THE TRUTH ABOUT SCHOLARSHIPS

New Zealand Tablet, 20 October 1921, Page 27

THE TRUTH ABOUT SCHOLARSHIPS

FATHER COFFEY'S REPLY TO STATEMENTS OF '. THE CHIEF JUSTICE. Very Rev. Father Coffey, Administrator of St. Joseph's Cathedral, Dunedin, has addressed the following letter to the general secretary of the Catholic Federation,' Westminster, London:— St. Joseph's Cathedral, Dunedin, N.Z., 14/10/21. Dear Mr. Mara, You will notice from the enclosed cutting from the Christchurch Press for September 9 (which statement was also published in other daily newspapers of this Dominion), that Sir Robert Stout,- Privy Councillor, Chief Justice of New Zealand, one time Premier, Lecturer on Free Thought, and ardent Sponsor of New Zealand's public school system of Free, Secular, and Compulsory Education, fias been enlightening the English public on the advantages and excellencies of our Public School System. I should have taken no notice of the notorious vagaries, nor even of the taradiddles of our Chief Justice, had he confined himself to bestowing his blessings on our Free, Secular, and Comjmlsory System of Education which is filling our Courts with juvenile criminals, giving plenty of work to our Magistrates and Judges, and keeping the birth-rate at about the lowest of any country": within the Empire. God knows the System requires all the blessings even a Chief Justice can bestow on it. Speaking of the Secondary Private Schools, the Chief Justice is reported to have said}' "nor have their supporters achieved much distinction in open competition. In the secondary schools very few scholarships have' been won by their pupils, while the Roman Catholics have obtained none at all." This statement is absolutely contrary to fact, and untrue. Speaking for only three small Catholic Secondary Schools in this town of Dunedin, our pupils, within the last five years, have won fourteen junior scholarships, nine senior National Scholarships, and four higher leaving certificates. In 1919 one of our boys from the Christian Brothers' School gained the highest number of marks for the while of New Zealand, while another gained

the highest for all the province of Otago in open competition with the much favored and judicially blessed public schools. The Chief Justice should have known these facts. There is not one of our secondary schools that has not won scholarships in competition with the public schools and won more than their . due proportion of the National scholarships. This fact is so .well known, notwithstanding the ignorance of our Ch‘ief Justice of it, that an agitation has

been got up by the public school teachers and the, secularists to prevent our successful pupils from taking out-their scholarships in our Church schools. And lam sorry to say that the agitation has been so successful that the’Government which in 1914 granted that-right has now taken it away. As the Education Act stands at present, the pupils attending Church, or private schools may sit for the National Scholarship examinations, hut, if they win them, they have to take them out in the Public Schools or-forgo them. Such is the spirit of injustice which our Chief

Justice upholds. I remain, dear Mr. Mara-,

Yours sincerely,

James Coffey,

Administrator St. Joseph’s Cathedral,

Dunedin, N.Z.