For Part 1, go here .
Part 2: Eugenics and Anti-Catholic Sentiment
The other side of the Progressive movement was a secular philosophy anchored in the theories of Darwin and in an increased role of government. Social Darwinism had become a popular philosophy which eventually evolved into the eugenics movement. The premise of Social Darwinism was that the races developed and evolved apart from one another, and the relative civilization of each race determined how advanced they were. Therefore, certain races were more or less worthy of power. This, combined with a populist push to eradicate social ills (aided by the Social Gospel movement), led to a massive change in the role of government from dispassionate referee to guarantor of social justice. Many of the social programs instituted in the late 19th and early 20th centuries had aspects of Social Darwinism as the foundation.
Scientifically Inferior
Through the 1850s there was a mass migration of Germans, Irish, and other Europeans, specifically Catholic Europeans to the United States. Some of this was due to famine, but much was due to governmental upheaval. In the 1850s there was a number of outbreaks of violence against immigrant Catholics, specifically the Irish Catholics. The nativist tendency of the natural-born Americans was showing itself through resistance to the more assertive Catholic Church. As the Irish Catholics were forced to retreat into their own communities, they created systems of schools. These schools, which became parochial Catholic schools, raised even more suspicions from the native-born Americans regarding the infiltration of Catholicism into American society.
Many Americans, especially the Social Darwinists, despised the low-class Irish Catholics that immigrated to the United States during the Potato Famine and thereafter. Anti-immigrant sentiment was not new in the Progressive Era, but for the first time there was a science that supported the bias. Even more, there was something to be done about it. The Progressive movement had finally consolidated enough power in the national government that the Social Darwinists could implement policy, highlighted by the election of Teddy Roosevelt.
The Protestants were somewhat split on the science of eugenics versus the spirituality of the Social Gospel. On the one hand, racism against Catholics was stoked by the Social Darwinists. On the other hand, the Social Gospel preached a different message regarding the poor and the destitute in an attempt to purify and perfect America. As is the case in modern politics, the message became muddled and descended to the lowest common denominator: the dislike of immigrant Catholics. Economist Francis Walker bluntly summed up the moral and scientific fusion of the eugenics camp, “We must strain out of the blood of the race more of the taint inherited from a bad and vicious past before we can eliminate poverty, much more pauperism, from our social life. The scientific treatment which is applied to physical diseases must be extended to mental and moral disease, and a wholesome surgery and cautery must be enforced by the whole power of the state for the good of all.”
Dying Influence
Protestants were confronted with an emotionally charged problem. Everything had been fine up until the increased Catholic immigration of the 1850s, but there were fears of influence from Rome, and a general scientific consensus that the Irish and Italian Catholic immigrants were lesser races and were uncivilized. Stoking the flames of Catholic hatred was the First Vatican Council in 1869. The most well-known decision to come from Vatican I was the doctrine of papal infallibility. The Roman Catholic Church established that when the Pope was speaking ex cathedra, he was speaking in an inerrant manner. To a skeptical and hostile Protestant America, this looked exactly like what they feared. The Catholics were attempting to run the world from Rome.
To have a major player such as the Pope be declared infallible, especially in political and social pronouncements, makes clear why Protestants were uncomfortable with Catholics, especially since Protestants were losing their grip on the society. They were panicked by the thought of the Catholics having a growing political and social coalition that would ruin the previous homogeneity of thought and culture in the United States. In order to protect against this encroaching foreign power, Progressive Era Protestants focused their attention on the most malleable of the Catholics, their children.
Comments
111 responses to “A History Of American Public Education: Part 2 in a 4 Part Series”
Not sure if you’ll be getting into it in this series, but industrialization and the desires of certain firms and governments to have a capable worker population for this transition also had a significant amount to do with the shape and structure of public education. Sounds to me like the ideological components of public education played out like a game of king of the hill: who gets to put this “neutral” education through their ideological filter, social Darwinists or Social Gospel progressives? It’s hard to tell whether progressives drove the cart or just jumped onto it.
Looking forward to reading the rest.
Are you Puerto Rican? If so, where are you from?
From Yauco, PR. Home base is Tucson these days. Either way, I’m not doing a good job of escaping the clutches of the damned papists, heh.
Pretty town. I went through there on my way around the island once and stayed in a parador there instead of going to Ponce and staying at the Hilton. Fajardo and Luquillo were my stomping ground for a couple years a long time ago.
Not a bad place to grow up if you like mountains (which I do). Fajardo’s real fun; have some good memories from there. I can confirm that despite the shit economy, the island’s still beautiful; went back last year for a wedding/romping around the island with family.
