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library moneys belonging to the district. They should then pay any indebtedness of the district by orders drawn on him, stating in the order what this payment is for, whether for teachers' wages, for incidental expenses or for library; that the assessor may know from which fund to pay the same.

Each district has two or three distinct funds which cannot be legally paid out for any other purposes than those for which they were raised, viz: The teachers' fund derived from State primary school fund and from two mill tax, together with any tax voted by the district for this purpose; the district library fund, in case the district has a library, derived from fines collected in the county and from such part of the two mill tax as the township may have voted for that purpose; the incidental fund, consisting of any moneys raised by district tax for the payment of incidental expenses; and sometimes a building fund. The assessor should open separate accounts in his books with each of these funds, charging each with any moneys received for it, and crediting each with the moneys expended from it. He should also carefully preserve the orders on which he has paid out any moneys, as his vouchers for such payment.

The director, also, should keep a record of all accounts audited, and of all orders drawn on the assessor, as also of all expenses incurred by himself on account of the district. The accounts of these two officers will serve as mutual checks, and will afford the exact information required to fill up the annual report. The importance of this method of proceeding may be conjectured from the fact that no other corporation or business firm would consent to any less particular system of accounts. In most of the larger union districts, this or a similar plan is pursued, and the law designs it to be universal.

I have dwelt at some length and with considerable particularity upon this matter, because of its importance to the districts themselves, and to the entire school system as represented and aided through this department of the State government.

Is there not just reason to fear that the character of the annual reports is a too faithful criterion of the fidelity and zeal

with which the reporting officers discharge all the high trusts reposed in them by the districts; and that the gross negligence in reporting the school work of the year is but the natural re-sult and fair index of the shiftless and inefficient way in which this work has been carried on? As far, at least, as my observation has extended, good and zealous school officers make fulland accurate reports.

BAD APPORTIONMENT OF SCHOOL MONEYS.

I cannot refrain from calling attention again to the bad sys-tem of apportionment of school moneys in use in the State, as evidenced by the statistics before us. It appears that the aggregate amounts provided the past year for the payment of teachers' wages, from the primary school fund, the two mill tax, the special taxes raised by the districts for this purpose, and the tuition paid by non-resident pupils, was five hundred and twenty-five thousand, two hundred and twenty-one dollars and ninety two cents. The total amount actually paid for teachers' wages, was five hundred and eighteen thousand and sixty-two dollars and two cents; showing a balance after paying every teacher employed in the State, of seven thousand one hundred and fifty nine dollars and ninety cents. In other words, had every school been made free we should still have had a surplus of $7,159 90 left on hand. And yet 1,740 districts were cursed with the odious rate bills, and $41,200 54 were needlessly collected by this tariff on schools, which both our written constitution and the genius of our institutions demand shall be free to every child in the State. And the evil wears a sadder aspect when we reflect that, for the most part, the heavy burdens of these rate bills fall upon the small and feeble districts.

In the annual report of the

which are least able to bear them. year 1862, this matter was urged upon the attention of the Legislature, and a new plan for the apportionment of the two mill tax was recommended-which was the equal division of one-half of the proceeds of the two mill tax among the several districts in each township, without regard to size or population,

and the apportionment of the other half to those districts in proportion to the number of children. This plan, after careful consideration, was unanimously approved by the educational committees of both Houses; but it failed for reasons not easy to be seen, to pass into a law. I cannot, without gross neglect of my duty to the public interests involved, refuse to call again the attention of both the people and the Legislature to this subject. The statistics I have presented, are a most impressive argument for the reform urged. Some remedy must be speedily found, or a most unfortunate reaction will arise against the two mill tax and a disastrous repeal be gained of this needful support of our schools.

While I have much faith in the equity and expediency of the plan of apportionment proposed, which agrees very nearly with the plans adopted in New York, Massachusetts, and some other States, I shall cheerfully concur in any which affords the aid needed by the feebler districts and prevents a useless accumulation of funds in the larger and richer ones.

