American immigration ills

The first chapter is the historical development of American education law.

Throughout the historical development of American education law, it can be divided into three stages: the period of decentralization, the period of decentralization and the period of centralization.

Section 1 Decentralization Period (Before the Civil War)

During the colonial period, immigrants from all over the world established and managed their own schools. British immigrants copy British education as it is. For example, higher education, Harvard, Yale and other colleges imitate Oxford and Cambridge. In secondary education, Latin law schools are modeled after British public schools and grammar schools; Primary education is modeled after English parochial schools, charitable schools and schools for poor children. Noble youth enter public schools, grammar schools and universities, and civilian children enter primary schools, and a dual-track system is implemented. Colonies and suzerain countries are in the same strain. German immigrants from Pennsylvania and Michigan speak German and set up German-style schools. These settlements are not connected with each other. Because the land was vast and the population was sparse at that time, it was impossible and unnecessary to implement unified management, so the immigrant areas went their own way and promulgated their own education laws. For example, in 1962 and 1967, the Massachusetts colonies issued decrees twice, stipulating that primary schools should be set up in towns with more than 50 households, and middle schools should be set up in towns with more than 100 households, and compulsory education should be implemented. The education law in this period was actually promulgated by the immigrants themselves, which we call the "decentralization" period.

After the founding of People's Republic of China (PRC), Article 10 of the amendment to the federal constitution of the United States in 179 1 stipulates: "All states or people shall retain the powers of the federation that are not granted by this Constitution and are not prohibited from being exercised by the states." The federal constitution makes no mention of education. According to the understanding at that time, education should be controlled by the States, which is called "reserving power". In fact, before the Civil War, except for a few states (new york, Michigan, Massachusetts, Connecticut), most states did not really shoulder this responsibility. Schools are still mainly in the hands of private individuals, churches and charities, and education is still characterized by "decentralized system", and education laws are still promulgated by various regions themselves.

Although the Federation also promulgated laws related to education during this period, such as the Land Demarcation Law promulgated on May 20, 1785, which stipulated that "each city and town should keep District 16 to set up public schools", the Northwest Law of 1787 stipulated that part of the land should be allocated for educational use, and specifically stipulated that "each city and town should reserve District16 to set up public schools". In fact, these laws.

Section II Decentralization Period (After the Civil War-1960s)

"Decentralization system" plays a great role in mobilizing the enthusiasm of local schools, is conducive to adapting to local conditions, and embodies the spirit of democratic localism. Although "distributed power system" has many advantages, it also has more disadvantages. Because the power of education is often controlled by local dignitaries and severely affected by party conflicts, and the education committee and teachers are ignorant, it is difficult to realize the innovation and reform of education, so the "decentralization system" has been severely criticized, especially after the Civil War, the southern slavery system collapsed and American productivity was liberated. With the development of industry and science and technology, the American bourgeoisie needs more and more workers and intellectuals with cultural and scientific knowledge, and the broad masses are constantly fighting for universal education. The objective situation requires centralized management of scattered schools. So after the civil war, the movement of merging school districts surged. The centralized leadership of the state on education has been developed, and the authority of school districts has been weakened. More and more states have established state education committees and state education departments to take charge of education. This form of state control of educational power is different from the past "decentralization system" and federal centralization system. We call it "decentralization".

In the process of developing the country's leadership over the right to education, many obstacles have been encountered. For example, some people worry that the state's mastery of educational leadership will dampen local enthusiasm. Some people call on the Federation to set up a Ministry of Education to exercise centralized leadership over education, so as to have a unified education level throughout the country. Decentralization theorists believe that the United States has a vast territory and different situations in different places, which is not suitable for the federal government to unify standards for running schools; On the other hand, it is pointed out that expanding the country's educational leadership does not mean that it will dampen the spirit of local schools. They advocate unified management by the state on the premise of encouraging local enthusiasm. So as to unify the education level of the whole country. They also said that education has been specialized, and it is necessary to imitate the scientific management methods of industry and commerce and carry out scientific management in education. Each state is rich in human and financial resources and is an ideal unit to realize science education and leadership education. Under the double flaunt of emphasizing democracy and science, the decentralization system prevails.

