played upon every leader of democracy. With our lack of reverence, we
delight in pulling to pieces the personalities of those who lead us.
Thus it is increasingly difficult to get men of sensitive spirit to pay
the price of leadership for democracy.

Is it not possible to do more than we have done, consciously to develop
such leadership? Where is it trained? In life, the college and
university, the normal school, the schools of law, medicine and
theology. Yes, but if not one boy and girl in ten graduates from the
high school, surely we want one man and woman in ten to fulfill some
measure of moral leadership, and the high school is directly concerned
with the task of furnishing such leadership for American democracy.

If that is true, is it not a pity that the high school is so largely
dominated from above by the demand of the college upon the entering
freshman? It is not to be taken for granted that the particular regimen
of studies, best fitting the student to pass the entrance examinations
of a college or university, is the best possible for the nine out of ten
students, who go directly from the high school into the world, and must
fulfill some measure of moral leadership for American democracy. The
presumption is to the contrary. College professors are human--some of
them. They want students prepared to enter as smoothly as possible into
the somewhat artificial curricula of academic studies they have
arranged. The Latin professor wishes not to go back and start with the
rudiments of his subject, as the professor of mathematics with the
beginnings of Algebra and Geometry. The result is they demand of the
high school what fits most smoothly into their scheme.

Now if it is not possible to serve equally the needs of both groups,
would it not be better to neglect the one tenth of the students, going
on to college, even assuming they are the pick of the flock, which they
are not always? They have four more years to correct their mistakes and
round out their culture. If any one must be subordinated, it would be
better to neglect them, and focus upon the needs of the nine out of ten,
who go directly from the high school into life and have not another
chance; yet there are states in the Union, where it is possible for a
committee of the state university at the top to say to every high school
teacher in the state, "Conform to our requirements, or leave the state,
or get out of the profession." The threat, moreo