists are satisfied that such an Institution was needed, and will, if properly sustained, become the means of much and lasting good to the community. Owing however, to the want of adequate funds, your Memorialists have been obliged to limit their operations, and if not aided beyond what they can expect from private liberality, they fear they will be compelled to relinquish some of the most important objects originally contemplated in the establishment of the institution. The amount which has been expended is $10,000 and this sum is probably as much as will be realized from the subscription list. But the Institution is yet incomplete. Several

important Objects have not yet been attained, nor can they be, without further pecuniary aid. One of these objects is a department for Teachers in which, by a course of instruction adapted to their occupation, young men may be thoroughly prepared to become instructors. Such a department, your memorialists deem of primary importance in the cause of education in this State. The present time appears to be a crisis on which hangs the destiny of our Literature. The attention of the Public is extremely awake to the subject. There is an increasing demand for Schools and consequently for Teachers of an elevated character and of enlarged qualifications. Institutions for forming such teachers are essential because they cannot be prepared in sufficient numbers under private tuition and because at such institutions, beyond all question, a more thorough and appropriate preparation can be obtained. The success, indeed the very existence of Common Schools depends on the character of the Instructions given and this on the qualifications of the Teachers. Such qualifications can be well obtained only in institutions prepared for the purpose. Such Institutions, aiming peculiarly to promote the public good, stand in need of public patronage.

        Teacher's department not yet established.

        Manual labor department incomplete in equipment.

        Another object contemplated in the charter granted by your Hon. body was an establishment where the students might devote a portion of their time to Labour, thus securing to themselves better health by exercise and diminishing at the same time the expense of education. As the region where the institution is located, does not admit of extensive agricultural operation, it was thought expedient that the students should direct their attention to Mechanical Pursuits. To this end some arrangements have been made and considerable has been done in the way of Labour, but it is ascertained that the expense of a suitable outfit, for a fair experiment in this department, is too great for the limited means possessed. Your Memorialists believe, however, that this appendage to the Institution, might be

made valuable, both as a means of promoting health and of diminishing the expenses of the Students, and they feel so confident of this, that they are resolved to test the theory by a fair experiment whenever they can be put in possession of the requisite funds.

        Course in higher branches of science needed.

        No equipment; need an engineering department.

        Another important object contemplated in the establishment of the Institution, was a department for the higher branches of science, where a suitable course of instruction might be given to such as could not afford the expense of a full collegiate course. The importance of a knowledge of science, when connected with Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts and as opening a wide field of observation and gratification to a contemplative mind is too obvious to need a particular discussion. No Education can be considered complete without some portion of this knowledge, and at this day when both agriculture and the Mechanic Arts, so essential to the prosperity of our Country, are beginning to be attended to on scientific principles, it is indispensable that every school of an elevated character, should be furnished with means for illustrating practically, or by experiment those principles, which must necessarily and so often be brought into operation in the business of life. With this view, your Memorialists have made arrangements to commence such a course of instruction, and have procured considerable apparatus for illustrating principles by experiments. In connection with what has been done, it is highly desirable that more apparatus be provided and that a cabinet be collected for illustrations in Natural History.

        Civil Engineering is another branch of Education, which at this time demands particular attention, and for which it is desirable that the Institution be more thoroughly furnished with the means of instruction.

        Ask aid from Literary Fund.

        And now that your Memorialists may be able to carry into full execution the plan contemplated in the establishment of the Institution, they beg leave to present their

case before your honorable body and respectfully solicit your aid. Far be it from your Memorialists to dictate to your Hon. body what shall be done, but with all due deference, they would ask, in what way can a portion of the public fund be more advantageously appropriated to promote the general cause of education, or the particular success of common schools than in aiding an Institution whose objects are such as have been stated?

        Greatest needs summarized.

        The Institution needs more apparatus for illustrating the principles of science, and for practical mathematics. A Library containing works of reference and a cabinet of Minerals and Geological specimens are also needed and are of high importance. Means ought also to be provided for supporting at least one permanent instructor independent of the income from tuition. These are the prominent wants of the Institution, and your Memorialists do pray that your honorable body will take the case into consideration and from funds in your possession or to come under your control, you will afford such pecuniary aid as may relieve them from all embarrassment, and enable them to extend their operations and thus raise up an institution, which will become a nursery for your University, a blessing to the Community, a monument to posterity of the zeal and wisdom of their fathers, and in all respects worthy of its patrons and of the State.

