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To the Editor of The New York Times:
The entire nation has cause to watch the proceedings regarding the repeal of the Lusk laws, given the significant influence New York holds over other states. It is worth questioning if those currently opposing this repeal have actually read the statutes themselves.
These laws represent a radical departure in legislation:
- Broad and Unenforceable Scope: One law mandates that no person, firm, or corporation may conduct any school or even a “course of instruction in any subjects whatever” without a state license and submission to state visitation.
- Interference with Private Life: Because the wording is so broad, it includes private courses and informal instruction, creating a system that would require “the best espionage system in the world” to fully enforce.
- Threat of Selective Enforcement: This leaves citizens in constant danger of “intolerable interference” at the discretion of officials.
- Oppressive Collectivism: While some may view these as conservative measures, they actually involve a “collectivism of the most oppressive kind” that mirrors the utilitarian state control seen in Nebraska’s restrictions on language education.
Far from protecting the state, these laws make the pursuit of classical or literary education a potential crime.
J. GRESHAM MACHEN
Princeton Theological Seminary