AMOUNT OF SCHOOL-TAX. 491 



5. Each township is bound by law to raise by assess 

 ment, for the payment of instructors only, at least one 

 dollar for each person between the ages of four and six 

 teen, or to forfeit all claim to their share of a school-fund 

 now accumulating, and which will ultimately become 

 large. But this amount is in reality greatly exceeded 

 some townships raising as much as ten, and none less 

 than two dollars for each person between these ages. 

 The average for the whole State, in 1848-9, was three 

 dollars 87 cents, or about 16s. 9d. sterling. 



The number of children between these ages is very 

 nearly one-fourth of the whole population ; so that in the 

 State of Massachusetts every person is taxed about 4s.* 

 a-year for the maintainance of free schools. This tax is 

 much heavier than that of the State of New York, which 

 has already a large school-fund, and where the tax 

 amounts only to lOd. a-head. Such a tax of 4s. a-head, 

 from the 20,000,000 of Great Britain, would yield a 

 revenue of 5,000,000 sterling ; a tax of lOd. a-head, 

 such as is levied in New York, would yield in Great 

 Britain 833,000 a-year. In treating of the New York 

 schools in a previous chapter, I have hazarded the 

 opinion, that this sum exceeds all that is paid to all our 

 schools from public funds, and that the State of New 

 York might well give a lesson to us. But how much 

 more of a national concern still do the people of Mas 

 sachusetts consider education, when they levy for their 

 schools a public tax, which in Great Britain would yield 

 5,000,000 sterling ? It must be borne in mind, however, 

 that it is only the national duty and national advantage 

 that are here in question. It is possible that a larger 

 amount than this may be spent upon individual educa 

 tion in Great Britain, paid directly by those who receive 

 and are immediately benefited by it. But if such a sum 



* It is as near as possible a dollar a-head ; the sum raised in 1 848-9 

 being 806,000 dollars, from a population of about the same number. 