And your Memorialists will ever pray

By Order of the Board of Trustees,

BENJ. ROBINSON, Pres.

JAS. H. HOOPER, Secy.

        Referred to committee.

        Memorial in Senate.--In Senate 10 Decr. 1836 read and referred to the committee on Education and the Literary fund.--

        Senate report.

        The committee on Education and the Literary fund, to whom was referred, the Memorial of the Trustees of Donaldson Academy and Manual labor school, respectfully report--.

        Entitled to State aid.

        Literary Fund should only be used to establish common schools.

        System of schools feasible; the difficulties of sparse population and prejudices may be overcome.

        Funds at present inadequate.

        Bad policy to loan the Literary Fund.

        That they have given the subjects embraced in the prayer of the Memorialists, that attention which their high importance demands. Your committee are of the opinion that while the laudable, and patriotic objects of the memorialists, justly entitle them to the patronage of the Legislature, it would be impolitic with reference, to higher considerations of the interests of the State, to grant their prayer. Your committee would unanimously recommend to the Senate that so soon as the resources of the State will permit, a system of Education be established, from which the whole state may derive an equal benefit. They regard the improvement of the mind, as essentially connected with the character, and the usefulness of the citizen; and that every step which is therefore taken, to advance the rising generation in the scale of intelligence, is so much gained in the permanency of our institutions, and in the attainment of all the great ends for which government was instituted. Nor, in the opinion of your committee, is there anything as has been supposed in the condition, or the character of our population, and society which is repugnant to the successful operation of a system of common Schools. That a difficulty might at the commencement, be encountered, from the prejudices of the country upon the subject, and from the sparseness of our population, is readily admitted; that the opportunities which would be afforded to all, would not under any system be equally enjoyed by all, is also not denied. But a system established by the lights and experience of other states and governments, and adapted with an enlightened judgment to the peculiar condition of our slave holding community would in the main be productive of more essential good than the expenditure of the same amount in any other manner. But the establishment of such a system would require a sum far beyond the present resources of the State; yet a judicious and prudent application of our present funds with an eye to their accumulation in connection

with the expectations of the state from other resources, create the hope that at no distant day education may be made accessible to every one, and its influences be felt by all. An appropriation in the present instance, would probably give rise to repeated applications for similar aid from other institutions in the State. If these applications should be rejected, it would produce dissatisfaction, and might be unjust. If granted, it would be to consume on partial objects, that treasure, which should be applied for the common benefit of the whole community. Your committee therefore recommend that the prayer of the Memorialists be rejected, and pray to be discharged from the further consideration of the subject.

Respectfully submitted

JNO. C. TAYLOR, Chm.

        Clerk's entry on above report: In Senate 16 Jan 1837 read and concurred in.

--Legislative Documents, 1836-37.

        Memorial in House.--In House of Commons, Dec. 12, 1836. Read and on motion of Mr. McNeill referred to the Committee on Education.

        The Committee on Education to whom was referred the Memorial of the Trustees of the Donaldson Academy and Manual Labor School, have had the same under consideration and submit the following

REPORT

        House report.

        The Memorialists ask for an appropriation to purchase a philosophical apparatus, a cabinet of minerals, and a library for the use of the Institution over which they preside.

        Literary Fund can only be applied to establishing common schools.

        Your Committee believe that the literary fund cannot be properly applied to any other purpose than the establishment of free and common schools--and to appropriate

the whole or any part of it to the assistance of a seminary of learning, in the benefits of which the great body of the people cannot participate, would be in direct opposition to the objects for which that fund was established. The same assertion may be made of any increase which the Literary Fund may receive from the action of the present Legislature. If any substantial good is to result from the establishment of a system of Education, it must be by diffusing its benefits so that they shall reach every section of the State and be acceptable to every class of society. The Donaldson Academy is located in a populous town, already possessing many advantages for the instruction of youth. And to make that institution the special object of Legislative patronage would afford reasonable grounds of Complaint and be manifestly unjust to other portions of the State having an equal interest in the funds proposed to be appropriated, and whose wants present a much stronger claim to the consideration of the Legislature.

        Your Committee return the Memorial to the House and ask to be discharged from the further consideration of the subject.

All of which is respectfully submitted,

ROB. GILLIAM, Chm.

--Legislative Documents, 1836-37.

4. ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS ON EDUCATION.

Tuesday, Dec. 6, 1836.

         Mr. Fox presented the following Resolution, viz.:

        Resolution to divide surplus revenue among the several counties.

