History and Purpose

The Horace Mann League of the United States of America was founded by a group of leading educators in 1922. It was originally chartered under the laws of the state of Delaware and later by the state of Maryland. The Horace Mann League exists to perpetuate the ideals of Horace Mann, the founder of the American public school system. Its basic purpose and activities are to strengthen our public schools. The League believes that the public school system of the United States is an indispensable agency for the perpetuation of the ideals of our democracy and a most necessary unifying and dynamic influence in American life. According to the League’s beliefs, our public schools should be free, classless, non-sectarian, and open to all of the children of all of the people. The schools should be dominated by such purposes that will insure the preparation of children and youth for effective citizenship in our democracy.

The League believes that the American tradition of separation of church and state must be preserved and should be most vigorously and zealously safeguarded. The League grants the right of special interest groups, including various religious sects, to maintain their own schools so long as such schools meet the standards defined by the states in which they are located. The League believes that these separate or non-public schools should be financed entirely by their supporters and is therefore unalterably opposed to proposals to devote public funds either to the direct or to the indirect support of private schools.

The League favors the generous financial support of the public schools by local, state, and federal funds. It believes, however, that federal grants should be so made that there will be no federal control or interference in the administration, curriculum, personnel, or instructional procedures of local school systems.

The League seeks the active support of those educators and laymen who are committed to the ideals of Horace Mann and who believe in the aims and policies set forth in this platform.

 

Giants of American Education: Horace Mann, click here.

Horace Mann and the Common School Revival in the United States by Burke Aaron Hinsdale.  Click here.

 

Books by Horace Mann

Horace Mann Bibliography

Baccalaureate delivered at Antioch College, 1857. [New York: H. Mann, 1857]

Education and prosperity. From his Twelfth Annual Report as Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education, 1848. [Boston: Directors of the Old South Work, 1903].

A few thoughts for a young man. Boston: Ticker, Reed and Fields, 1850. Reprint, New York: J. B. Alden, 1890.  Click here.

Lectures on Education by Horace Mann, click here.

A few thoughts on the powers and duties of woman: Two lectures. Syracuse: Hall, Mills, 1853.

Go forth and teach; an oration delivered before the authorities of the City of Boston, July 4, 1842. Also other materials relating to his life. Centennial edition. Washington, D.C.: Committee on the Horace Mann Centennial, National Education Association, [1937].

The ground of the free school system. From his Tenth Annual Report as Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education, 1846. [Boston: Directors of the Old South Work, 1902].

Horace Mann on the crisis in education. Edited, with new introduction by Louis Filler. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1983.

Horace Mann’s letters on the extension of slavery into California and New Mexico: And on the duty of Congress to provide the trial by jury for alleged fugitive slaves. [Washington]: Buell & Blanchard, printers, [1850].

The judgment of Horace Mann on European institutions. Warrington, [England]: Printed at the Oberlin Press, [184-?]

Lecture on education. Boston: Marsh, Capen, Lyon and Webb, 1840. Reprint, New York: Arno Press, 1969.

Lecture on the best mode of preparing and using spelling books: delivered before the American Institute of Instruction, August 1841.  Boston : S.D. Ticknor, 1841.
Lectures and annual reports on education. Cambridge, [Mass.]: The editor, 1867.
Life and works of Horace Mann. [Boston: Walker, Fuller and Company, 1865-68]. Reprint, [Boston: Lee and Shepard: New York: C. T. Dillingham, 1891].

New dangers to freedom, and new duties for its defenders: A letter by the Hon. Horace Mann to his constituents, May 3, 1850. Boston: Redding and Company, 1850.

On the art of teaching (Little books of wisdom).  Applewood Books, 1990.

On the crisis in education. [Yellow Springs, Ohio]: Antioch Press, 1965.

Slavery: Letters and speeches. Boston: B.B. Mussey & Co., 1851. Reprint, New York: Arno Press, 1969.

