1922) MEYER V. STATE OF NEBRASKA (42 Sup.Ct.) 627 successfully passed the eighth grade, which is not usually accomplished before the age of twelve. The Supreme Court of the state has held that "the so-called ancient or dead languages" are not "within the spirit or the 401 30 L. Ed. 220; Minnesota v. Barber, 136 U. Jing in school of any subject except in Eng8. 313, 10 Sup. Ct. 862, 34 L. Ed. 455; Al-lish; also the teaching of any other lanlgeyer v. Louisiana, 165 U. S. 578, 17 Sup. guage until the pupil has attained and Ct. 427, 41 L. Ed. 832; Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 25 Sup. Ct. 539, 49 L. Ed. 937, 8 Ann. Cas. 1133; Twining v. New Jersey 211 U. S. 78, 29 Sup. Ct. 14, 53 L. Ed. 97; Chicago, B. & Q. R. R. v. McGuire, 219 U. S. 549, 31 Sup. Ct. 259, 55 L. Ed. 328; Truax v. Raich, 239 U. S. 33, 36 Sup. Ct. 7, 60 L. Ed. 131, L. R. A. 1916D, 545, Ann. Cas. 1917B, 283; Adams v. Tanner, 224 U. S. 590, 37 Sup. Ct. 662, 61 L. Ed. 1336, L. R. A. 1917F, 1163, Ann. Cas. 1917D, 973; New York Life Ins. Co. v. Dodge, 246 U. S. 357, 38 Sup. Ct. 337, 62 L. Ed. 772, Ann. Cas. 1918E, 603; Truax v. Corrigan, 257 U. S. 312, 42 Sup. Ct. 124, 66 L. Ed. 254; Adkins v. Children's Hospital (April 9, 1923), 261 U. S. 525, 43 Sup. Ct. 394, 67 L. Ed. -; Wyeth ▼. Cambridge Board of Health, 200 Mass. 474, 86 N. E. 925, 128 Am. St. Rep. 439, 23 L. R. A. (N. S.) 147. The established doctrine ⚫400 is that this liberty may not be inter*fered with, under the guise of protecting the public interest, by legislative action which is arbitrary or without reasonable relation to some purpose within the competency of the state to effect. Determination by the Legislature of what constitutes proper exercise of police power is not final or conclusive but is subJect to supervision by the courts. Lawton v. Steele, 152 U. S. 133, 137, 14 Sup. Ct. 499, 38 L. Ed. 385. [4] The American people have always regarded education and acquisition of knowledge as matters of supreme importance which should be diligently promoted. The Ordinance of 1787 declares: "Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged." purpose of the act." Nebraska District of Evangelical Lutheran Synod, etc., v. McKelvie et al. (Neb.) 187 N. W. 927 (April 19, 1922). Latin, Greek, Hebrew are not proscribed; but German, French, Spanish, Italian, and every other alien speech are within the ban. Evidently the Legislature has attempted materially to interfere with the calling of modern language teachers, with the opportunities of pupils to acquire knowledge, and with the power of parents to control the education of their own. It is said the purpose of the legislation was to promote civic development by inhibiting training and education of the immature in foreign tongues and ideals before they could learn English and acquire American ideals, and "that the English language should be and become the mother tongue of all children reared in this state." It is also affirmed that the foreign born population is very large, that certain communities commonly use foreign words, follow foreign leaders, move in a foreign atmosphere, and that the children are thereby hindered from becoming citizens of the most useful type and the public safety is imperiled. That the state may do much, go very far, indeed, in order to improve the quality of its citizens, physically, mentally and morally, is clear; but the individual has certain fundamental rights which must be respected. The protection of the Constitution extends to all, to those who speak other languages as well as to those born with English on the tongue. Corresponding to the right of control, it is all had ready understanding of our ordinary Perhaps it would be highly advantageous if the natural duty of the parent to give his speech, but this cannot be coerced by methods children education suitable to their station in which conflict with the Constitution-a delife; and nearly all the states, including Nesirable end cannot be promoted by prohibited braska, enforce this obligation by compulsory laws. Practically, education of the young is only possible in schools conducted by especially qualified persons who devote themselves thereto. The calling always has been regarded as useful and honorable, essential, indeed, to the public welfare. Mere knowledge of the German language cannot reasonably be regarded as harmful. Heretofore it has been commonly looked upon as helpful and desirable. Plaintiff in error taught this language in school as part of his occupation. His right thus to teach and the right of parents to engage him so to instruct their children, we think, are within the liberty of the amendLent. The challenged statute forbids the teach means. For the welfare of his Ideal Commonwealth, Plato suggested a law which should provide: ⚫402 "That the wives of our guardians are to be common, and their children are to be common, and no parent is to know his own child, nor any child his parent. The proper officers will take the offspring of the good parents to the pen or fold, and there they will deposit them with certain nurses who dwell in a sepor of the better when they chance to be dearate quarter; but the offspring of the inferior, formed, will