It would doubtless be better, and, in the end, more economical as well as more equal, if the popular sentiment would permit the change, to make the two mill tax a county or even a State tax like the school tax of New York, instead of a township tax; or better still, to adopt the township school system explained in the annual report for 1862.

DISTRICT AND TOWNSHIP LIBRARIES.

In former reports, I argued at considerable length, the vital necessity and great value of these libraries, and I can only reaffirm with new emphasis, the views before presented. It must however, be confessed that the majority of the people do not seem to hold them in high esteem. Meagre sums are appropriated by the townships for their support, while in a majority of the townships the matter is neglected entirely. The interest in the libraries seems to be fitful and short-lived, both in our own and older States; and a few friends of education,

yielding to a hasty and ill-considered opinion, would dispense with them entirely.

In this State, many are ready to charge the decline of the libraries to the change from township to district libraries; not remembering that formerly the township libraries were loudly and almost universally complained of as ineffective and worthless, and that they were emphatically condemned by the popular vote, which at a single election, in 1859, abolished them. in two-thirds of the townships throughout the State. "When we had township libraries they amounted to something," cry these forgetful people, "but the district libraries are small and worthless." A little while ago they clamored against township libraries; to-day they clamor against the district system.

"So when a raging fever burns,

We shift from side to side by turns,

But 'tis a poor relief we gain,

To change the place but keep the pain."

It will be well if the State is not deluded by these cries to repeat a round of useless experiments, by returning to old and exploded theories.

The township library system was tested faithfully, and for years. The sum of twenty-five dollars, in addition to the fine moneys, was annually appropriated in each township, being upwards of $12,000 annually for the State, for the purchase of books. At first, each district was allowed to draw quarterly, its quota of books, thus making temporary district libraries; but it was found, as might have been easily foreseen, that many directors would not take the trouble to go each quarter, to the township library for the books; while others drew them but failed to return them, and so the libraries were in danger of being utterly scattered and lost. Then the law was modified so as to permit the Inspectors to suspend the distribution to the districts, and to permit readers to draw books directly from the township library. This was found to confine the advantages, practically, to persons living in the immediate vicinity of the library, while in the distant districts, the books were never seen. But a worse evil grew up in the systematic

plans of peddlers to palm upon the libraries a mass of cheap, trashy, and often pernicious literature. One or two wealthy booksellers kept their peddling agents traversing the State, and many are the tricks by which they boasted that they cajoled the Inspectors. A few libraries were well selected and well kept; but so valueless for public good, and especially for the education of the young, had the great majority become, that all intelligent friends of education desired a change.

An act was passed, in accordance with numerous petitions, authorizing the townships, by a popular vote, to distribute their libraries permanently among the districts. Out of 537 townships 350 at once voted the change, and by large majorities. But unfortunately the same legislature that authorized the the change of system, took away from the libraries all regular support. The district libraries were thus left to starve from their birth, or to depend upon the uncertain and fitful support that the township might appropriate. The districts owning them could not vote a dollar to buy books, except in the hurry and bustle of the annual township election day, and by a gen. eral vote of the township. The result was easy to be seen. In a few townships, strong and influential friends of the libraries have succeeded, against all opposition, in carrying the appropriations; but in the great majority of cases, the matter is either entirely forgotton, or successfully opposed, and these important agencies of public education are left to waste away. To base an argument against district libraries, on their inutility and decline under such a system, is as unjust as to condemn a dying man for his idleness.

If the apparent estimate of a majority of the people as thus indicated by the failure to vote library appropriations, is to be taken as an evidence of the real value of public libraries, we might well doubt the propriety of seeking to maintain them; but when we reflect how slow the common schools grew into popular favor, we may wisely wait for the "sober second thought" of the people. Were it not for the strong stimulus of the public school moneys, hundreds of districts would even

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