Speech of Hon. Horace Mann, of Massachusetts, on the institution of slavery. Delivered in the House of Representatives, August 17, 1852. Washington, D.C.: Buell & Blanchard, printers, [1852].

Speech of Hon. Horace Mann, on the right of Congress to legislate for the territories of the United States, and its duty to exclude slavery therefrom: Delivered in the House of Representatives, in Committee of the Whole, June 30, 1848. To which is added, a letter from Hon. Martin Van Buren, and Rev. Joshua Leavitt. Boston: J. Howe, Printer, 1848.

Speech of Horace Mann, of Massachusetts, in the House of Representatives, Feb. 23, 1849: On slavery in the United States, and the slave trade in the District of Columbia. Boston: W.B. Fowle, [1849].

Speech of Mr. Horace Mann, on the right of Congress to legislate for the territories of the United States, and its duty to exclude slavery therefrom. Delivered in the House of Representatives, in Committee of the Whole, June 30, 1848. Rev. ed. Boston: W. B. Fowle, 1848.

Speech on the right of Congress to legislate for the territories of the United States and its duty to exclude slavery therefrom, delivered in the House of Representatives, in Committee of the Whole, June 30, 1848. Washington: Printed by J. & G.S. Gideon, 1848.

Thoughts selected from the writings of Horace Mann. Boston: H. B. Fuller and Company, [1867].

First Annual Report (1837), Horace Mann asserts that “teaching is the most difficult of all arts and the profoundest of all sciences.”

Second Annual Report (1838), Horace Mann endorsed the work of Gallaudet and his belief that a sight vocabulary is faster to learn than letters and phonograms.

Third Annual Report (1839), “After the rising generation have acquired habits of intelligent reading in our schools, what shall they read?” wrote Horace Mann in this annual report, “for with no books to read, the power of reading will be useless.” Mann urged for more extensive support for school district libraries.

Fourth Annual Report (1840), Mann stated that “they (teachers) need to have a repertoire of teaching techniques, not only common methods for common minds, but also peculiar methods for pupils of peculiar dispositions and temperaments.

Fifth Annual Report (1841),Mann argued successfully that economic wealth would increase through an educated public. It was therefore in the self-interest of business to pay the taxation for public education.

Sixth Annual Report (1842), Horace Mann devoted a large part of his annual report to the importance of physiology and hygiene.

Seventh Annual Report (1843). Horace Mann inspected and appraised favorably the Prussian school system. This report led to widespread improvement .of education through the educational theories of Pestalozzi, Herbart and eventually Froebel.

Eighth Annual Report (1844), Mann spoke of parental mistreatment of children and said, “We who are engaged in the sacred cause of education are entitled to look upon all parents as having given hostages to our cause.”

Ninth Annual Report (1845), Mann stressed for the first time the democratic ideal that education could equalize the nation, making the poor wealthy.  Poverty could be erased by schooling.  In this we have something of John Locke’s notion of a faith in experience to improve the blank mind of the child. Education would provide, through excellent teaching, those experiences. Schools would thus create a more democratic society, one dedicated to controlled reason.

Tenth Annual Report (1846). Mann asserted that education was a natural right for every child. It is a necessary responsibility of the State to insure that education was provided for every child. This report led to the adoption of the first State law requiring compulsory attendance in school in 1852.

Eleventh Annual Report (1847), Horace Mann published the average teaching salaries of that year. He wrote that if these salaries are “compared with what is paid to cashiers of banks, to secretaries of insurance-factories, to custom-house officers, Navy agents, and so forth, it will then be seen what pecuniary temptations there are on every side, drawing enterprising and talented young men from the ranks of the teacher’s profession.”

Twelfth Annual Report (1848). Mann presented a rationale for the support of public education through taxation. Society improves as a result of an educated public. He argued for non-sectarian schools, so the taxpayer would not be in the position of supporting any established religion with which he might disagree in conscience.

Click here to view the Twelfth Annual Report.

Compiled by Library Services, Santa Clara County Office of Education, June 2006