Many American statemen have expressed their views of the subject of the separation of State and sectarian schools and I close this statement with an excerpt from a speech of President Grant, delivered to G. A. R. veterans at Des Moines, Iowa, in September 1875, quoted in the Catholic World, 22: 434, 435, January 1876:

"Leave the matter of religious teaching to the family altar, the church and the private school, supported entirely by private contribution. Keep church and state forever separate."

I respectfully recommend that Senate bill 717 be retained in the Senate Committee on Education and Labor. Respectfully submitted.

ROSCOE C. WALKER.

(Whereupon, at 12: 10 p. m., the committee recessed to 10 a. m. of the following day, Thursday, April 12, 1945.)

FEDERAL AID FOR EDUCATION

THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 1945

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR, Washington, D. C. The committee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10 a. m., in room 357, Senate Office Building, Senator David I. Walsh presiding. Present: Senators Walsh, Hill, Chavez, Ball, Tunnell, Smith, Donnell, and Morse.

Senator WALSH. The committee will come to order, please. You may proceed; Dr. Reeves.

I will suggest to the other witnesses that the committee is anxious to hear their views on the details of the bill rather than the general discussion of the need for the bill. You can save our time a good deal by confining your views to the various portions of this bill. All right, you may proceed, Dr. Reeves.

STATEMENT OF FLOYD W. REEVES-Resumed

much

Mr. REEVES. In looking over my testimony of yesterday, I discovered that through an error in the typing of the material the name very of one member of the commission was omitted. I regret this and wish now to correct that error. Miss Florence Thorne, Director of Research of the American Federation of Labor, served as a member of our commission and rendered a most valuable service to the commission.

Our commission gave most careful consideration over many months to the question raised yesterday as to whether a formula should be written into this bill for the distribution of funds under titles II and III, thus doing away with the need for a National Board of Apportionment. There are valid arguments on both sides of this question that need to be considered, and honest persons who have carefully and thoughtfully considered the issue can easily disagree in this matter. The advantages of writing a formula into a Federal aid bill have been presented to this committee many times in the past. Certainly a formula would provide a guarantee that political factors would not be considered in the allocation of funds, and that is an important point. But the disadvantage of writing any formula into a bill is that such a procedure, to some extent, freezes the funds in a way that makes it difficult to meet emergencies that may arise as a result of rapid and unforeseen migration of population, such as we had during the early 1930's, and again during this war period, and will have again after the war ends. Our commission weighed this matter carefully and decided unanimously that insofar as title II and a part of title III

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are concerned, it would, on the whole, be preferable to trust to the honesty and integrity of five men appointed by the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate, in order to secure a degree of flexibility, than it would be to write a formula into the bill.

If, after weighing this matter carefully, your committee believes that we are placing too much trust in human beings selected to protect the interests of the children, and approved by the Senate with that in mind, then I think you should provide a formula for every title of this bill. Our commission, however, prefers a degree of flexibility, with a national board to apportion the funds. But if you should decide to use a formula instead, then we think that a formula constructed in a manner similar to that in S. 181 would serve the purposes of this bill. Clearly this is not an issue that should stand in the way of the enactment of Federal aid to education.

TITLE III. FUNDS TO ENABLE STATES TO RENDER SPECIAL EDUCATIONAL SERVICES

The second authorization of an appropriation-$100,000,000 in title III, section 301-is provided for current expenditures for educational facilities and services such as transportation to and from school, textbooks and other reading materials, library facilities, visual aids and other instructional materials, and school health programs and facilities, and other necessary educational projects. This title would make statutory provision for some of the services that are currently available under the war emergency aid provisions of the Lanham Act and for a number of the services which were available under the Work Projects Administration.

Further consideration of section 301 of title III has led our commission to conclude that the purposes that this section is intended to accomplish are not clear as the section is now worded. As a substitute for the present wording, we suggest the following:

SEC. 301. To promote the health, welfare, and safety of school children by providing for current expenditures for services to children, such as transportation to and from school, nonsectarian textbooks, and current reading materials, school lunches, and health examinations and services, including measures for the prevention of physical defects, there is hereby authorized to be appropriated for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1946, and for each fiscal year thereafter, $100,000,000, to be apportioned among the States in the manner hereinafter provided. The suggested wording would make it clear that this title is for services to children and not for the operation and maintenance of schools, and it would better carry out the intent of the title that none of these funds would be used for teachers' salaries or for any strictly institutional purposes connected with the operation and maintenance of the school as an institution.

The members of the commission feel very strongly that all services as defined under title III, as revised, should be made available to all children regardless of race, creed, or color, whether attending public or nonpublic schools. To make possible the implementation of this principle in States in which statutory or constitutional provisions make it impossible to provide such services to children in nonpublic schools, trustees are proposed to administer the funds which are made available under this section for services to children in the nonpublic schools.

