Extended excerpt [Speech]:

“The old aristocratic system had a leaning towards charity as the ecclesiastical system has; and the view of education as a charity has always been one of the greatest weaknesses of both systems. Education pays the State. The more persons educated, the better education pays the State. But to dole it out to a restricted number is to regard it as charity and to turn the State into an alms-giver.” (p. 42) 

Source link: The Rebuilding of Old Commonwealths (April 1902) online via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=RcETAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA42&dq=The+old+aristocratic+system+had+a+leaning+toward+charity+as+the+ecclesiastical+system

Extended excerpt [Speech]:

“Now no wise man has anything to say against church schools or private schools in their right places; for both have their uses. But the history of civilization has proved over and over again that no church and no private means can ever overcome the social and financial and political and religious differences of people and build a training place for all. Nothing has ever done this and nothing can ever do it but a pubic institution that is maintained by taxation and that belongs to all the people alike.

And now we come to the very heart of the matter. To talk about education in a democratic country as meaning anything else than free public education for every child is a mockery. To call anything else education at all is to go back toward the Middle Ages, when it was regarded as a privilege of gentleman or as a duty of the church, and not as a necessity for the people.” (pp. 87-88)

Source link: The Rebuilding of Old Commonwealths (April 1902) online via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=RcETAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA87&dq=To+call+anything+else+education+at+all+is+to+go+back+toward+the+Middle+Ages