but should be suppressed until a complete idea is brought forth to form with others the basis of our work. These ideas are at the same time the result and the cause of our civilization. In introducing new ideas into the schools we must discriminate between those things which are speculative and those for which the public should be taxed as necessities. The public school, while containing the latest and best thought of acknowledged leaders, should not become the prey to a supposed idea until test of fitness for survival has demonstrated its right to a permanent place.

The preamble of your constitution states that your organization is formed "to elevate the character and advance the interests of the profession of teaching, and to promote the cause of popular education in the United States." My friends, I welcome you here because your association stands for all that is best in education, for all that is helpful to those who attend your meetings. We hope your coming may give the words "culture" and "training," as commonly used, a more sterling signifi

cance.

The test of life in any calling is intelligence, efficiency, and moral stamina. These qualities should be the test of the school. Help us to courses of study which produce these attributes. Give us more truehearted men and women, and less method. Let us continue to build character, the foundation of which is duty. Our schools should maintain and produce the rugged independence of thought and action of America's forefathers, and eliminate time-serving diplomacy which places individual security and prosperity before permanent liberty and personal independence. The solution of the problems of education both at home and in our new possessions depends largely upon the advice and counsel of your body. Your members have been called to places of trust and responsibility in the new dependencies of this country. The future of Porto Rico, Cuba, and the Philippines depends more upon their teachers than upon the sword. Much has already been done; the future problem is not to be solved by the army or the navy, or both forces combined. The teacher and the home will solve the future problem of government in this country and in any new lands coming under its flag. Former mistakes of reconstruction in our home country should bring forth methods of education in our new possessions which will make our wards self-supporting thru manual pursuits, and prepare them for their future places in social and political reconstruction. By a united effort, the force which is to assist in solving this and other problems of government should be organized as a separate department, with its separate head, subject to no political exigency.

Among those who have forever ceased to meet and act with you is one who for years was Michigan's most active representative in your counsels. I cannot close without alluding to the work of this illustrious

member of your association. Tho Burke A. Hinsdale has passed from us, his influence and work will forever survive.

Members of the National Educational Association, we rejoice that in following the star which has brought you to us you bring us, not worldly gifts, but gifts which will help us to assist others to live more profitable and godly lives.

RESPONSE

RICHARD G. BOONE, SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, CINCINNATI, 0. I have listened with pleasure, and I think excusable pride, to the kind words of welcome just spoken by these representatives of the great state of Michigan, and of her metropolis, whose hospitality we are here to share. For myself it seems almost more fitting that I should join in welcoming these hosts to Michigan than that I, from among the incoming thousands, should share your hospitality, and be, in any small part even, the object of your thoughtfulness.

Six years' residence in Michigan, in the suburbs of this city, sufficed to discover a wholesome activity in matters of personal and public improvement, many noble men and women, and scores of friends whose interests are ours. I take it the spirit of welcome is mutual; and the impulse to respond is mutual. We are here, because here center our professional and personal concerns. A year ago you gave us a cordial invitation, and now you extend a no less warm, tho comfortable, reception. This should be a glad week for many thousands of teachers and their friends. We appreciate the painstaking forethought for our comfort, fo our amusement, and for our instruction. Speaking not for myself alone, but for all of this concourse whom I have the honor to represent, I am quite assured that you gentlemen and friends will be able to make good all your generous offers in these various respects. We shall enjoy your river, your parks, and your homes. I bespeak for these thousands before you, and other thousands to come, that they may come to know you as I know you, and appreciate your great work and the good things for which you and your state stand.

As representing many millions of people, and the interests of other millions of children, these gentlemen and ladies bring you, we are assured, a rich feast of good things for the mind, clean and genial companionships, and hearts to enjoy, equal, if possible, to your care for our comfort. And as I stand here before you all, seeing among you hundreds of familiar faces, I am reminded that the real good of a series of meetings such as these lies not in the papers read and the formal discussions and the parliamentary procedure and the fine organization, important as

these are. A richer harvest may come to you from a personal touch with the friend or stranger at your side, a quiet conference with a fellowworker, the give-and-take of social companionship, and the uplift that always comes from acquaintanceship with the people of your profession whom you have not before known.

ment.

