Education in Early America
The history of education in the Early Republic and antebellum years is a complicated one. The Northwest Ordinance included a section encouraging education. Article 3 reads “Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.”[1] Land in the Northwest Territory was set aside to be rented in order to fund public schools; in practice, however, the cheap prices of land and poorly enforced terms of renting led to challenges in establishing education.[2]
Despite these logistical problems, Americans understood the importance of education, both as a moral necessity and a path to economic success for their children. When Black residents were deprived of those opportunities, it limited their opportunities for advancement within communities and reinforced racial separation.
While education was understood as important to all Americans, there was an added layer of necessity for Black Americans. Many white Americans held on to Enlightenment ideas about race; they believed that race was tied to intelligence, creativity and the ability to reason. This belief was used to defend slavery and unequal treatment of Black Americans. For many, education was a way to push back on these ideas. Receiving an education, especially an education that emphasized Greek and Latin literature, proved that Black students were as intelligent as white students. It allowed Black citizens to engage in conversations about race through the same cultural framework held by white citizens, which allowed them to successfully argue for their inclusion in American society.[3]
​
​
Notes
​
1. United States, Charles Thomson, United States Continental Congress, and Continental Congress Broadside Collection, An ordinance for the government of the territory of the United States, North-west of the river Ohio (New York: s.n, 1787). Accessed November 6, 2020. https://www.loc.gov/item/90898154/.
​
2. Carl F. Kaestle, “Public Education in the Old Northwest: ‘Necessary to Good Government and the Happiness of Mankind,’” Indiana Magazine of History 84, No. 1, The Northwest Ordinance (March 1988): 60-62. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27791140.
3. Margaret Malamud, African Americans and the Classics: Antiquity, Abolition and Activism (London: I.B. Tauris and Co., 2016): 8-13
​
​