        Resolved, That the Committee, to whom was referred so much of the Executive Message, as relates to the Surplus Revenue, that may be deposited in the State, be instructed to enquire into the expediency of providing, by law, for the distribution of the same, among the several counties of this State, according to population and taxation; to report by bill or otherwise.

        Which was read, and, on motion of Mr. Edwards, ordered to lie upon the table.

--Senate Journal, 1836-37, p. 48.

        Thursday, Dec. 23, 1836. Mr. Dockery presented the following Preamble and Resolutions, to wit:

        Constitution requires the establishment of schools.

        Surplus revenue to be added to Literary Fund.

        Whereas, the Constitution of this State makes it the duty of the Legislature to establish Schools for the education of the people; and whereas, a faithful compliance with the said requisition of the Constitution, is calculated to perpetuate the blessings of a free government to posterity, since all such governments must mainly depend upon the intelligence and virtue of the mass of the people, who are the rightful source of all political power; and whereas, this state is about to receive a large amount of money from the Government of the United States, which will not, in all probability, be required for a great number of years, if ever, by the legitimate wants of said Government: Therefore,

        Revenue of Literary Fund to be distributed to the counties on basis of Federal population, to educate indigent children.

        Resolved, That the joint select Committee on the surplus Revenue, be instructed to enquire into the expediency of adding ........ thousand dollars to the Literary Fund.

        Resolved, That they be further instructed to enquire into the expediency of distributing the interest of said

fund among the several counties of this State, in proportion to their federal population, to be applied to the purposes of educating the indigent youth of the State; and that they have leave to report by bill or otherwise.

        Which were read and referred to the Committee on Surplus Revenue.

--Senate Journal, 1836-37, p. 110 and 111.

Saturday, January 7, 1837.

On motion of Mr. Gilliam,

        Resolution on establishing free schools.

        Resolved, That the Committee on Education be instructed to enquire into the expediency of establishing a general system of Free Schools throughout the State.

--House Journal, 1836-37, p. 436.

        Friday, Jan. 20, 1837. Received from the House of Commons the following Resolution, in which they ask the concurrence of the Senate, to wit:

        Literary Board to digest a plan of schools for next Assembly.

        Resolved, by the General Assembly, that the President and Directors of the Literary Fund of North Carolina be instructed to digest a plan for Common Schools, suited to the condition and resources of this State, and report the same to the next General Assembly.1

        1 This resolution was introduced in House by Robert B. Gilliam.

        Which was read and adopted, and ordered to be enrolled.

--Senate Journal, 1836-37, p. 229.

Also see House Journal, 1836-37, p. 500.

5. LITERARY FUND: RECEIPTS.

        Disbursements.

        

The balance of cash in the hands of the Public Treasurer, as Treasurer of the Literary Fund, on the 31st of Oct. 1835, as reported to the General Assembly of that year was	1,167.08
The receipts at the Treasury Department of money belonging to this fund, for the last year, that is, from the 31st of Oct. 1835, to the 1st Nov. 1836, amount to $32,642.71 and consist of the following items, viz:
Cash received from sundry auctioneers, for tax on sales at auction	1,159.06
Cash received for entries of vacant land	5,682.71
Cash received from the Roanoke Navigation Company, for dividend of 1¾ per cent. on 500 shares of stock appropriated to this fund, declared in Nov. 1833	875.00
Cash received from the Roanoke Navigation Company, for dividend of 1 per cent on same shares, declared in Nov. 1834	500.00
Cash received from the bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividend No. 1 of 2½ per cent on 34 shares of stock subscribed 24th Nov. 1835	85.00
Cash received from the bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividend No. 2 of 4 per cent. on 1700 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared Dec. 1835	6,800.00
Cash received from the bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividend No. 1 of 2½ per cent. on 100 shares subscribed 6th January, 1836	250.00
Cash received from the bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividend No. 2 of 4 per cent. on the same shares subscribed as above	400.00
Cash received from the bank of the State of North Carolina, for dividends Nos. 1 and 2 on 40 shares of stock, subscribed 1st Feb. 1836	260.00