Let it be a part of your business this summer, and every summer, and always as opportunity offers, to make yourself familiar with the best that is being thought and said and done in other places, not in our own land alone, by members of your profession. Waste no time in useless experiUse the results of others' experience. That is what you are here for. Identify yourself with whatever educational movements exist for the improvement of the schools. Become possessed with the spirit of the times and of our country. Here you will find a fair representation from most of the states, and from our English sister, Canada. It is a great and rare opportunity for a live teacher to make much of a short week. We have been assured that whatever is here is for our delectation and enjoyment-make the most of it.

In conclusion, gentlemen, we thank you for your words of confidence and hospitality, for your comfortable accommodations and fair weather; and we trust that our behavior and appreciation may be such as to justify all this care in our behalf. Permit me to assure you of our joy at being in Detroit, among friends, our confidence in the wisdom of the Executive Committee in selecting this place for the meeting of 1901, and our determination to take counsel of your zeal, and bear our share in the efforts to make this the greatest meeting in the history of the great National Educational Association.

ADDRESSES

PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS

THE DUTY OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION IN SHAPING PUBLIC EDUCATIONAL OPINION

JAMES M. GREEN, TRENTON, N. J.

Mr. Chairman, Members of the National Educational Association, Ladies and Gentlemen:

We are assembled in our first meeting of the twentieth century. As we cross this boundary line between two cycles, the one characterized by the greatest accomplishments of the world's history, the other by the expectation of things greater than have yet been achieved, it is quite natural that we should give attention for a moment to the particular part in the activities of men that seems to be ours.

Our association was formed in 1857. It sprang, Minerva-like, from the head of education. Its childhood may be said to have lasted till 1884; its youth, from that time to the present, when it may be said to be entering into the full strength of manhood.

As men destined to great usefulness often manifest superiority early in life, so the National Educational Association early began to make its influence felt. While in the beginning of its history its numbers were small, they were composed of vigorous, earnest, thoughtful personspersons who gave their attention, not only to the most fundamental propositions of local and state education, but also to matters of national

concern.

A glance at the programs of the different meetings will show that there is scarcely a question of school organization and government, or of selection of subject-matter, or of method in treatment, from the kindergarten to the university, or from the independent rural district to the nation as a whole, including its dependencies, that has escaped consideration either in some one of the departments or on the general program. Rural schools, graded schools, elementary, secondary, and higher education, the kindergarten, manual training, art, music, the metric system, Herbartianism, morals, school architecture, the relation of superintendent to teacher, to school board, systems of raising money, of selecting school officers, permanency of appointment, training and certificating teachers, interstate comity, etc., are types of the many questions that have been considered frequently and carefully.

The work of the association has resulted in some definite institutions, such as the National Bureau of Education, but by far the greatest good has been thru the modified and enlightened opinions its members have carried from the annual conventions to their local fields of labor. It is safe to say that to this influence is due the fact that, while we have no strictly national educational system, the education of our nation is more nearly uniform and has produced more uniformly good schools than that of any other country in the world.

While this association has been a brain center for countless thoughttracks, a storage battery thru which have passed many lines of intelligence, yet its growth has had the characteristics usual to an institution in a new country. It has had many crudities. If we are to form our opinion from the statements of the older members, there have been times when it has been ambitious in personal diplomacy, and indeed times when even a more germinal state of politics has prevailed.

But our association has now reached a stage of responsibility such that, if we are still to lay claim to the adjective "national," we must put aside our crudities, take our place in line with the conventions of other great nations, and assume a general rôle of seriousness in the problems we undertake. It is proper that we should try ourselves and find wherein we are wanting. We are indebted to one of our journals of education for a symposium of criticisms, favorable and unfavorable, concerning ourselves. One who read these criticisms carefully must have reached the conclusion that in the main they were favorable to our organization. There were, however, two or three that may receive attention here:

First, concerning the size of our annual volume. There are those who think the volume too bulky; there are those who think it too small. In all candor, this does not appear to be a very serious question. It would seem that much more depends upon the quality of matter in the volume than upon the number of pages it contains. If the Executive Committee and the heads of departments continue to exercise the care they have hitherto taken in the selection of persons to appear before the meetings, they will find it very embarrassing to say to such persons as they invite to prepare papers for the conventions that they will presume to pass upon their manuscript and edit it with a view to publication. No one should be invited to appear before the National Educational Association whose views are not sufficiently authoritative to be worthy of publication, so long as he keeps within time limits. Certainly, worthy men who give us their time and thought are entitled to this consideration.

Second, concerning the manner of choosing the Executive Committee. The author of this paper is not today as much concerned in the manner of choosing a president as he might have been had he been a candidate. one year ago; hence he may be credited with speaking without personal motives.