be put away in some mysterious, unknown place, as they should be." In order to submerge the individual and develop ideal citizens, Sparta assembled the 628 43 SUPREME COURT REPORTER Reversed. (Oct. Term. Mr. Justice Holmes and Mr. Justice Suth erland, dissent. males at seven into barracks and intrusted proceedings not inconsistent with this opin their subsequent education and training to ion. official guardians. Although such measures have been deliberately approved by men of great genius their ideas touching the relation between individual and state were wholly different from those upon which our institutions rest; and it hardly will be affirmed that any Legislature could impose such restrictions upon the people of a state without doing violence to both letter and spirit of the Constitution. The desire of the Legislature to foster a homogeneous people with American ideals prepared readily to understand current discussions of civic matters is easy to appreciate. Unfortunate experiences during the late war and aversion toward every character of truculent adversaries were certainly enough to quicken that aspiration. But the means adopted, we think, exceed the limitations upon the power of the state and conflict with rights assured to plaintiff in error. The interference is plain enough and no adequate reason therefor in time of peace and domestic tranquility has been shown. (262 U. 8. 434) BARTELS v. STATE OF IOWA. BOHNING v. STATE OF OHIO. POHL v. SAME. NEBRASKA DISTRICT OF EVANGELICAL No. 440. (No. 134, Argued and Submitted Nov. 28, 192 Nos. 181, 182, Argued Oct. 10, 1922 No. 440, Argued Feb. 23, 1923. Decided June 4. 1923.) Constitutional law 255-Schools and school districts 164-Statutes relative to teach. Ing of foreign languages held unconstits. tional. Act Iowa April 10, 1919 (Laws 1910, e. 198), Act Ohio June 5, 1919 (108 Ohio Laws, P. 614), and Act Neb. April 14, 1921 (Law. The power of the state to compel attendance at some school and to make reasonable regulations for all schools, including a requirement that they shall give instructions in English, is not questioned. Nor has chal-1921, c. 61), relative to the teaching of foreig lenge been made of the state's power to prescribe a curriculum for institutions which it supports. Those matters are not within the present controversy. Our concern is with the prohibition approved by the Supreme Court. 403 Adams v. Tanner, 244 U. S. 594, 37 Sup. Ct. 662, 61 L. Ed. 1336, L. R. A. 1917F, 1163, Ann. Cas. 1917D, 973, pointed out that mere abuse incident to an occupation ordinarily useful is not enough to justify its abolition, although regulation may be entirely proper. No emergency has arisen which renders knowledge by a child of some language other than English so clearly harmful as to justify its inhibition with the consequent infringement of rights long freely enjoyed. We are constrained to conclude that the statute as applied is arbitrary and without reasonable relation to any end within the competency of the state. a medium of instruction, are unconstitutional, languages, or the use of foreign languages ■ as violating Const. U. S. Amend. 14, providing that no state shall deprive any person of liberty without due process of law. Mr. Justice HOLMES and Mr. Justice SUTIIERLAND dissenting in part. In Error to the Supreme Court of the State of Iowa. In Error to the Supreme Court of the State of Ohio. In Error to the Supreme Court of the State of Nebraska. Criminal prosecutions by the State of Iowa against August Bartels, and by the State of Ohio against H. H. Bohning and against Emil Pohl, and suit for injunction by the Nebraska District of Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States. and others, against Samuel R. McKelvle and others. Judgments of conviction in the first three cases were affirmed (191 Iowa, 1000 181 N. W. 508; 102 Ohio St. 474, 132 N. E. 20. and a judgment for plaintiffs in the fourth case was reversed (187 N. W. 927), and defendants in the first three cases and plaintif Judgment [5] As the statute undertakes to interfere in the first three cases reversed, judgment is Messrs. Frank E. Farwell and Charles F Pickett, both of Waterloo, Iowa, and I. I. The judgment of the court below must be Albert, of Columbus, Neb., for plaintiff in er reversed and the cause remanded for further ror Bartels For other cases see same topic and KEY-NUMBER in all Key-Numbered Digests and Indexe 1922) BARTELS v. STATE OF IOWA (43 Sup.Ct.) 629 Mr. Bruce J. Flick, of Des Moines, Iowa, [ing elementary, private and parochial schools for the State of Iowa. ⚫408 and providing that instruction shall be in the English language" (108 Ohio Laws, 614), approved June 5, 1919, which prohibits the teaching of German to pupils below the eighth grade. No. 440. An injunction is sought against the Governor and Attorney General of the state and the attorney for Platte county to prevent enforcement of “An act to declare the English language the official language of this state, and to require all official proceedings, records and publications to be in such lau *Messrs. A. F. Mullen, of Omaha, Neb., and C. E. Sandall, of York, Neb., for plaintiffs in error Nebraska Dist. of Evangelical