Cash received from Bank of Cape Fear, for dividend of 3½ per cent. on 704 shares of stock appropriated to this fund, declared 1st Jan. 1836	2,464.00
Cash received from Bank of Cape Fear, for dividend of 3½ per cent. on 50 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared as above	175.00
Cash received from Bank of Cape Fear, for dividend of 4 per cent. on 704 shares of stock appropriated to this fund, declared in June 1836	2,816.00
Cash received from Bank of Cape Fear, for dividend of 4 per cent. on 50 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared as above	200.00
Cash received from the Bank of Newbern, for dividend of 7 per cent. capital on 141 shares of stock owned by this fund, declared January 4, 1836	987.00
Cash received from the Bank of the State for dividends Nos. 1, 2 and 3 on 66 shares subscribed on behalf of this fund 5th of July, 1836	643.50
Cash received from the Bank of the State for dividends Nos. 1, 2 and 3 on 36 shares, subscribed in behalf of this fund July 11th, 1836	351.00
Cash received from the Cape Fear Navigation Company, being a part of dividends Nos. 12, 13 and 14 of 650 dollars each, declared by said Company as per account rendered	417.22
Cash received from Sheriffs for tax on retailers of spirituous liquors	2,597.22
Cash received from the Bank of the State of N. C. for dividend of 3¼ per cent. on 1840 shares owned by this fund, declared in June, 1836	5,980.00
	$32,642.71

Which added to the balance above stated, makes the aggregate sum of	33,809.79
The disbursements from the Literary Fund, during the foregoing period, are	29,964.70
Balance in the hands of the Public Treasurer, as Treasurer of the Literary Fund, on 1st day of Nov. 1836, of	$3,845.09

--From Treasurer's Report, made to Legislature, Nov. 21, 1836.

6. LEGISLATION ON SWAMP LANDS AND LITERARY FUND.

        Board of Literature incorporated.

        An Act to drain the swamp lands of this State, and to create a fund for Common Schools.

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That there shall be a Board of literature in this State, to be denominated and called by the name of "The President and Directors of the Literary Fund of North Carolina;" and by that name they are incorporated into a body politic and corporate, and shall be capable of suing in any court of record in this State.

        Board to consist of Governor and three others.

        Sec. 2. That the Governor of this State, by virtue of his office, shall be the president of the said board; and there shall be three other members of the said board biennially nominated and appointed as such by the Governor of the State under and with the advice of the Council; but in case a vacancy occurs, the same shall be filled by the other members of the board.

        Swamp lands vested in Board.

        Sec. 3. That all the swamp lands of this State, not heretofore duly entered and granted to individuals, shall be vested in the said corporation and successors, in trust, as a public fund for education and the establishment of common schools

        Bank stock vested in Board.

        Sec. 4. That in addition to the said lands, the following property and funds shall be vested in said corporation and their successors in trust, as aforesaid, to wit: all the shares of stock owned by the State in the Bank of the State of North Carolina, excepting one thousand shares of stock now held in said bank in the name of the president and directors of the Literary Fund, making, in all, five thousand shares; and also five thousand shares of stock in the capital of the Bank of Cape Fear, and the profits and dividends arising from said stock; which profits shall be re-invested by the said president and directors from time to time as they accrue, for the use of said

fund, as they may judge best; subject, however at all times, to the direction and control of the General Assembly.

        Complete control and management of swamp lands; details.

        Sec. 5. That the said president and directors of the literary fund, shall be and they are hereby invested with full power and authority to adopt all necessary ways and means for causing so much of the swamp lands aforesaid to be surveyed, to contract with one or more persons to construct canals, ditches and other works necessary for the purpose of reclaiming said lands, upon such terms and conditions as may be prescribed by the said corporation; the contractor or contractors in each case, giving bond and security for the faithful performance of the agreement.

        Sec. 6. Whenever it shall be necessary to construct any of the works of said corporation on the lands of any individual proprietor, the written consent, of such proprietor, without any formal deed of conveyance for the lands necessary to the work, and its future unrestricted enjoyment, shall vest the title thereof in the said corporation forever; and when any infant or person non compos mentis, or feme covert, shall be owner thereof, the guardian of such infant or person non compos mentis, shall be, and he is hereby authorized to give such consent; and the feme covert, with her husband may do so, without any separate examination; and the consent so given, shall, in either case, be good and valid to all intents and purposes.

        Sec. 7. That whenever the consent of the proprietor aforesaid shall be withheld or refused, it shall be lawful for the said corporation, or their agents to enter on the said lands, and lay off so much of the same as may be necessary to be used in said work, the value of which shall be assessed to the proprietor according to the law of the land; and upon the payment, thereof, the title of said land shall be vested in the said corporation forever: PROVIDED, that in the assessment of such valuation, the benefit that will accrue to the proprietor by reason of said improvement,

may be likewise reckoned and set off against the said damages.

