South Dakota.

Tennessee.

Texas

Vermont

Washington.

West Virginia.

Wyoming.

TABLE IV.-Computed effort indexes under 8. 2 for States based on U.S. Office of Education estimates of ADA and revenue receipts from State and local sources, 1951-52, 1953–54, and 1955-56

Chairman, Subcommittee on Education, Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C.

DEAR SENATOR MURRAY: The department of education of the National Catholic Welfare Conference respectfully submits to the Subcommittee on Education some considerations on proposals for Federal funds for education not yet discussed in public hearings.

The department is aware of the important problems in education in the United States today. It shares the general concern to improve educational standards and facilities and is encouraged by the serious consideration accorded to these problems by Congress. In the hope that its convictions will aid the Members of Congress in its complicated task, the department of education presents its position with regard to Federal assistance for education.

528

FEDERAL SCHOOL GRANTS TO STATES

The department is firmly convinced of the validity of the American principle that education in the United States is best served when it is locally controlled and locally supported. When questions of Federal assistance have arisen in the past, the department has held that Federal assistance, if it is to be granted, should be granted for specific purposes, and for limited periods in areas of proven need. It has urged that the assistance should be granted democratically to all without distinction of race or creed.

Most of the Federal-aid-to-education measures considered by the Congress since the publication of the report of the Roosevelt Advisory Committee on Education in 1938 have considered Federal aid as a temporary measure, and have been careful to exclude Federal control of curriculum or administration. Some measures now before the Senate incorporate another concept of Federal assistance promoting the idea of continuing support for that of temporary Federal aid.

There is an essential difference between the idea of support and of aid; support is permanent, aid is temporary. Any bill considered by the Senate should carefully distinguish between these choices. Otherwise a bill authorizing a permanent Federal subsidy might well carry in its wake Federal control and permanence which all agree would be harmful to education.

The dangers inherent in the concept of permanent support cause serious misgivings about the intrusion of the Federal Government into the area of teachers' salaries. The department is acutely aware of the needs of teachers and is not opposed to the improvement of their position. It questions, however, the proposal that the Federal Government should subsidize teachers' salaries by means of financial grants. A Federal subsidy for teachers' salaries appears incompatible with the idea of temporary aid; for, such a proposal, as a practical matter, is inherently nonterminable. Furthermore, it would give to school maintenance and custodial employees, to firemen, policemen, and other civil servants an equal claim on the Federal Government.

Federal grants to meet existing emergencies for schoolhouse construction are a type of aid that can, and should, be temporary in nature. The department of education, however, calls to the attention of the Senate the heavy financial burdens of parents who choose to send their children to private, nonprofit schools. If Congress in its wisdom determines to aid the parents of publicschool children by means of Federal assistance, it cannot in just be indifferent to the parents of these non-public-school children.

Congress can easily avoid an inequity by granting to private, nonprofit schools long-term, low-interest loans for school construction. This is not a new proposal, nor is it it outside the framework of existing laws as interpreted by the courts. Rather it is a means devised by Congress itself when it passed the National Defense Education Act of 1958 to provide in an emergency way for the needs of both public and private education. It seems to the department of education that this statesmanlike approach to the question of Federal assistance should be the basic consideration for temporary Federal aid to education.

Private and public education are partners on the American education scene and their welfare should be advanced simultaneously in any proposals for temporary Federal assistance. Such action on the part of Congress will maintain the pluralism which is a cherished feature of the American way of life and avoid reducing educational effort to a common mold.

In summary the department of education of the National Catholic Welfare Conference affirms:

1. Its traditional opposition to outright continuing Federal support for education.

2. Its opposition to the use of Federal funds for teachers' salaries.

3. Its contention that Federal assistance, if there is to be any, should be granted on a temporary basis for specific purposes and to areas of proven need.

4. The claim of private, nonprofit education to that measure of justice permitted by law and suggested by legislative precedent.

The department of education is grateful for this opportunity to clarify its position with the members of the Senate Subcommittee on Education. Respectfully submitted

ALBERT G. MEYER,

Archbishop of Chicago, Chairman, Department of Education.