Luth-guage and all school branches to be taught in eran Synod and others. Messrs. Mason Wheeler, of Lincoln, Neb., and O. S. Spillman, of Pierce, Neb., for defendants in error McKelvie and others. ⚫409 Mr. Justice McREYNOLDS delivered the opinion of the Court. The several judgments entered in these causes by the Supreme Courts of Iowa, Ohio, and Nebraska, respectively, must be reversed upon authority of Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390, 43 Sup. Ct. 625, 67 L. Ed., decided to-day. No. 134. Plaintiff in error was convicted of teaching pupils in a parochial school below the eighth grade to read German, contrary to "An act requiring the use of the English language as the medium of instruction in all secular subjects in all schools within the state of Iowa," approved April 10, 1919 (Acts 1919, c. 198). He used English for teaching the common school branches, but taught young pupils to read German. The Supreme Court of the state held: said language in public, private, denominational and parochial schools," etc., approved Sec. 7762-2. All private and parochial schools and all schools maintained in connection with benevolent and correctional institutions within this state which instruct pupils who have not completed a the first seven grades of the elementary schools of course of study equivalent to that prescribed for this state, shall be taught in the English language only, and the person or persons, trustees or officers in control shall cause to be taught in them such of the General Code or such as the advancement of branches of learning as prescribed in section 7643 pupils may require, and the persons or officers in control direct; provided that the German language shall not be taught below the eighth grade in any such schools within this state. "The manifest design of this language stat- Sec. 7762-3. Any person or persons violating the ate is to supplement the compulsory educa- provisions of this act shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall be fined in any sum not less than tion law by requiring that the branches enumerated to be taught shall be taught in the dollars, and each separate day in which such act twenty-five dollars nor more than one hundred English language, and in no other. The evi- shall be violated shall constitute a separate offense. dent purpose is that no other language shall Section 1. The English language is hereby debe taught in any school, public or private, dur-clared to be the official language of this state, and ing the tender years of youth, that is, below the eighth grade." 191 Iowa, 1060, 181 N. W. BOS. were severally convicted (102 *Ohio St. 474, 132 N. E. 20) of violating "An act to supplement section 7762 of the General Code and to repeal section 7729, concernSection 1. That the medium of instruction in all secular subjects taught in all of the schools, public and private, within the state of Iowa, shall be the English language, and the use of any language oththan English in secular subjects in said schools bereby prohibited, provided, however, that nothing Serein shall prohibit the teaching and studying of foreign languages as such as a part of the regular hool course in any such school, in all courses above the eighth grade. all official proceedings, records and publications shall be in such language, and the common school branches shall be taught in said language in public, private, denominational and parochial schools. shall, in any private, denominational, or parochial Sec. 2. No person, individually or as a teacher, or public school, teach any subject to any person in any language other than the English language. Sec. 3. Languages other than the English language may be taught as languages only, after a the eighth grade as evidenced by a certicate of pupil shall have attained and successfully passed graduation issued by the county superintendent of the county or the city superintendent of the city in which the child resides: Provided, that the provisions of this act shall not apply to schools held on Sunday or on some other day of the week which those having the care and custody of the pupils attending same conscientiously observe as the Sabbath, where the object and purpose of such schools is the giving of religious instruction, but shall apply to all other schools and to schools held at all other times: Provided that nothing in this act shall prohibit any person from teaching his own children in his own home any foreign language. Sec. 2. That any person violating any of the provisions of this act shall be deemed guilty of a Sec. 7. Chapter 249, of the Session Laws of Nodemeanor, and upon conviction shall be fined braska for 1919, entitled, "An act relating to the Bot less than twenty-five dollars ($25.00) nor more teaching of foreign languages in the state of Nethan one hundred dollars ($100.00). braska," is hereby repealed. 