Expenditures. 105 



5. Education. 



In this period the state began to awake to the fact that it was no 

 longer maintaining its premier position in the realm of public edu- 

 cation. The chief reason why Connecticut was losing its prestige 

 was its possession of a large and productive school fund. It will 

 be remembered that at the beginning of the second period, the 

 state appropriation for schools was withdrawn because of this fact.^ 

 By 1821 all legal obligations for the people to support the public 

 schools by taxation were withdrawn and the school districts were 

 allowed to assess the parents of the scholars for school expenses 

 in excess of the income from the school fund.^ The result was that 

 in the majority of school districts, the schools were kept open just 

 long enough to consume the money derived from the school fund 

 or some town fund and taxation for ordinary school purposes was 

 almost entirely an unknown event.^ 



A beginning of state supervision was made near the end of the 

 second period,^ but this had ceased in 1842, when the board of com- 

 missioners of the common schools was abolished.'^ A new start 

 was made in 1845, when the commissioner of the school fund was 

 made superintendent of the common schools by virtue of his office.^ 

 From that time there has always been some form of state super- 

 vision. In 1849, when the first state normal school in Connecticut 

 was established, the principal of the school was made superintendent 

 of the public schools in place of the school fund commissioner." 

 In 1854 the legislature passed an act again requiring the towns to 

 lay a tax of one cent on the dollar of its list of taxable property and 

 polls. As the list was made at this time, this was equivalent to a 

 tax of three cents on a hundred dollars of the true valuation of 

 property and ten cents for each poll. In the year ending in 1857 

 the state began to make appropriations for school libraries. During 

 the five years ending March 31, 1861, this amounted to sixty-nine 

 hundred ninety dollars. The expense incurred for the superintend- 

 ence of the schools increased from five hundred twenty-eight 

 dollars for the first year of the period to thirty-three hundred sixty- 



1 Cf. p. 83. 



2 Report of Superintendent of Common Schools, 1852, pp. 23, 24 (Leg. 

 Doc. 1852). 



^ Idem, p. 37. 



* Public Acts, chap. 52, sec. 1. 



5 Pubhc Acts, 1842, chap. 50, sec. G. 



« Public Acts, 1845, chap. 46, sec. 1. 



' Pubhc Acts, 1849, chap. 24, sec. 1, 3. 



