religious instruction, whether in voluntary schools (in which its inclusion might be assumed as of course) or in board schools, purely permissive. In practice it was only in Wales that school boards availed themselves to any extent of the liberty to abstain from giving religious instruction, and this comparative secularism of Wales certainly argued no lack of religious life among the people.
The third change in the bill was the substitution of the ad hoc school board for the municipally appointed board originally proposed, a change which commended itself in view of the special difficulty presented by the case of London. These boards were elected by the system of cumulative voting under which each elector had as many votes as there were candidates to be elected, with liberty to give all his votes to one candidate or to distribute them amongst the candidates as he thought fit. This system was much criticized as being unduly favourable to minorities, whose representation it was devised to secure; it continued, however, until the supersession of the ad hoc authorities by committees of the county and urban councils under the act of 1902.
School boards were empowered not only to acquire sites for schools under powers of compulsory purchase, but also to take transfers of existing voluntary schools from their managers. The section which enables managers to transfer schools to the school board or local education authority for the purpose of board or council schools freed from religious trusts unquestionably marks an important inroad by the state upon the sanctity of trusts. Thus though the act of 1870 did not itself introduce the principle of compulsory transfer, it formed the point of departure for the proposals in this direction which were the basis of the unsuccessful bills of 1906 and 1908. The act of 1870 did not introduce either direct compulsory attendance or free education, but it took a distinct step forward in each direction by enabling school boards to frame by-laws rendering attendance compulsory, and also to pay the school fees in the case of poverty of the parent.
The policy of compromise between the two systems of voluntary and rate-established schools was carried out in the provisions relating to the future supply of schools. On the one hand, building grants were continued temporarily for the benefit of those who applied (as voluntary managers alone could apply) before the 31st of December 1870. On the other hand, the Education Department was authorized to refuse parliamentary grants to schools established in school board districts after the passing of the act if they thought such schools unnecessary.
The following figures are of interest as showing the progress made under the act of 1870. In the year 1870 there was accommodation in inspected day schools for about 2,000,000 children; the average attendance was 1,168,000, and the number on the books about 1,500,000. It was computed, however, that there were, exclusive Progress under
the act of 1870.of the well-to-do classes, at least 1,500,000 children who attended no school at all or schools not under inspection. In 1876 accommodation had been provided for nearly 3,500,000, and of the 1,500,000 new places nearly two-thirds were provided by voluntary agencies. “These voluntary agencies,” says Sir H. Craik, “had received grants in aid for about one-third of the schools they had built, the grants defraying about one-fifth of the cost of the aided schools.” On the other hand, the growth of school boards was rapid and continuous, notwithstanding the permissive character of the act and the strenuous efforts of the voluntaryists to keep pace with the new demands. In 1872, 9,700,000 of the population were under school boards, and of these 8,142,000 were under by-laws; in 1876 the numbers were respectively 12,500,000 and 10,400,000. In the same period the annual grants increased from £894,000 in 1870 to £1,600,000 in 1876.
The development evidenced by the above figures, and in particular the fact that 52% of the population were subject to by-laws, enabled Mr Disraeli’s government in 1876 to take a notable step forward in the direction of universal direct compulsion. The act of 1876 embodied the declaration that “it shall be the duty of the parent of Act of 1876.every child to cause such child to receive efficient elementary instruction in reading, writing and arithmetic, and if such parent fail to perform such duty he shall be liable to such orders and penalties as are provided by the Act”; next, it rendered an employer liable to a penalty who took into his employment a child under the age of ten years, or a child between the ages of ten and fourteen years who had not obtained the required certificate of proficiency in reading, writing and arithmetic, or of previous attendance at a certified efficient school. In order to complete the machinery for compulsion, the act directed that, in every district where there was no school board, a school attendance committee should be appointed by the local authority. The law as to school attendance, resting upon this and subsequent enactments, is complicated and in some details obscure. The subject was dealt with in the report of an inter-departmental committee in 1909, who recommended the abolition of the partial exemptions permitted, and the raising of the age of exemption to 13.
In 1880 Mr Mundella, as vice-president of the Council in Mr Gladstone’s administration, passed a short act which made the framing of by-laws compulsory upon school boards and school attendance committees, thus completing the system of universal direct compulsion. Under the acts of 1876 and 1880 the average attendance increased from Act of 1880.2,000,000 in 1876 to 3,500,000 in 1878 and 4,000,000 in 1881; in terms of percentage to population, 8·06 in 1876, 9·60 in 1878, and 10·69 in 1881. In the last-mentioned year the annual grant rose to £2,200,000, having more than doubled in the decade.
With the passing of the Elementary Education Act 1880 the education question entered upon a new phase. The country was now possessed of a national system of elementary education, in the sense that provision was made for the supply of efficient schools and for compulsory attendance. The question of free education Development of public opinion.was brought within the range of practical politics by the adoption of universal compulsion, but as yet it was advocated only by a small political group of pronounced collectivist tendencies. Whilst opinion was maturing on this topic, there began to force itself upon the public mind the vastly more difficult problem of combining the two systems of voluntary, denominational, state-aided schools on the one hand, and public, undenominational, rate-supported schools on the other. From the denominational point of view the problem presented itself as that of a burden imposed and a danger threatened in ever-increasing degree by the competition of the board schools, a competition that was felt not so much by direct rivalry of school with school as indirectly by the steady raising of the standard of efficiency with respect to buildings, equipment, salaries of teachers and educational attainment which inevitably resulted from the establishment of authorities with power to draw upon the rates. On the other hand, from the purely educational point of view, it was seen that the dual system tended in practice to an illicit but almost inevitable recognition of two standards of efficiency, the lower being conceded to voluntary schools in consideration of their comparative poverty. Experience, too, of the shortcomings of small country school boards was beginning to confirm the misgivings entertained long before by the Newcastle Commissioners as to the wisdom of entrusting autonomous powers to the parish, when the reform of local government by the creation of popularly elected county authorities turned attention once more to the question of organizing education upon a county basis.
In 1887 a royal commission under the presidency of Viscount Cross was appointed to inquire into the working of the education acts. The labours of this commission produced a thorough discussion of the educational problem in all its aspects, political, administrative, scholastic and religious. For any clear recommendations with Cross Commission, 1887.regard to the reorganization of education generally the moment was not opportune, inasmuch as the commission just preceded the establishment of the new county authorities and the powers with respect to instruction other than elementary which parliament was shortly to confide to them under the Technical Instruction Acts. Nevertheless the report of the majority of the
