CHART 3 RELATIVE SIZE OF CATHOLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM Senator MORSE. In support of your argument, I observe that if we could but press a button automatically closing the door of every private school in America, with the result that these boys and girls would rap at the doors of every public school tomorrow morning, then, for the first time the American taxpayer would have a better understanding of the contribution private schools are making to the public coffers of the country. That is why I have taken a position of being of some assistance to the private schools. I have not taken the position that the private school people, including you, have advocated, but at least it has been a position which has recognized that there is a public responsibility to be of some assistance to boys and girls who attend private schools. We can discuss later, or argue later the form that such assistance should take. On the general proposition-for after all, it is most important in the legislative process to narrow our areas of disagreement by the acceptance of common, general principles on the general principle that the public as a whole has some responsibility to children in private schools, we are in agreement. It is a matter of further determining, within our legislative processes and in accordance with what we consider to be the powers of a democratic government, what form that assistance can take. As chairman of this subcommittee, I thank you very much for this information. It is in the best form I have ever seen it. Don't be upset if you find me turning into a plagiarist. I surmise I shall be plagiarizing this material in speech after speech. I may not always remember to put it in quotation marks either since I feel, this now belongs to the public. This is public information, and I am going to use it. Thank you very much. Monsignor HOCHWALT. I would like to say to the chairman the colloquy he and I have had on this subject over the years, both in public hearings and private, have revealed his concern over our position, and we understand the problems connected with it. And so I am deeply grateful for your sympathetic understanding. We turn now to the financial contribution of the Catholic school system to our country. SAVINGS TO TAXPAYERS The existence of the Catholic school system has been a financial boon to public education. Through the years, Catholic schools have saved the taxpayers of the Nation billions of dollars. If our system is able to continue its normal expansion, the savings to taxpayers will be even greater. This saving will enable more money to be invested in public education in order to raise standards and increase facilities. However, if a Federal-aid bill excluding our children is passed, the drain on our financial resources will be such that we will be unable to expand and perhaps even forced to retrench. More of our children will have to attend public schools with a consequent tax increase to the general public. The saving to the taxpayers is enormous. Based on per pupil costs for 1959-60, the annual savings in some States is dramatic, e.g., New York, $467,138,570; Illinois, $234,122,146; Pennsylvania, $230,522,823; California, $203,458,195. The $22 billion Catholic schools save the taxpayers is, in effect, a subsidization of local public schools by our system. If our children did not attend Catholic schools, the State would be obliged to provide for their education. The more children who are enrolled in nonpublic schools, the more money is released for public school education. SAVINGS ON TEACHER SALARIES ALONE In terms of teacher salaries alone, the resulting savings would be tremendous. If there were no Catholic school teachers, public school teachers would have to be hired. Thus, it would cost New York taxpayers an additional $149,723,000 a year for teacher salaries. This, too, is a conservative statistic since we have more children in our classrooms than some public schools. Many States would have to hire more teachers than we use if they would maintain their current pupilteacher ratio. A total of $929,018,722 in teacher salaries is saved each year by the Catholic school system. Again, using the 1959-60 per pupil costs, the financial subsidy of Catholic schools to local public school sytems is startling, e.g., Catholic schools save the taxpayers of Cleveland $21,212,057; of Chicago, $119,606,888; of St. Louis, $13,510,276; of Buffalo, $26,215,590; of Cincinnati, $12,945,646. Imagine what it would cost the taxpayers of America if they had to duplicate the Catholic elementary and secondary school system. It would mean constructing at least an additional 12,968 schools. It would mean providing another 178,985 classrooms to house our 51⁄2 million students in rooms of 30 pupils. The number of teachers and administrative staff that would have to be hired would be staggering. The National Education Association recommends 50 professionals for every 1,000 pupils. In terms of the present Catholic school population, 269,150 people would have to be hired and paid for by local, State and Federal taxation. If the Catholic schools were to close tomorrow, the burden on the general public would be enormous. It would be difficult to conjecture how the money needed could be raised without cutting into funds now expended on public education. In fact, it is not too difficult to imagine that it could eventually destroy the whole effectiveness of a Federal aid program. If our schools were forced to close, the burden of educating the children would fall on the public schools. The money expended by the Federal Government would have to be used to provide an education for these children instead of going into an upgrading program for present public schools. QUESTIONS RAISED BY OPPONENTS We realize that providing aid to church-related schools is not an easy problem to solve. Many questions have been raised. There are those who sincerely believe that aid to nonpublic schools, and especially church-related ones, will lead to a divisive spirit in this country and to a fragmentation of the public school system. Others are troubled