        Sec. 8. That when there are lands owned by individuals, which can be reclaimed by reason of the canals, ditches or other works of the said corporation, the said lands owned by said individuals shall be assessed to contribute an equitable proportion of the costs of said works; which assessment shall be made by the said president and directors, or by a board of commissioners appointed by them; and the assessment so made shall be charged on said lands: PROVIDED, HOWEVER, that the said corporation may, by contract with individual proprietors, agree upon the said assessment, and accept payment thereof in labor or money.

        Sec. 9. The said president and directors shall have power and authority to appoint an engineer and surveyor and other servants, under them to plan the works herein contemplated, upon the most reasonable terms they can be procured; and they may enact all necessary rules and regulations for surveying and reclaiming the swamp lands of this State, or in any of them; for assessing the lands of individuals, which may be improved by the works; and for collecting said assessments and the assessments so made shall be published weekly, for five weeks in one of the newspapers published in Raleigh, and also filed in the office of the Clerk of the Superior Court where the lands assessed are situate; and if no objections are filed at the court next after such advertisement the said assessments shall be confirmed by the Court, and the lands adjudged liable for the amount, and execution may be issued for the execution of said lands, to satisfy the same on motion to the court for that purpose: and if any reasons be shown against the said assessments, they shall be heard and determined by the said court. And the said assessments shall be increased or diminished as the court shall adjudge is right.

        Sec. 10. The said corporation and their officers or agents shall have a right to enter upon the lands of all and whomsoever, for the purpose of surveying; and all the grants and deeds for swamp lands heretofore made, shall be proved and registered in the county where such lands are situate, within twelve months; and every such grant or deed not being so registered within the time aforesaid, shall be utterly void and of no effect, and the title of the proprietor in said lands shall revert to the State of North Carolina.

        Sec. 11. That the said corporation may sell and convey any part of the lands, which may be reclaimed for the best price which can be obtained for the same; and the title of the purchaser or the purchasers, shall be good and valid in law and equity. But the corporation shall not sell any canal by them constructed under this act.

        Sec. 12. That the corporation aforesaid, shall not expend any part of the moneys and stock herein before vested in them for the purpose of reclaiming the said lands.

        $200,000 to be used in reclaiming lands.

        Sec. 13. That two hundred thousand dollars shall be and is hereby appropriated to the use of the said president and directors; and they have power to expend so much thereof, in reclaiming the swamp lands, as can be beneficially applied to that object; and if the same shall not be immediately required, the said president and directors shall have power to loan the same, on short credit and good security, or to deposit it with a bank or banks, at a reasonable rate of interest, as they see fit, until it is required for the work herein provided for.

        Powers of the Board.

        Sec. 14. That besides the powers herein before given, the said president and directors are invested with all the rights and powers heretofore belonging to the president and directors of the literary fund of this State; and also with all powers and authority necessary and proper for reclaiming the swamp lands of this State, and for obliging the owners of any part to bear an equitable share of the

expenses, whenever such owners are benefitted by the work of the company.

        Ratified 20th of January, 1837.

--Laws 1836-7, Chap. XXIII.

        Supplementary act

        An Act to repeal so much of the act, passed during the present session, entitled "an act to establish a fund for Internal Improvement, and to create a board for the management thereof," as is consistent with an act passed at the same session, entitled, "an act to aid the Internal Improvements of this State," and also to repeal so much of the act passed during the present session, entitled, "an act to create a fund for the establishment of common schools," as is inconsistent with another act, passed during the same session, entitled, "an act to drain the swamp lands of this State and to create a fund for common schools."

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That so much of the act passed during the present session, entitled, "an act to establish a fund for Internal Improvement, and to create a board for the management thereof," as is inconsistent with an act, passed at the same session entitled, "an act to aid the Internal Improvement of the State;" and also so much of the act, passed during this session, entitled, "an act to create a fund for the establishment of common schools," as is consistent with another act, passed during the same session entitled, "an act to drain the swamp lands of this State, and to create a fund for Common Schools," be, and the same are hereby repealed.

        Pay of members of the Literary Board.

        Sec. 2. Be it further enacted, That the persons composing the Literary Board, created under an act, entitled, "an act to create a fund for the establishment of common schools," shall be entitled to receive the same pay, and

under the same regulations, as persons composing the board created under an act entitled "an act to aid the Internal Improvements of the State."

        Management of Literary Fund.