The members of the commission are strongly committed to the principle of providing Federal aid for services of this type to all children and youth in both public and nonpublic schools, but we shall be glad to accept any method other than the provision of a trustee, if a method can be found which would better meet the purposes of this principle.

The question was raised yesterday as to whether the setting up of a trustee is not a subterfuge. I do not believe that it is. It is a way of permitting the Federal Government to do something that needs to be done, but that some States are either unwilling to do or have not taken the trouble to make possible through either modifying their constitutions or their laws. In the meantime, the children suffer, and the Nation also pays a price for this neglect at a time when it needs its youth to defend it.

The funds under title III are distributed to States upon the basis of need, but because the needs of the States for aid for services to children differ from those for aid for instructional purposes, the technique of determining need set forth in title III differs from that employed in title II. Furthermore, all of the appropriations authorized under title III are available for current expenditures for services and facilities for children without regard to whether they attend private schools or public schools. This provision differs from the provision in title II, according to which three-fourths of the funds are allocated to expenditures for teachers' salaries in public schools only.

Senator WALSH. Is this distribution made by population?

Mr. REEVES. This distribution is made, part in terms of population, and part on the same basis as in title II.

Senator WALSH. Does anybody know the total amount of money expended for textbooks in the United States in a given year?

Mr. REEVES. I cannot answer that question, Mr. Chairman; I do not know.

Senator WALSH. You do not know what percentage of it will be used for textbooks and what percentage of it would be covered by the $100,000,000?

Mr. REEVES. No; I cannot answer that.

Senator WALSH. It seems to me that is important. Are the textbooks selected by the local authorities?

Mr. REEVES. The textbooks in some States are selected by local authorities.

Senator WALSH. Are these distributions for services to be made in cash from the Federal Treasury to the local authorities through these trustees?

Mr. REEVES. That is one of the matters that, under the bill as it now stands, is left for the State to determine, with the exception of those facilities that would go to nonpublic schools. In those cases the funds would be distributed by the trustee, who is, of course, a Federal official even though he is nominated from a list of names submitted by the Governor of the State.

Senator CHAVEZ. Why could not the States do that?

Mr. REEVES. Pardon me?

Senator CHAVEZ. Why could not the State educational authorities distribute that money?

Mr. REEVES. For many of the purposes set forth in section 301, I think there is no prohibition in any State. There is certainly no prohibition in any State with reference to some of the health services. On the other hand, as was pointed out yesterday, in connection with some of the purposes set forth in title III there is a prohibition in a number of States, in the case of some purposes, in a considerable number of States. Because there is that prohibition in some of the States-take, for example, in connection with the transportation of children to and from schools-because there is a prohibition against spending money in that connection as well as against other of the items included under title III, therefore, the technique is set up in this bill of providing the trustee, who is a Federal official, to administer those funds, and that part of it, in a sense, becomes a Federal program.

Senator WALSH. Is it right to infer from your testimony on yesterday that you do not believe in this provision personally?

Mr. REEVES. I believe wholeheartedly and our opinion was unanimous on this provision.

Senator WALSH. I thought you were among the members of the committee who did not believe in any of the funds being used for sec

tarian institutions.

Mr. REEVES. May I make this distinction

Senator WALSH. Pardon me. Did you say that?

Mr. REEVES. NO. I would like to clarify that statement.

Senator WALSH. Did I understand, gentlemen, the witness to say yesterday that he was among those who did not believe that any of these funds should be used for sectarian institutions?

Senator DONNELL. Any funds under title II.

Senator SMITH. Any funds under title II. He was differing with the commission on title II.

Mr. REEVES. That is correct.

Now we come to title III. That is a matter of providing services to children, and we think in that case there should be no distinction made between children who attend public schools and children who attend nonpublic schools, and we are unanimous in that point of view, and we feel it is a very important point.

Senator SMITH. Might I ask the witness this question? Why isn't that something that your State should take its own responsibility for? Why should the Federal Government be called upon to take care of those things that seem to be so obviously necessary for the children, if they have any educational program at all? It seems to me in the matter of textbooks, and so on, that is a State function very definitely. Does your data indicate that States cannot afford even that minimum expenditure for the basic needs for the health of the children so they neglect to do that locally?

Mr. REEVES. They are neglecting it very much in many States. Now, you can very well raise the question as to whether we think that is a function of major importance, and we do think so, but the fact of the matter is that in one case, in the case of title II, funds are provided to make it possible to maintain schools as such for the children and in the case of title III funds are provided for services to children who attend public and nonpublic schools, services that are of major importance, that is true.