The White Ribbon. "For God, and Home, and Humanity." WELLINGTON, MARCH 18, 1944. TEMPERANCE TEACHING IN SCHOOLS.

White Ribbon, Volume 50, Issue 2, 18 March 1944, Page 4

The White Ribbon. "For God, and Home, and Humanity." WELLINGTON, MARCH 18, 1944. TEMPERANCE TEACHING IN SCHOOLS.

New Zealand lias led the way in some reforms, notably Women’s Franchise, and we are proud of it. But other reforms are pressing upon us. This world war should have taught all countries a lesson ujion the need of giving careful instruction to children and youth. In one generation Hitler has trained the Herman Youth to worship force, to throw aside every feeling of compassion or even of decency, and persecute those who differ from them. Reports from our own soldiers tell us that the brutalities inflieU'l upon Jews, prisoners, or enemies, are mostly the work of the younger German soldiers. Let us take a lesson which is verv much needed. Judges, magistrates, joliticians and press are speaking of juvenile depravity in our Dominion. \\ hy blame the young? Blame the system of education given to the rising generation. When the Education Act of IK, 8 t(x)L the Bible out of the schools it sowed the seed for moral corruption, and to-uay the harvest is beginning to Ik* reai-ed. Teachers and parents trained under the old system have passed on and presentday parents and teachers are of the later training, and now- the second generation are causing people furiously to think of the cause ot* this moral decay. It can be stated in a nutshell. Children to-day have a different standard of conduct held i,p and different heroes to imitate. The Bible contains the finest standard of conduct, its pages record the life of the world’s greatest heio, the lover and the friend of little children. But with the Bible removed from schools, children lost their dearest Friend, for Jesus was

very real to the children—they loved Him, they strove to imitate Him, and grew more like Him. Now, alas! the Bible removed from our day schools, Sunday Schools emptied because Sunday is a day of pleasure, the child of to-day finds its heroes and heroines in the sexsaturated pictures visited on Saturday, and is it any wonder that they are imitating the film stars whom they watch and envy? Our press rejxirts tell of accidents to and of crimes committed by youth, and always the giant alcol ol ap-jx-ars in these pictures.

Alcohol is listed in the pharmacopia as a narcotic jioison, as a racial jwison. Yet rarely arc its evils told to schoolchildren. Start at once to educate, restore the Bible as the standard of conduct, and give full particulars of alcohol, the licensed enemy of all that is purs and holy, and the destroyer of the individual, the race and the nation.

Temperance Teaching is compulsory m each of the 48 Stales of the U.S.A. Jn September, 1943, Temperance teaching became compulsor* in the schools of Arizona. Thus, the last of the 48 states of the U.S.A. passed the law making instruction compulsory of the nature of alcoholic drinks and their effects on the human system. In 1858 the first la a was passed, and now there is no i>art in continental U.S.A. where some instruction in the effects of alcoholic beverages is not given to the pupils. Yale Univer?ity in its Laltoratorv of Allied I’hvsiology is one of the leading fact finding institutions of the world in the field of alcohol as a beverage. It began with the effects of alcohol on the Ixxly, and now is turning to the effects of alcohol on society. National Prohibition was followed by a slump in alcohol teaching, but now there is a revival of interest, due, no doubt, to alcohol as a menace to their war effort. Instruction is required in all public elementary schools, 29 states specify time to lx* given to it, and text-books to be used.

Some states direct boards of education to see that adequate time is given to this subject, and suitable text-books provided. Teachers are instructed in normal schools or teachers’ colleges in some states and ten states require an examination in alcohol education before a teacher can receive a certificate. Some states provide ixnalties for failure, neglect or refusal to teach or cause to be taught this subject; others withhold state funds froir district or schools that have not complied with the statutes requiring alcohol education.