by the constitutional aspects of the issue. They sincerely feel that since the Catholic school curriculum is permeated with religious principles, any aid to these schools would be aid to religion and, consequently, a violation of the first amendment to the Constitution. We respect these views, while, at the same time, we disagree with them. The legal department, NCWC, has completed a valuable study on the constitutionality of the inclusion of church-related schools in Federal aid to education. A copy was provided for you with this testi mony. You, yourself, have suggested that it be included in the record as I am suggesting here. Again, we are grateful to you for your courtesy. Mr. Chairman, our replies to some of the questions raised by opponents of Federal aid to church-related schools will be answered by our next two witnesses. We hope to provide answers in a restricted area-Pennsylvania-and later New York, which will probe the questions deeply, charitably, and with the best interests of our country at heart. We feel that a solution to most of the problems raised can be found which will be satisfactory to all concerned. The burden of this part of the testimony has simply been to point out the vast educational and financial contributions nonpublic and especially Catholic schools have made to our country. To stifle in any way this contribution would be America's loss and her enemies' gain. In view of this educational and financial contribution our schools are making to the American scene, we feel that all who are concerned about the national interest and welfare should lend a sympathetic ear to some of the problems which we are facing. We have as strong a desire to maintain high educational standards as anyone, but we honestly believe that we will not be able effectively to upgrade our standards and, at the same time, expand our facilities if more money is spent on public education with no benefits to our students. FINANCIAL PROBLEM It is entirely possible that in such an event we may be priced out of educational effectiveness. The cost of education is rising for us as well as for the public schools. Buildings, equipment, and salaries are all increasing at the same rate as they do in public education. If we are to continue our normal expansion, we will have to rely more and more upon our lay teachers. The increase in salary costs will be tremendous. Our ability to keep up our expansion will be tremendously weakened since the areas of heavy Catholic school populations will be the areas hardest hit by Federal taxation. Our methods for financing schools have been entirely dependent upon the free will offerings of our people. The greatest source of our finances comes from freely contributed donations. Naturally, this method has certain dangers inherent within it. The ability of our people to contribute depends upon the economic status of the country. There is just so much money in the pockets of our benefactors. If more money were taken from them for Federal taxation in order to support_public schools, it leaves less money available for private education. If less money is available, it will be impossible for us to expand and to maintain the highest educational standards. CURTAILMENT OF PAROCHIAL SERVICES INCREASES PUBLIC COST Even now, we are not able to accommodate well over half of the Catholic school-age children. We have indicated above that large numbers of children have had to be turned away from our schools during the past several years because facilities were not available. What will be the results if our educational effort is severely wounded? We definitely will not be able to grow. The recent announcement of the archdiocese of St. Louis could be a sign of things to come. That archdiocese has announced that it will be unable to expand its school system for the next 5 years. Two reasons have been offered: the lack of teachers and the lack of funds. Any barrier to our growth will naturally put greater pressure on the local public school system. The less children attending our schools, the more there are who will have to attend public schools. The more who attend public schools, the higher the rise in taxation for the general citizen. It seems to us penny wise and pound foolish to consciously or unconsciously stymie the growth of a system which has been a real boon to the taxpayers and to the national educational effort. If we were to receive a fair share of the modest sum proposed by the Federal Government for education, we would be able to maintain our present status. A few dollars spent in helping us raise our educational standards would mean a savings of hundreds of dollars per child to the local and State governments. To hamper our educational effort would be to hamper the national need and welfare. Who knows where the future leaders of our country will come from? Certainly many of them are at this moment among the 512 million children who are in our school system. An equitable distribution of Federal funds, if Federal aid is passed, would relieve the pressures upon us even more than those which are on the shoulders of the public schools. It would allow us to continue to make our contribution and, at the same time, release more money for public education. It was the possibility of a Federal aid to education bill being passed a bill excluding aid to nonpublic schools-that led the Catholic bishops to make their statement after President Kennedy made his educational program public. ISSUES These questions are involved. One was the question of justice, civil rights, and discrimination, a domain in which the bishops felt an obligation to take a stand since the responsibility for the Catholic schools was basically theirs. The secondary question flows from the first. If, in justice, Catholic school students were not treated as other students, if they were discriminated against by the Government because they exercised the rights of choice of education, the bishops perceived the subsequent effect this would have on our school system and upon the national interest. Although it was an unpleasant task, they felt obliged to make their voice heard. |