We’re gonna retire to there someday, I think. Or buy a second home. One of them.
Another Tucsonan?
The U of A seems to have a fair-sized complement of SJW morons. I’m wondering how long until the legislature steps in. I think a bill or two has been introduced along those lines, but until their budget takes a hit, nobody will care.
They’d put a statue of Lenin on the UA grounds if he weren’t so unfortunately white.
And given their soaring tuition, apparently their leftism is as fiscal as it is social…
Puerto Rico, duh doi.
hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
(sigh)
was meant to link to this
never heard it. Thanks, Gil.
sorry about your good name being taken. I’m trying to look out for it should they show up again.
i’m trying to stop posting there. still reading, just not diving in.
i couldn’t help the last-gasp of exasperation today.
It’s hard to not scream at the wall.
I recommend just walking away and not reading the comments.
It’s easier that way.
“”I recommend just walking away and not reading the comments. “
i have an RSS feed; which is basically that
Another SD;DR today.
Saw it in my newsreader, the top blurb calling Milo a misogynist, race-baiter, pedo, etc.
No, he doesn’t hate women. He hates feminists. And there are a lot of women who hate feminists too. But in the twisted mind of an anti-freedom SJW and faux libertarian, it’s easy to wave that off as “internalized patriarchy.”
Of course, attacking SJWs for all their divisiveness and actual race baiting is race baiting… somehow.
And being the victim of a pedophile and ending up conflicted about the topic makes you a pedo yourself. Never mind that a female victim of pedophilia who won’t name her abuser is easily forgiven.
I don’t think I could go back there unless they fired her for #1 not being a libertarian #2 fake news purveyor #3 perpetually dwelling in darkness while others are trying to help people find the light of liberty.
not that it matters, but that’s not remotely accurate either. he specifically denied there was anything to it except him being a horny teenager who seduced someone older than themselves.
What’s actually the most intellectually-dishonest aspect of the way Nick/Shikha described it was the fact that the very same interview had a LONG discussion of Milos disapprobation of actual pedos. (about 1hr 7m in)
iow, he does an interview where he says, “actual Pedos are terrible and should be thrown in jail” – then later admits he had a voluntary dalliance with someone older once, but that he was in his teens and it was entirely initiated by himself.
That was twisted into “Milo defends Pedos” by the press (and by Reason).
Yep, I’m fully aware of the selective editing on that video, Gilmore.
I wouldn’t know what else they wrote about him because I didn’t get much past the byline.
My point is, legally speaking the priest should have known better and even if young Milo initiated, he should have rejected the advances.
Morally speaking is a completely different mess. I got into that just a bit in early morning links yesterday (comment 22). Leftists love moral relativism when it suits their arguments (SJWism), but hate it when it is used to defend their opponents. Not that anyone was accusing them of being rational.
Puerto Rico Suave
Aren’t they all from Senor Frog’s?
Good to see you here TiT
*i always feel weird referring to you as “tit”.
Been called worse, heh.
Glad you made the jump over
“industrialization and the desires of certain firms and governments to have a capable worker population for this transition also had a significant amount to do with the shape and structure of public education. ”
That was something we discussed when I got my teaching degree (which lasted 2 years before being trashed). The springboard for the discussion was this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U
It has its proggie moments, but if I recall it making some valid points.
Perfect, TiT and TaT.
Good stuff, trashman! It’s a history I’m not familiar with.
…Italian Catholic immigrants were lesser races and were uncivilized.
This is actually true.
Catholic schools seem to still do pretty well. Interesting that they are still a shelter from the proggies.
This is actually true.
My wop wife would take offense to that. I, on the other hand, tend to agree.
As a dago, I’ll stand by my statement.
“Education,” secular or religious has never been about educating, it has been about inculcating whichever philosophy one is pushing. The whole dancing to the tune of whomever pays the fiddler thing.
Thing. Where can I buy an edit button? Whomever pays the fiddler thing…
A small part, sure. But I don’t remember my math or science teachers trying to push anything on me other than math or science.
Objective vs. Subjective. Math and Science (the science is settled!) deal in objectives. The reading list is where it’s at…that dictates the world view.
Oh, I agree. I was just pointing out that there are exceptions.
Yes, but my third grader was instructed that “diversity” is an important function of government. And given how much space was allotted to it compared to the rest, it must be the most important.
My high school calculus teacher owned a liquor store as well, so the non-math conversations were interesting
Many Americans … despised the low-class Irish Catholics
and we still do!
html failz
FIFY!
well,
Obligatory.
Man I love that movie.
Me too. Can you imagine if he tried to make it today? Joyless progs would burn down theaters.
