University of Virginia Library

III. Bill of 1779

The first of all Jefferson's practical measures for public education was the Bill of 1779, which carried no expressed purpose in its text that was to reach beyond the borders of Virginia, yet, as it was based upon principles that went down to the foundation of society, its scope, in its broadest significance, was really as universal as the scope of the Declaration of Independence itself. In taking up the subject of his share in the drafting of this bill, we have come to the most interesting chapter in his career as an educational reformer previous to the establishment of the University of Virginia. By this measure, he sought to create in his native State, even before the fires of the Revolution had burnt out, a system of public instruction so far ahead of his times that the community continued too unripe to receive it until the War of Secession had removed everyone of those impediments, which he, with all his zeal and persistency, had found it impossible to surmount. But the credit due him should not be diminished but enhanced by the deferred consummation of his complete design, for it proved that his foresight was one hundred years in advance of the vision of the great body of his own countrymen. It was, however, no new and untried theory that he endeavored to put in

practice. During several centuries, the concept that it was the duty of the State to educate all its citizens had prevailed in many coteries in Europe, but it was not until the eighteenth century that the politico-economical value of that concept was fully tested by Prussia and Austria in a scheme of popular instruction scientifically ordered and rigidly enforced. Massachusetts had adopted a similar scheme as early as 1647. At first, the system in that colony stood upon a religious platform; next, the purely utilitarian view intruded; and then, finally, the belief that, by universal education, the people could be trained to govern themselves more wisely, and to preserve their political freedom more securely.

The latter was the opinion which Jefferson himself entertained. He wrote Washington, in 1786, that the liberties of the community were only safe when they were in the grasp of an " instructed people"; and that it was the business of the State to give this instruction; and that this could not be done successfully except in harmony with a general plan. What he thought that general plan should be was very lucidly expressed in the bill of 1779. At the time that he drew up this bill, the schools of Virginia differed but little in quality from those in existence there during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: there were the home schools for the children of affluent planters taught by private tutors; the old field schools for the children of the upper and middle classes alike; and the College of William and Mary for the higher training of all who aspired to it. Jefferson, in later years, justly claimed for himself the credit of having been the first citizen of the State to propose, in a formal way, the substitution of a concatenated system of public education for the unarticulated methods of private education which he discovered in use in his youth. Early in

1776, while a member of the General Assembly, he was chosen as the chairman of the committee appointed to revise the laws of the new Commonwealth. After the elimination of Mason by resignation, and of Lee by death, this committee was composed of Wythe, Pendleton, and himself, the three men whom the entire community acknowledged to be the most fully and nicely equipped for the work in view to be found in Virginia; but that work was really performed by Jefferson and Wythe, pupil and master of old, who were keenly in sympathy with each other in liberality of opinion, and quite on a level in breadth of information. As a proof of their insatiable appetite for their task, it is reported of them that they went carefully through the whole collection of British and Colonial statutes, and drew out those that seemed to them to be most apposite to the genius, and most fostering to the peace and prosperity, of the Virginian people.

Of the one hundred and twenty-six bills in which their conclusions were precisely incorporated, the one for the diffusion of knowledge was hammered into shape by Jefferson alone. It was drawn up, in reality, in the form of three bills, which provided (1) for the erection of primary schools, -in which the children of all classes were to be taught the rudiments of education, -and of colleges, in which all higher grades were to be open to older pupils; (2) for the establishment of a university in the broadest sense of the word; and (3) for the collection of a great library, to be used by students and readers of all ages. Jefferson, in drafting this bill, did not narrow his gaze to the intellectual and moral advantages of education only, but, looking forward, he was convinced that he had raised a new bulwark for the defense of political freedom, by providing for the division of each

county into wards as the local unit for the elementary schools.

An examination of the preamble of this famous bill reveals that it was written under the influence of all those emotions which were most inflamed by the Revolutionary struggle that was still in progress. All persons in power, it states in substance, are invariably inclined to use that power for the ends of tyranny. How is this disposition to be combated? By educating the people so thoroughly that they will be able to detect at once the encroachments of sinister and scheming office-holders, and to block them before any permanent damage is done. Education too will make the average office-holder himself more solicitous to guard the rights and liberties of citizens as well as more competent to administer their affairs.

