The united American : a magazine of good citizenchip., January 01, 1925, Page 6, Image 6

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Page Six
JANUARY, 1925
THE UNITED AMERICAN
plan into being is to connect it up with the state pro­
gram of public education under the direct supervision
of the State Superintendent of Public Education.
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In this issue The United American is presenting a
draft for a Bill creating a State Department of Adult
Immigrant Education, and many prominent educators
and supervisors of public education and ranking
legislators are, in the main, in full accord with the
views of the United American as embodied in the
provisions set forth in this measure. Citizens of
Oregon who are interested in promoting a sound plan
for educational Americanization among the immi­
grant people of the- state, who have no personal
interests to promote in connection with such a plan,
may be truthfully said to be whole-heartedly in favor
of this draft.
The Bill which is presented on page seven repre­
sents a thorough and careful analysis of every
element which has had or has any bearing upon the
question of alien assimilation in Oregon. In the draft
is embodied the necessary safeguards against the
possibility of having an independent machinery of
education set in motion which, at this time, would
yield nothing but vague and impractical plans, un­
trained supervision, tutoring and whatever activities
might otherwise be inaugurated.
This draft represents mature thought and holds a
promise for the future. The adoption of the major
portions of this plan will permit unhampered growth
and development of public interest and will promote a
popular response among the immigrant people in need
of educational help. The adoption of THIS PLAN
for state-wide Americanization will prevent the in­
auguration of anything that may become the means
to an end other than the aliens’ Americanization.
The adoption of this measure will eliminate the possi­
bility of anyone obtaining arbitrary power, with
potential possibilities, over a state department, os­
tensibly educational, which may be used for other pur­
poses and other interests, political, racial or sectarian.
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There should be but one specific thing in mind
in this connection — the intellectual advancement of
the alien people. Whether they reside in the cities
or in the most remote rural communities, they are
entitled to the same protection in the matter of educa­
tion as our children; and we should NOT grant STATE
POWER for their educational care to any untrained
individual, group or department outside of the State
Department of Public Education.
For educational purposes a volunteer in a new
field of thought is invariably a menace until he has
been given a course of training.
Without specific provisions for educational qualifi­
cations of teachers, a state authorized plan of Ameri­
canization should NOT be proposed or adopted.
The untrained volunteers that are now engaged
in Americanization work in Oregon — if they are in­
telligent and realize their own shortcomings —
will stand as a unit, first, in backing the move to
legislate a thorough Americanization training course
into our state institutions of advanced learning, and
second, in backing the move to have the state Ameri-
canization educational plan placed in the hands of the
State Department of Education. Those who oppose
this plan can hardly avoid the suspicion that their
interest is NOT solely actuated by a desire to help
the untrained and untutored aliens.
There is no doubt in the minds of thinking Ameri­
can citizens and all those who have come into citizen­
ship by merit and not by accident, that the immigrant
in America who is sorely in need of assistance in be­
coming intelligently assimilated, would be better off
as the beneficiary of the kindly thoughts and com­
miserations of many of the so-called friendly (but
untrained) volunteer teachers who have inflicted
themselves upon him with sundry novel ideas on how
to fix him up as an American.
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At the last election in Oregon the people adopted
a constitutional amendment requiring a literacy test
of adopted citizens whereby those who are not able
to read a certain number of words in the American
language and unable to write a lesser number of the
matter they have read, shall be deemed lacking the
educational qualifications to register and vote. A law
was enacted during the session of 1923 providing the
manner and means by which such a machinery should
be set in motion. The operation of this law was held
in abeyance pending the ratification of the constitu­
tional amendment submitted to the people. The
amendment was ratified on November fourth by an
overwhelming majority, and the measure, enacted by
the legislature in 1923, automatically became a law
with a definite meaning.
When the registration for the next election in
Oregon begins in earnest, the rights of many natural­
ized citizens to register will be challenged unless they
are able to read the printing on a card, containing
fifty words of the State Constitution, which they must
draw from a container on the registration counter.
The inability to write ten words of the matter read,
and subquently called by the registration official,
will likewise constitute a cause sufficient to deny the
applicant the privilege to register and vote.
The enactment of this law has placed a moral re­
sponsibility with the ’state to provide reasonable
means for those who because of their illiteracy in the
language of America will be unable to enjoy the full
benefits as well as discharge their entire obligations
and responsibilities in citizenship.
Provisions must be made to enable those in need
of assistance, the farmers and the laborers in the re­
mote country sections- in the scattered rural communi­
ties as well as the city dwellers, to obtain immediate
help and instruction, so that they may be able to de­
fend their citizenship, The expense will be small, if
■any, but the benefit to the state and the nation will
be far reaching.
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By making it mandatory upon the state-supported
higher educational institutions to incorporate in the
teaching personnel (at least for the summer course)
a graduate in the Americanization study, to instruct
volunteer and professional public school teachers in
such a course, the state will immediately be equipped,
almost everywhere, with teachers who are able to