No doubt. I’m waiting to show it to the kids. I know they would laugh, but probably not quite understand how it was making fun of stereotypes. Soon, soon…
Mel Brooks and Monty Python movies are excellent teaching tools.
It worked for me!
The reason I took latin in high school was directly related to watching The Holy Grail when I was 8 or 9.
Latin? I meant sex!
Humphrey: So, just listen. Now, did I or did I not… do… vaginal… juices?
Pupils: Mmm. Mmm. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.
Humphrey: Name two ways of getting them flowing, Watson.
Watson: R – rubbing the clitoris, sir?
Humphrey: What’s wrong with a kiss, boy? Hmm? Why not start her off with a nice kiss? You don’t have to go leaping straight for the clitoris like a bull at a gate. Give her a kiss, boy.
Wymer: Suck the nipple, sir?
Humphrey: Good. Good. Well done, Wymer.
Pupil: Uh, stroking the thighs, sir.
Humphrey: Yes. Yes, I suppose so. Hmm?
Pupil: Oh, sir. Biting the neck.
Humphrey: Yes. Good. Nibbling the earlobe, uhh, kneading the buttocks, and so on and so forth. So, we have all these possibilities before we stampede towards the clitoris, Watson.
Watson: Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.
quoting Monty Python in grade school goes over pretty well.
My wife is half-Irish. When we first started dating, her Irish grandmother hated my guts because I’m Dutch, who “run this town.”
Okay, it is true, the Dutch do run my town, but other than my cis-shitlord white male privilege, my background has never opened any super-secret special back doors for me.
I’m Irish and hate the Dutch too. Competing for coeds against 6’5″ blond hair Aryan youth at Western sucked.
I’m only 6’2″ and my once white blond hair has turned a muddy brown. Ze Fuherer would be disappointed.
That’s because you never learned the secret Dutch handshake. It’s only for closers.
something windmil something black licorice?
See, you didn’t mention tulips or the colour orange, this is why you fail as a Dutchman.
my background has never opened any super-secret special back doors for me.
Still a PIV guy, huh?
PIP
You’re Cr1tikal?
I was thinking more a dick that sucked other dicks. Or two xenomorphs Frenching.
ahh. Carry on!
Mom’s side of the family was half-Irish, half-Dutch.
Look, they may have gotten the genetic inferiority thing not quite right with the Irish and Italians, but everyone knows the Poles and Slavs who came later were definitely all of those things the Irish were accused of being, amirite?
/sarc
Hmmm…the Irish, stomped on by the English for generations, most well known for alcoholism and wife-beating.
The Poles, stomped by everyone around them for centuries and kept on kicking, most well known for killing a lot of Germans, Russians and Turks.
I think you have that reversed.
yeah, but we had anarchy down.
Don’t forget the Anglo-Dutch, Norman, and Vikings.
It was also meant to partially insult the English’s stomping ability.
Would like a word with you.
It is true that Irish culture always seduced whoever attempted to rule the country.
Just slightly OT, I’m reminded of the eugenicist Walter Plecker in Virginia who led the state bureaucracy in its attempts to eradicate Indians from existence (on paper). It’s interesting that my own family was on the list of sneaky Injuns that were, as Mr. Plecker put it, were “watching eagerly the attempt of their pseudo-Indian brethren, ready to follow in a rush when the first have made a break in the dike.”
http://www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/lewisandclark/students/projects/monacans/Contemporary_Monacans/letter.html
Scruffy,thank you for mentioning WA Plecker who is one of history’s great, unacknowledged monsters. I’m planning to do an article on him in a few weeks (which in Toniospeak means not before Halloween, and lucky to have it then). Could I interview you for it? Can be done via email. Hereby giving the site admins here permission to share that with you or you can click my name on a posting on that other site (go back a few weeks).
Minimum wage was one of the tools they used to try and keep the Potato and Tomato Catholics out of the work force. Economic progressives believed they were ‘under pricing’ themselves and this hurt Anglo-Saxons. They knew it would price the immigrants right out of the market. It was all by design. To think MW is still seen as a noble thing truly baffles the mind given its unholy roots.
Straight up racist.
And Davis-Bacon could probably be better named James-Crow
And Davis-Bacon can’t teach typing for shit.
I was under the impression it was also meant for blacks and other non-white minorities.
Sure – all immigrants and minorities who were seen as a threat.