        Sec. 3. Be it further enacted, That if the stock holders in the Cape Fear Bank shall fail to accept the amendment of their charter, which is made by an act of the present General Assembly, so that the funds of the State cannot be invested in the stock of said bank as by said act is directed, it shall be the duty of the president and directors of the literary fund to loan out the sum so directed to be invested and added to the Literary Fund, or otherwise to secure and manage the same, so as to cause said fund to accumulate as rapidly as possible.

        Sec. 4. This act shall be in force from and after its ratification.

        Ratified 23d January, 1837.

--Laws 1836-7, Chap. XXIV.

        Surplus revenue act.

        An Act to receive the proportion of the Surplus Revenue to which the State of North Carolina is entitled, under the act of Congress to regulate the deposites of the public moneys.

        Whereas, by an act passed at the last session of Congress it was directed that the money which shall be in the Treasury of the United States on the first day of January, eighteen hundred and thirty-seven, reserving the sum of five millions of dollars, shall be deposited with such of the several States of this Union, in proportion to their respective representation in the Senate and House of Representatives in the United States, as, shall, by law, authorize their Treasurer, or the competent authorities to receive the same, on the terms specified in said act:

        Revenue accepted; details.

        Be it therefore enacted by the General Assembly of this State and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the

same, That the proportion of the surplus revenue which is allotted to the State of North Carolina, by an act of Congress passed at the last session, entitled, "an act to regulate the deposites of the public money," be, and the same is hereby accepted, by and in behalf of the said State.

        Sec. 2. Be it further enacted that the Governor of this State, immediately after the passage of this act, notify the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of the acceptance, by the State of such proportion of the surplus revenue to which it is entitled, according to the provisions of the act aforesaid.

        Sec. 3. Be it further enacted, That the Public Treasurer of this State is hereby authorized, empowered and directed to execute in behalf of this State, such certificates of deposite for said money, pledging the faith of the State for safe keeping, and for the payment of the same, as may be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, according to the provisions of the said act of Congress.

        Sec. 4. Be it further enacted, That the Public Treasurer is hereby authorized and empowered to receive of the Secretary aforesaid, or his agent or agents, such portions of the public money to which the State is entitled aforesaid, and to execute such acquittances and acknowledgments for the same in behalf of the State, as may be prescribed or required, according to the provisions of the act of Congress aforesaid; and when said money shall be received by the Public Treasurer he shall deposit the same for safe keeping in the banks of this State, as a separate and distinct fund from the revenues of this State, and not subject to draft except by special order of the General Assembly, or unless the safety of the same shall require it, which shall be determined by the Governor, who may order it to be withdrawn.

        Sec. 5. Be it further enacted, That this act shall take effect and be in force from and after its ratification.

Ratified 11th January, 1837.

--Laws, 1836-7, Chap. LI.

        Redemption of script; details.

        An Act to provide for the redemption of the script issued by this State, under the act of the General Assembly, passed in the year one thousand eight hundred and thirty-five, and entitled "an act to provide for the payment of instalments on the shares reserved to the State in the capital stock of the Bank of the State of North Carolina."

        Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same That the Public Treasurer is hereby empowered and directed to negotiate with the trustees of the University of this State, for the purchasing of the script issued by the State, and now held by the trustees of said University, amounting to one hundred thousand dollars principal; and to effect such purchase, the Treasurer aforesaid, in the name of and on behalf of the State, is hereby directed to transfer in lieu of said scrip one thousand shares of the capital stock of the bank of the State of North Carolina, now held and owned by the State in said bank.

        Sec. 2. The Governor is hereby empowered and directed to appoint an agent, whose duty it shall be to purchase it, if practicable, the scrip issued by the State and sold to the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States for the use of the Cherokee Indians, amounting to three hundred thousand dollars; and to effect such purchase, the Governor is authorized to draw on any bank or banks of the State, having in it or their possession, any part of the surplus revenue of the United States, which has been or may be deposited with this State, under an act of the twenty fourth Congress, passed at its first session, entitled, "an act to regulate

the deposits of the public money," for a sum not exceeding three hundred thousand dollars, with which said sum the agent aforesaid may purchase the said scrip directly, or purchase other stocks, and transfer the same to the holder of said scrip in lieu thereof, as shall be agreed on between said agent and holder of said scrip.

        Sec. 3. Said scrip when purchased in, under either of the foregoing sections, shall not be cancelled nor be deemed in anywise to be extinguished by such purchase but shall be deposited in the Public Treasury of the State, and shall not be re-issued, except in case of a call by the Federal Government on the State for the surplus revenues deposited with this State, under the before recited act of Congress, and re-issued then only by resolution of the General Assembly.