Since 1930s, education reformers such as Horace, Mann and H Barnard began to set up state education committees and state education departments, but few of them were set up before the civil war. It was not until after the civil war that each state gradually improved its education administrative system and fulfilled its educational responsibilities entrusted by the Constitution.

After the implementation of the decentralization system, the education law is mainly formulated by the state. Generally speaking, the state legislature formulates principled education laws, and the state education commission implements the principles of these education laws and regulations. Among them, the more important Compulsory Education Law (literally translated as "Compulsory Education Law") was almost all enacted after the Civil War except Massachusetts. In recent years, the state legislature attaches great importance to education, and about half of the bills passed are related to education.

During this period, the Federation also enacted many education laws, mainly the first Moreel Act of 1862, the second Moreel Act of 1890, and the Vocational Education Act of 19 17 (also known as the Smith-Hughes Act). However, the federal education law in this period was mostly a single subsidy, and mainly subsidized higher education. The federal government's control over education is limited.

The third quarter to the period of the development of centralized system (from the 1960s)

It can be seen from the history of American education that since the founding of the People's Republic of China, the federal government has used public land as a means to control and promote national education. This kind of control is developing continuously in breadth and depth. The War of Independence, the Civil War, the First World War and the Second World War all urged the Federation to undertake more educational responsibilities to varying degrees. Especially after the Soviet Union launched the first man-made satellite, the Federation took training talents and developing intelligence as a national plan. Vigorously developing education has become an important task. The rapid development of education is beyond the capacity of the country. For example, the number of public schools soared from 22.3 million in 1945 to 52.4 million in 1963, and the education expenditure of state and local governments increased from $2 billion in 1935 to $22 billion in 1964. From 1954 to 1965, 700,000 classrooms were built, and teachers' salaries increased by 43%. 1945 per capita expenditure was $296, and 1964 per capita expenditure reached $444. The state and local governments have been unable to afford this huge education expense, which has caused some serious problems. For example, in 1964, 25% to 48% of the people who could not perform military service because of illiteracy accounted for 10 states. This situation has aroused serious concern in the Federation. There are other tasks, such as abolishing apartheid to achieve educational equality, conducting international cultural and educational exchanges, and narrowing the gap between the rich and the poor within the Federation, which the state cannot undertake. The general trend is that the federal government must take more responsibility for education. With this need, people put forward new theoretical basis and challenged the theory of "reserved power" of decentralized system. This new theoretical basis can be summarized as two clauses: (1) "* * * with national defense" and "general welfare" (Article 1, Item 8 of the US Federal Constitution authorizes Congress to act on behalf of the people); (2) According to Article 1 of the amendment to the Federal Constitution, the Federation has the right to protect citizens' freedom of religion, speech and publication, and to protect citizens' right of appeal. According to the new theory, education is closely related to national defense and people's welfare, and the Federation has the right to control education from the needs of national defense and people's welfare and levy taxes for it. In addition, education involves citizens' rights to freedom of religion, speech and publication. The Federation has the right to interfere, citizens have the right to appeal, and the Federation has the right to protect this right of citizens. This actually broke the theory that education is the state's "reserved power". It creates a theoretical basis for federally controlled education. Based on this new theory, the federal control over education has been greatly strengthened.

In the history of American education law, the most important milestone of federally controlled education is the Primary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. This law expands the federal support for education from individual to comprehensive, from higher education to other levels and types of education after the founding of the People's Republic of China. Since the Second World War, large-scale education subsidies have been passed seven times in the Senate and five times in the House of Representatives, but they all died in the end. It was not until 1965 that the large-scale federal education subsidy bill was signed into law by the president for the first time. This is the Primary and Secondary Education Law.