The practical clauses of, the bill provided for the election in every county of three persons to be known as aldermen, who were to meet first at the court-house to divide the county into hundreds, each of which was to embrace a sufficient number of pupils to make up a school. The site of the school-house having been chosen by the voters of the hundred, the aldermen were to erect a suitable building thereon, in which were to gather the children for instruction in reading, writing, and common arithmetic, and also in Roman, Greek, English and American history. They were to be at no expense for this tuition during the first three years of their attendance. Each set of ten schools was to be under the supervision of officers, with authority to appoint the teachers, to visit the several school-houses, and to inspect and question the pupils; and each school was to be subject to a competent overseer. Next the State was to be divided into groups of counties with a view to the establishment of colleges for secondary education. The overseers of the elementary

schools of each group were to choose the site for the college of that group, which they were required to construct of brick or stone, with ten or twelve lodging rooms for the use of double that number of pupils. A master and usher were, in each college, to give instruction in the Greek and Latin languages, English grammar, geography, and the higher branches of arithmetic, -for such was the course which Jefferson thought to be sufficient for the education of the average person who was in the possession of an easy fortune. Each college was to be under the watchful and controlling eyes of a rector and board of visitors, who were to select its teachers and administer its finances.

The expense of gathering up food for the students, employing a steward, and hiring servants, was to be divided among the pupils. Those among them who were attending the classes gratuitously were also to be relieved, through the public treasury, of the cost of subsistence, while the balance of the expenses was to be met by the parents of the pupils who were able to pay. Every elementary school in each group of counties was to have the right to enter its most promising scholar each year, without charge, in the college of that district, if his father or guardian was too indigent to provide for his necessary outlay. Annually, too, one third of the boys thus advanced were to be dropped from the roll; and of those who should succeed in remaining two years because of their industry and talents, one was to be retained, with the privilege of staying two years longer in the college. The students who should thus signalize themselves were to be chosen as seniors; and every year one senior was to be selected from the whole number of those in attendance at each college, to be sent on to William and Mary University,-for the bill, as we see, converted that

institution into a university, -there to be taught, clothed, and boarded at the public charge. This regulation would assure the presence annually in Williamsburg of about twenty young men of no fortune, who had exhibited in the colleges superior capacity and scholarship, and who would, otherwise, have failed to receive the higher education to which their ability and diligence justly entitled them.

There were four remarkable features in this scheme of public instruction. The first was that the pupils in the elementary schools, which embraced the children of the entire white population, were to be grounded in history, both ancient and modern. The reason given for this provision was characteristic of Jefferson: by apprising them of the experience of other times and other nations, they would be the better qualified to fortify themselves against the intrigues of lurking tyranny. A second feature was that it would enable the poorest boys of talent to enjoy every advantage of education that was in the reach of the sons of the wealthy. And, thirdly, by giving an opportunity to youths of promise to advance from the lowest to the highest grade, -that is to say, from the elementary school to the university, -it would knit all parts of the system firmly together. Finally, by imposing local taxes for the support of the elementary schools, it would establish a principle that would entirely relieve the State treasury of their charge, and also ensure a more careful attention to the proper use of the money to be raised, by obtaining it exclusively from the parents of the pupils immediately benefited.

By the terms of the second bill, the College of William and Mary was to he transformed into a veritable university. The courses of instruction laid off for it, in its altered form, were to be distributed under the following

heads: the fine arts, applied science, municipal and foreign law, theology, and also ecclesiastical history so far as it was not coupled with sectarianism. No provision seems to have been made for languages, perhaps because the Greek and Latin tongues were expected to make up an essential part of the curriculum of the district colleges. Under the head of applied science, military and naval science was to he taught; horticulture and agriculture too; and also the practical relations of science to the arts and manufactures, to medicine, surgery, and pharmacy.

It was Jefferson's opinion that the whole educational scheme of 1779 failed to become law largely on account of this second bill. He had hoped that, by arranging for the elementary schools and colleges in a separate measure, and by making the divinity course at the new university purely historical, he would disarm the hostility of the Presbyterians and Baptists, and bring them to a hearty concurrence with his plans; but they soon began to suspect that there was some secret purpose to favor the Episcopalians by placing the old Episcopal College at the apex of the public school system; and they coldly turned their patronage away from the whole design. [5] But it is possible that the reluctance of the property-holders to shoulder the additional taxes, which, as will be seen, cropped up in 1796, when the like plan was broached, had much to do with the defeat of these educational bills. Had Jefferson not been kept out of the State by his mission to France, and afterwards, by his occupancy of a seat in Washington's Cabinet, his energy and persistency, brought to bear directly on the spot, would, perhaps, have led to the early adoption of his scheme of popular education,-

not simply in the letter, as was partially done in 1796, but in positive actual practice.