Edmund Barton

I was for two years a pupil at the Model School in Fort street which was then conducted upon the Irish national system, and if any special religious instruction was given in connection with that system, I do not recollect it. ”

A State which has universal suffrage and a wide extension of the jury franchise, must qualify the people by education to rightly exercise the great powers with which they are invested. ”

I say further that our system of education should be unsectarian. ”

If it is the duty of the State to educate, it is the duty of the State also to bear the burden of education, namely, the taxation out of which education is provided. ”

It is the duty of the State to educate, and the right of the people to demand education. ”

The difference between the denominational system and the public school system is all the difference between bolstering them up on the one hand and letting them alone of the other. ”