630 43 SUPREME COURT REPORTER 413 (Oct. Term, statute is subject to the same objections as those offered to the act of 1919 and sustained *I agree with the Court as to the special in Meyer v. Nebraska, supra. The purpose proviso against the German language con of the later enactment as stated by counsel tained in the statute dealt with in Bohning for the state, is "to place beyond the possi-V. Ohio. bility for legal evasion a prohibition against Mr. Justice SUTHERLAND concurs in the teaching in schools of foreign languages this opinion. McKelvie and Davis, formerly Governor and Attorney General, no longer occupy those offices. The cause is dismissed as to them. Otto F. Walter is now the county attorney and the judgment below as to him must be reversed. keversed. 412 Mr. Justice HOLMES. We all agree, I take it, that it is desirable that all the citi zens of the United States should speak a common tongue, and therefore that the end aimed at by the statute is a lawful and proper one. The only question is whether the means adopted deprive teachers of the liberty secured to them by the Fourteenth Amendment. It is with hesitation and unwillingness that I differ from my brethren with regard to a law like this but I cannot bring my mind to believe that in some circumstances, and circumstances existing it is said in Nebraska, the statute might not be regarded as a reasonable or even necessary method of reaching the desired result. The part of the act with which we are concerned deals with the teaching of young children. Youth is the time when familiarity with a language is established and if there are sections in the State where a child would hear only Polish or French or German spoken at home I am not prepared to say that it is unreasonable to provide that in his early years he shall hear and speak only English at school. But if It is reasonable it is not an undue restriction of the liberty either of teacher or scholar. No one would doubt that a teacher might be forbidden to teach many things, and the only criterion of his liberty under the Constitution that I can think of is "whether, considering the end in view, the statute passes the bounds of reason and assumes the character of a merely arbitrary flat." Purity Extract & Tonic Co. v. Lynch, 226 U. S. 192, 204, 33 Sup. Ct. 44, 47 (57 L. Ed. 184); Hebe Co. v. Shaw, 248 U. S. 297, 303, 39 Sup. Ct. 125, 63 L. Ed. 255; Jacob Ruppert v. Caffey, 251 U. S. 264, 40 Sup. Ct. 141, 64 L. Ed. 260. I think I appreciate the objection to the law but it appears to me to present a question upon which men reasonably might differ and therefore I am unable to say that the Constitution of the United States prevents the experiment being tried. For other cases see same topic and KEY-NUMBER in all Key-Numbered Digests and Indexes Senator PELL. Thank you very much, Mr. Ruiz. STATEMENT OF DR. JOSE A. CARDENAS, SUPERINTENDENT, EDGEWOOD INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS DISTRICT, SAN ANTONIO, TEX. Mr. CARDENAS. Gentlemen, I have spent 20 years in professional service in the education of Mexican Americans. I have viewed problems of the education of the Mexican American from various perspectives, as a classroom teacher and administrator and supervisor, as a college professor, in research and development activity. I would like to communicate to you some of the problems in the education of the Mexican American and the implications of Senate bill 3883 for the resolution of some of these problems. In the first place, I would like to agree with the previous speakers, that the Mexican American is an isolated ethnic group in many school systems. And I have worked in their school systems. I see the Mexican American as a segregated, isolated ethnic group. In some cases, because they live in predominant Mexican American barrios, and the school district contains large numbers of Mexican Americans; in other cases as in the case of the school district where I work, it is a gerrymandered school district where the lines that divide the school district from others follow no political or geographic barrier and are arbitrarily drawn, to include a predominant quantity of Mexican Americans. In some cases, I have seen educational isolation of the Mexican American child because of intentional segregation and the establishment in various States in this country of the so-called "Mexican" schools. It is a minority group and it is isolated as a minority group. Ironically, even in cases where the Mexican American makes up as much as 85 percent to 90 percent of the population of the community, it is still treated as a minority group. It is excluded from the educational enterprise. Dropout figures indicate the extent of the nonparticipation of the student. There are no figures, though, that indicate the extent of not-participation of the parents in the educational enterprise. Mexican Americans very little participate as teachers and professional personnel in education. It is rather unique to find a Mexican American that participates in an administrative or supervisory capacity in a school system which may be predominantly Mexican American. We also see the isolation because of the migrancy of the Mexican American where he is treated very much like a stepchild in the school district. Characteristics of the Mexican American in the public schools are underachievement, retention and dropout. This, in itself, tends to isolate. They are isolated through tracking systems that are utilized in schools. They are separated from the Anglo counterparts who go |