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Dewey, John, and Others. Studies in Logical Theory (1903); University of Chicago Press. Creative Intelligence (1917); Henry Holt & Co.

James, William. Pragmatism, a New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking (1907); A Pluralistic Universe (1909); The Meaning of Truth (1909); Some Problems of Philosophy (1911); Radical Empiricism (1912); The Will to Believe, and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy (1897); The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902); Longmans, Green, & Co.

Moore, A. W. Pragmatism and Its Critics (1911).

Murray, D. L. Pragmatism; Schiller.

Pratt, James B. What Is Pragmatism? (1907); Macmillan.

ONE

CHAPTER XI

FREEDOM AND LAW

NE of the chief impediments to proper progress in educational principles has been our misconception of the relation between freedom and law. We have not been willing to give the child's individuality free play because we have feared that such freedom would result in license. We have been dominated so long by the idea that the teacher is the chief factor in the school, the absolute monarch whose word is law, that we have found little place for the child's freedom. In fact, in the average school, the child has little to do with either the work or the discipline of the school. His business is to do the work assigned him by the teacher, obey her orders, and ask no questions. He has been taught that his teacher is his master, his elders his superiors, and that he is a perverted, totally depraved creature who has no rights. until he becomes a man. While we have had as our chief aim in the school the development of the child into a useful citizen, we have conducted our work in such a manner as to make him a slave rather than a self-active, free man. We have acted as though we thought that we could best train him for citizenship in a free republic by taking away from him all freedom during his training. We have forgotten that the ability to use freedom aright cannot be learned from books; it can be learned only in the practical school of experience. Here we have another example of the weakness of our educational system due to the overemphasis of books as means of education. It has caused us to overlook the fact that the school organism is the best possible means of training the boys and girls

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in the principles of liberty and of giving them a proper attitude toward law. We have thought of the school merely as a means of coercing the child into doing what we want him to do and have not thought of it as a means of developing in him the ability to use freedom aright.

Governor Whitman in his inaugural address to the New York legislature said that the greatest menace to this republic is the prevalent disregard for law, and this is just what we should expect when the people are trained under a system of education based on force. Such a system inculcates the wrong attitude in the pupil's mind toward the law, and when he leaves the school he of course takes this attitude with him and does not have the right attitude toward the law on the outside of the school. If pupils do not learn to respect law when in school, they will not respect it when they leave school. In the schools they become accustomed to looking upon it as hostile to their best interests; if they obey it, it is not because they love the law, but because they fear the consequences of disobedience. If grown men and women have any respect for the law of the land, it is not because they have gained that respect in the schools. Such an attitude was inculcated, more than likely, by law-abiding parents.

The fact that the school organization is based on force leads not only to the lack of self-control with respect to law, but to other vices which are sapping away our vitality as a nation. We may cry out against the high cost of living from now until doomsday, but it will do no good unless we exercise more self-control and selfrestraint in our methods of living. As some one has said, it is not the high cost of living that is troubling us; but it is the cost of high living. We are living high because the other fellow does. He has n't the self-control

to restrain his desire for pleasure and display, and we have n't the self-control necessary to keep from aping him.

TRAINING FOR FREEDOM

We have made some progress in freedom in the realm of government, but this does not affect the individual until the battle with him is either lost or won. We have been clamoring for more liberty without seeming to realize that it is extremely important that we first know how to use such liberty aright, and, as a result, we have paid extremely dearly for it in most instances. We have failed to use the schools as we should have done in developing the pupil's self-control. It is very important that, if we are to train citizens for a republic, we regard the school as a miniature republic, where, under the direction of the teacher, the child learns not to abuse his liberties and attains a proper attitude, not only toward the school law, but toward law in general. While we should have used the school organization to develop in the child the habit of self-control, we have used it, as a matter of fact, to crush his individuality, and, as a result, when he goes out into the world where there is no teacher to control him, not having the proper attitude toward the law, he abuses his rights.

Our attitude toward the child in his training is somewhat similar to the attitude of some of our forefathers toward the common man of one hundred and fifty years ago. They believed that anarchy would result if he were given any voice in his government, and for this reason they kept the rights of government out of his hands as long as possible. Monarchical Europe has looked with a good deal of skepticism on the trial of democracy in the New World. It is only within the

past few years that Europe has been willing to confess that it has been even a partial success. Our brothers on that side of the ocean have put themselves in the attitude of the overanxious mother who was unwilling that her son should go near the water until he had first learned to swim. How can men use freedom until they have first learned to use it in the school of experience? It must be handed to them a little at a time until they are able to enjoy it completely. The common man who came to America could not have used aright the liberties which were granted him in this country had he not learned to use them in his own local self-government in the old country. When boys and girls become men and women, they cannot be expected to use aright the liberties which are then thrust upon them unless they first learn to use them in the process of their education.

SOURCE OF LAW

In order to develop in the pupil the proper attitude toward law and to create conditions conducive to his growth in self-control, we must get him to understand the nature and source of law. The pupil is not going to respect the law so long as he believes that it emanates from the teacher. He is not going to be interested in his school work so long as the inspiration comes from without, and he is not going to thrive in the school atmosphere where the teacher's will is law and no place is given for the exercise of his own individuality.

The pupil must understand that the real law of the school is inherent in the organism, and that the law the teacher promulgates is real law because it corresponds with this inherent law. The very nature and purposes of the organism determine the law. This is true of a

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