1965' s primary and secondary education act removed several major obstacles for the federal government to further subsidize education: race, religion and federal control. The elimination of these three obstacles created conditions for the passage of a large number of federal education laws later.

Before 1965, the federal education law was fragmented. After 1965, the federal education law became more systematic. Among them are 1965 Higher Education Law, 1966 Child Nutrition Law, 1966 Adult Education Law and 1968 General Education Law. (General Principles of Education Law), Vocational Education Law of 1968, Special Education Plan Law of 1974, Community Schools Law of 1974, Education Law of Disabled Children of 1975 and/kloc.

The federal government subsidizes education through the education law, which has many funds, wide scope, many channels and deep influence. All kinds of education at all levels in the country are increasingly controlled by the federal government. At the same time, the call for the federal government to set up the Ministry of Education is getting louder and louder. The main reasons are the disparity between the rich and the poor, different standards and a large gap in education level. In addition, local education is often dominated by minority groups, short-sighted and conservative. In order to overcome these shortcomings, the central government must conduct centralized management and unified planning. 1979 10, President Carter signed Public Law No.96-88, the Organic Law of the Ministry of Education, authorizing the establishment of a cabinet-level federal Ministry of Education. The establishment of the federal Ministry of Education in the United States does not mean that education is centralized. The Organic Law of the Ministry of Education clearly points out: "The establishment of the Ministry of Education will not increase the power of the federal government in education, nor will it reduce the educational responsibilities reserved for state and local school systems and other institutions in the state." Nevertheless, the establishment of the Federal Department of Education does show that American education has taken another step forward in the direction of centralization. This is reflected in the management of education and civil rights projects. By 1979, about 160 education and civil rights projects of different scales were scattered in different federal departments and institutions, and the larger projects were controlled by the Ministry of Education, Health and Welfare (General Education Department and General Civil Rights Department) and the Ministry of National Defense (foreign home schools). At present, the Organic Law of the Ministry of Education provides for the transfer of personnel and employees of the Ministry of Education, Health and Welfare (now called the Ministry of Health and Human Services) and four other federal agencies to the Ministry of Education. In other words, changing the past decentralized management into centralized management is one of the manifestations of centralization.

The federal control of education is indirectly realized by providing funds through the Federal Education Act. Congress avoids direct federal control of education. Usually there is a special section in the education law to explain this point in detail. In the General Education Law of 1968, it is clearly stipulated: "No scheme implemented can be interpreted as authorizing any federal department, institution, official or employee to instruct, supervise and control the teaching plan, management plan or personnel plan of any educational institution or school system. It cannot be interpreted as instructing, supervising and controlling any educational institution or school system to choose library resources, textbooks or other printed and published teaching materials, nor can it be interpreted as requiring the allocation or transportation of teachers to overcome ethnic imbalances. " This actually shows that the federal education law in the United States still has the characteristics of decentralization. The federal education law does not require States and school districts to enforce it. States and school districts are free to accept or reject federal funds and their policies. However, this is by no means to say that the federal education law is insignificant. On the contrary, in the case that school districts are extremely eager to increase funds, federal education funds make most school districts have to implement federal education policies. Therefore, the federal government indirectly controls education by providing education funds. Although indirect, it is true in many ways. People call the Federation the "Super Education Committee", which illustrates this point. The Federation has both power and prestige in formulating educational policies.

After President Reagan came to power, the trend of centralization showed signs of retrogression. Reagan advocated giving States greater educational power. 198 1 year, the federal parliament passed the education merger and improvement act, which is a new education law with a huge scope, showing the basic changes in the relationship between governments at all levels in education. It combines the special subsidies given to primary and secondary education for designated purposes into general subsidies without designated purposes, and modifies the first item of the Primary and Secondary Education Law, which has far-reaching significance. It shows that the federal government intends to return the responsibility of formulating policies and using subsidy funds to state and local educational institutions.