        Sec. 4. The expenses of said agent, and such compensation for his services in the performance of the duties herein prescribed, as the Governor shall deem reasonable and proper, shall be paid him by the Treasurer on the warrant of the Governor.

        Sec. 5. This act shall be in force from the passage thereof.

(Ratified 21st January, 1837.)

--Laws 1836-7, Chap. LII.

7. PROCEEDINGS OF LITERARY BOARD.

RALEIGH, N. C., March 4, A. D. 1837.

        First meeting under law of 1836-7; two hundred shares of bank stock bought.

        The Board of the Literary Fund met at the Executive Office, present his Excellency Gov. Dudley Prest. ex officio, Charles Manly and David W. Stone, Esqrs. when it was resolved that two hundred shares of stock should be subscribed for in the stock of the Bank of Cape Fear when the books for the same are opened for the new stock in the said Bank and that $26,900 of the monies now belonging to the literary fund now on deposit in the Bank of the State and Cape Fear, should be paid on the first instalment on the surplus of which over the first instalment interest would be allowed as an advance payment.

        Blank books.

        It was also resolved that the Secretary of this Board be directed to purchase a good blank book well bound for the purpose of keeping a record of the proceedings and doings of this Board. No further business being before the Board it adjourned to meet again on Monday the 13th of March at the Executive Office.

C. C. BATTLE, Secty.

RALEIGH, N. CA.,
EXECUTIVE OFFICE, 13 March, 1837.

        Act about Mattamuskeet Lake.

        The literary Board met pursuant to adjournment. Present His Excellency Gov. Dudley, Prest. ex officio, Charles Manly and D. W. Stone, Esquires. The act ratified in General Assembly 18th Jan'y last, to provide for draining Mattimuskeet Lake, having been submitted to the Board, it is therefore Resolved That the act of the General Assembly entitled "an act to drain the swamp lands of this State and to create a fund for common schools" ratified on 20th January last has in the opinion of this board repealed and superseded the said act first referred to.

        Engineer to be employed.

        Resolved That this Board will take immediate steps to

employ a suitable engineer in conformity with the powers under the act and that the Prest. of the Board be requested to make advertisement in the Raleigh Register and North Carolina Standard published in this City--the National Intelligencer and New York Evening Star weekly for six weeks.

        Secretary.

        Resolved that Christopher C Battle be and he is hereby appointed Secretary of this Board and that he be allowed a compensation at the rate of three dollars per diem for each and every day he may be employed provided that the whole of his compensation shall not exceed $500 per annum.

        Literary Board laws to be codified.

        Resolved that all the laws and acts of the General Assembly in relation to the powers and authority of this Board be collected and transcribed by the Secretary in the first part of the Book in which the proceedings of this Board are to be kept.

        The Board adjourned until tomorrow 10 o'clock.

RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA.
EXECUTIVE OFFICE, March 14, '37.

        The Board met according to adjournment. Present His Excellency Gov. Dudley, Prest. ex officio, Charles Manly and D. W. Stone, Esquires. In obedience to the resolution of the last meeting the President of the Board submitted the following:

NOTICE.

        Advertisement for an engineer.

        Pursuant to an order of the President and Directors of the Literary fund of North Carolina, a competent engineer to superintend the draining of the swamp lands of the State will be employed. Applications with satisfactory references are requested as early as possible. Which was accepted by the Board and immediately sent to the Standard Office for publication.

        Titles to swamp lands.

        Resolved That the Secretary be directed to examine whether any law has been passed since the session of 1826 instituting a commission in each of the counties in which

the Swamp Lands lie before whom the owners of low lands shall substantiate their titles and report the result of his examination to this Board at the next meeting.

        Board ask interest on funds in bank.

        Resolved. That the President of the Board address a communication to the President of the Bank of the State and the President of the Bank of Cape Fear and inquire whether said Banks or either of them will receive the funds of this Board at interest on deposit and at what rate. The Board agreeing to give thirty days notice to the Bank of all sums to be drawn for or over $10,000 and all drafts of $5,000 and under to be paid at sight.

        The Secretary was directed to copy in the front of this Book the following acts. (viz.)

        To drain the Low Lands.

        Laws codified.

        The original act creating a fund for common schools and establishing the President and Directors of the Literary Fund. The act for draining Mattimuskeet Lake. The act for draining swamp lands passed in 1836-7. The supplement thereto.

        Swamp land maps and reports examined.