This infuriates me too. Those laws were literally intended to drive the ‘unfit’ out of society, to make it so they couldn’t afford to raise children, to drive them to suicide or other forms of economic self extinguishment. And they have to fucking gall to claim they just want to help people. >(
It’s what makes them evil in my view. Back then, they admitted that was their goal. Today, somehow that original intent has been ignored or forgotten and they blindly assume they’re helping people. The umbilical cord connecting old progressive eugenicists and modern progressives is still there. They still use the same language and jargon.
every time I point that out I hear “LALALLAALALALAALA cant hear you, living wage!”
A ‘minimum’ wage doesn’t ensure a ‘living’ wage for obvious reasons.
The minimum wage is 0 dollars per hour. No legislature can raise it above that number anymore than they can alter the gravitational constant.
All they can do is create an anoxic layer between $0 and whatever they have decreed the minimum wage to be, where no employment contract can exist.
Unless you work for the gov.
fuck. try 2
But enough about Vdare.com
You know who else didn’t like Popish influences…?
William of Orange
I think I did that wrong
Preet?
Hickens?
Clement VII?
Oliver Cromwell?
The current debate re:
“has Sweden* had a good experience w/ importing 5% of its total population from the ME over the last 10years?”
(or any other European country, really – but sweden is notable because 1) its comparatively small and homogenous, and 2) Trump sed it)
has a retarded degree of contrarianism. One side goes LOL NOTHING TO SEE HERE, and the other goes OMG ISLAMIC HOLOCAUST
(i would provide links for examples, but… sigh)
I tend to avoid that whole thing; no offense to Papaya, but…. i just think the topic brings out the Derp in people.
That said, the way Fox covered this recent news? Is worth a giggle=
Just saw that. I larfed. Trump played that one the same way he played the murder of Kathryn Steinle in San Fran during the election. Say something provocative about immigrants, let the usual suspects get outraged and foreground the issue, and just wait for the news to confirm what you said and make the usual suspects look like idiots.
That is the current debate but not the original debate.
Trump implied there was a terrorist attack (or something else newsworthy involving Muslim immigrants) the night before his speech in Sweden and there wasn’t. Rather than just acknowledging he misspoke, the goalpost was picked up and moved so far away it can’t even be seen any longer.
It’s disturbing to think that so many people are so wrapped up in Trump that they can’t even admit when he makes a flat-out, glaring mistake–or just lies for rhetorical effect.
(Just a general observation, nothing pointed at what you said specifically.)
“”implied””
there’s your problem
OT: MILO Resigns from Breitbart News
The soft focus shot is kind of creepy, honestly.
The commenters there don’t even seem to know what happened.
The comments there give me a headache. It’s so loaded with jargon and in-jokes and vitriol and counter-vitriol I barely understand any of it.
I feel sympathy for the people who try to casually lurk here and The Other Place.
I know right? There was some guy writing pornography about Clinton getting fucked by a shoggoth! I mean, who does that?
I admit I’m part of the problem. But look at this. Sarcasm? Truth? Anti-sarcasm? Irony?
I’m going with truth. I’ve seen similar stuff on youtube videos of Milo, especially the one where he and McInnes make out. The comments are rife with “and this is why Islam is winning, because we’ve abandoned Christianity and let degenerate faggots speak for conservatives.”
yeah, religious conservatives are all the rage. That’ll win in 2020
I tend to listen to Ben Shapiro once and awhile, and it’s always hilarious to me when people ask him to run for President and when he talks about considering it.
Because you know what the voters really want? A whiny, nasally social conservative Orthodox Jewish elitist who fundamentally can’t understand why people might not want to live the way he does or like the things he does.
Shaprio is a person who, to me, at least understands libertarian thought. He is pretty good when he goes to talk on campus.
Shapiro’s good for challenging the campus crowd and criticizing his political opponents. But that’s the problem, he’s an excellent critic and good at deconstructing other people’s arguments, but he’s got the Cruz problem being clever (and knowing it) mixed with a somewhat whiny personality.
I thought his first performance was good, but Simon Cowell was totally right to rip him apart in the later episodes.
Great article, Trashy.
Thanks Tonio!
Test
Test
here
Hmmm. I wonder
testing…
This made me laugh. It’s like the html version of the magazine clipping ransom note.
I had to disguise my typing so nobody would know it was me.
“As the Irish Catholics were forced to retreat into their own communities, they created systems of schools.”
I am descended from Polish Catholic immigrants. Most of the older generation of my family went to catholic schools in the 50,s and 60’s. I didn’t realize this is the reason catholic schools were originally established. I will have to do some more reading into this.
As of right now, the catholic schools is my area are vastly superior to the public schools. I would guess this is true most everywhere. I guess the joke is on the proggies. By excluding Catholics, they forced the Catholics to create a school system of their own which turned out to be superior to the schools the progressives sent their kids to.