ARGUMENT FOR MEDICAL INSPECTION 



to the Connecticut law, with its permissive " may/' The exercise 

 of the power to enforce school attendance is dangerous if it is 

 not accompanied by the appreciation of the duty of seeing that 

 the assembling of pupils brings to the individual no physical detri- 

 ment. When the subject is considered both from the standpoint 

 of the individual and from that of the state, the wonder is, not 

 that medical inspection is now being practiced, but rather that 

 it was not begun long ago. 



Nor is the state, in assuming the medical oversight of the 

 pupils in the public schools, trespassing upon the domain of 

 private rights and initiative. Under medical inspection what is 

 done for the parent is to tell him of the needs of his child, of which 

 he might otherwise have been in ignorance. It leaves to the 

 parent the duty of meeting those needs. It leaves him with 

 a larger responsibility than before. Whatever view be taken of 

 the right of the state to enforce measures for the correction of 

 defects discovered, the arguments for and against do not enter 

 into the present discussion. It is difficult to find a logical basis 

 for the argument that the state has not the right to inform the 

 parents of defects present in the child, and to advise as to remedial 

 measures which should be taken to remove them. 



The justification of the state in assuming the function of 

 education and in making that education compulsory is to insure 

 its own preservation and efficiency. Whether or not it is to be 

 successful will depend on the intelligence of its individual members. 



But the well-being of a state is as much dependent upon the 

 strength, health, and productive capacity of its members as it 

 is upon their knowledge and intelligence. In order that it may 

 insure the efficiency of its citizens, the state through its compulsory 

 education enactments requires its youth to pursue certain studies 

 which experience has proved necessary to secure that efficiency. 

 Individual efficiency, however, rests not alone on education or 

 intelligence, but is equally dependent on physical health and 

 vigor. Hence, if the state may make mandatory training in 

 intelligence, it may also command training to secure physical 

 soundness and capacity. 



Much time may elapse before there will be put in practice 

 in all schools the measures, now so successfully pursued in some, 



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