        The Board then examined the report of former commissioners took a general survey of the lakes, the topography of the country around them and the improvements they had already undergone by means of charts, maps and other drawings relating to the subject under consideration. The Board then adjourned to meet at the summons of the President.

CHRISTOPHER C. BATTLE, Secretary.

EXECUTIVE OFFICE, RALEIGH,
March 25th, 1837

        The Board of the Literary Fund met in pursuance of the call of the Prest. present His Excellency Governor Edward B. Dudley, D. W. Stone and Charles Manly, Esquires.

        Swamp land funds to be loaned.

        Communications having been addressed to the State Bank and the Bank of Cape Fear under an order of the

last meeting inquiring if they would receive the funds of this Board at interest and at what rate, and as no answers have been received from said Banks by the Board. The Board has thought proper to advise as to loaning to individuals, when the following resolution was adopted. Resolved. That the Board will on the 1st day of April ensuing proceed to lend such part of said fund as may then be in their possession. Resolved that the succeeding notice be sent to the papers of this city for two weeks publication.

        Office of the Board of the Prest. & Directors of the Literary Fund of North Carolina.

NOTICE.

        Newspaper notice of loan of funds.

        Pursuant to an order of the Prest. and Directors of the Literary fund of North Carolina the funds appropriated for the draining of the Swamp Lands and not immediately required for that purpose will be loaned out in sums not less than one thousand Dollars and the Board will be in session on the 1st day of April next at the Executive Office--the office of said Board and so continue to act upon applications for the same. The Secretary is directed to receive all applications for loans. The following form of note must be observed.

        Form of blank to be made.

        (Place of Residence) day of 1837. $ Three months after date with interest from the date hereof, we jointly and severally promise to pay the Prest. and Directors of the Literary fund of North Carolina, or order at the office of said Board at Raleigh Dollars for value received.

        Resolved. That the Secretary be directed to purchase a Blank Book.

        Blank warrants to be printed.

        Resolved. The the Secretary be directed for the use of the Board to have five Quires of blank warrants on the Treasury printed. The Secretary reported that in accordance

with an order of the last meeting, he had examined the laws from 1826 to 1837 inclusive with the exception of a part of the acts of 1829 & all of those of 1830--which he could not find & that he found no law instituting a commission before whom owners might substantiate their titles. There being no other business it was Resolved That the Board adjourn to meet again on Saturday the 1st day of April next ensuing.

CHRISTOPHER C. BATTLE, Secretary.

EXECUTIVE OFFICE RALEIGH
Saturday, 1st day of April 1837

        Pursuant to adjournment the Board of the Literary Fund met this day. Present His Excellency Gov. Dudley, Ex officio Pres. of the Board D. W. Stone and Charles Manly Esquires.

        Notes presented for loans.

        In accordance with the published Notice of the Board at its last meeting, this day was occupied in discounting notes with the money appropriated by the last General Assembly for draining the swamp lands of this state as is required by said act of Assembly. The Secretary presented all notes to the Board which had been presented to him for said purpose; when the Board acted upon and accepted the following notes & directed warrants upon the Public Treasurer for the same individually. (Viz.)

        

No. 1.	John Sugg, James Newlon Alsey Beavers	$1,200
No. 2	Selby & Greene Bennett T. Blake Daniel Murray	1,000
No. 3	Bennet T. Blake B. B. Smith T. H. Selby	2,500
No. 4	B. B. Smith, W. Hill Bennett T. Blake J. Busbee	4,000
No. 5	A. J. Battle C. C. Battle	4,000
No. 6	T. S. Beckwith & Co. John Beckwith C. C. Battle	1,000
No. 7.	Jno. J. Christophers James Litchford A. Williams	1,000

No. 8.	Wm. F. Clark, James Litchford Jno. J. Christophers	1,500
No. 9	Thos. Cobb, John Buffalow John G. Marshall C. A. Smith John (his X mark) Hutchins W. M. Peck	5,000
No. 10.	C. W. D. Hutchings Bennett T. Blake T. H. Selby	1,200
No. 11.	Terrell & Brooks William Roles Benjamin Dunn Benjm. Marriott W. P. Terrell	2,500
No. 12.	William Roles Burrell Perry John S. Terrell	1,000
No. 13	J. Busbee Sarah Stone	2,000
No. 14	Sarah Stone B. B. Smith J. Busbee	1,200
No. 15	John Devereaux T. P. Devereaux	1,200
No. 16	Samuel M. Morgan W. Barbee N. J. King	2,000
No. 17.	William Barbee Samuel M. Mor