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264 . . . I challenge those who contest the bill to quote a single article from the Constitution that establishes, I do not say categorically , but in a way that can be deduced by arguing fairly, that the obligations and powers of the central power in these matters are of such an absolute, exclusive character as is claimed by these gentlemen. There is no such article, Mr. President. The duty of providing instruction in establishments such as the national high school—I insist on this phrase—is one of those general duties that it has with its correlating attributions, to promote the prosperity of the provinces in every way, their progress and their growth, exercising them, as I have said before, in certain conditions and in all situations of those provinces where their action and initiative is safeguarded because they have the same duties and the same rights. In fact, they have preferential duties and rights because the central power can and must take action only when they cannot do so. Yes, Mr. President: it is they who must first provide and develop education for their people, and, depending on their efforts and resources, they will be assisted by the nation or left to their own efforts, which will then be invigorated and go far beyond where they would if they were to expect everything from the general government. Mr. President, I am not of the authoritarian school either. Precedents are always held up as supreme, decisive; always the subservience of ideas, so often a hindrance to healthy reforms and genuine progress. I am not so fatuous as to spurn precedents and expect my poor intelligence to impose itself on everything; but as I do not relinquish my own discretion, my individual judgment, I set my faculties to work by inquir8 lEaNdRo N. alEm Investigation into the National Secondary School of Buenos Aires (Excerpt from Speech to Legislature of Buenos Aires Province, 22nd Ordinary Session, June 28, 1876) Original title: “Investigación sobre el Colegio Nacional.” Source: Roberto Etchepareborda , Leandro Alem: Mensaje y destino, vol. 5 (Buenos Aires: Editorial Raigal, 1955). the natIonaL Secondary SchooL oF BuenoS aIreS (1876) : 265 ing whether therein lie reason, truth, and justice, and if I believe I have found them I abide by them and bow to them. But if I am convinced that therein lies an error, I stand aside and fight these precedents—I never accept them blindly, for that is a poor, poor method. Error belongs to mankind and, what is more, Mr. President, something that happens in one place and in one period, an idea, a theory that arises from it, they may be useful and have a reason to exist in that place and at that time, while applying them at other times and in other places may be unsuitable and harmful. And, among ourselves, it is more dangerous still in matters of this nature, for, it can be said, we are still learning about our political life, continually wrapped up in discussions, vacillations, trying to consolidate and render practical the institutions stated in our fundamental code. Mr. President: having considered the issue that is the reason for this bill, from the point of view of the suitability and development of education among us, the ideas of those of us who support it are also advantageously positioned. Anyone who reads the beautiful pages of the notable publicist Charles Hippeau,1 whose books on elementary and higher education in Germany and the United States are peerless, must be persuaded, Mr. President , of the truth of our doctrines. Leaving aside events in Germany, with whom we have nothing in common in our political ways, I shall for a moment cast an eye over the enlightened peoples of the American Union. It is well known, Mr. President, and perhaps in no other country in the world has education been developed more strongly and splendidly than there. Hundreds and hundreds of elementary schools and educational establishments of all kinds are to be found in American territory, containing in their bosom an incalculable number of pupils. And so, Mr. President; the central power may have encouraged somewhat , no doubt, that development, while neither financing nor running any of those establishments exclusively, but the main idea is almost entirely due to the efforts of the federal states, the efforts of the commune, the municipality, the neighborhood, and even individual initiative. The 1. Alem is referring to Célestin Hippeau (1803–1883), French philologist and literary historian; commissioned...

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