Speech #880069036

There are many jobs in agriculture during the summer. Unlike factory. inside or heavy work. agricultural jobs seldom harm a healthy child. No proponent of Public Law 78. to my knowledge. has ever advocated that the small children of migrant families should work in the fields for money or education. I personally believe there is a good deal of education in any kind of honest work. however. Most proponents of Public Law 78 advocate and urge. with a humane sensitivity. that families with small children stay in a permanent place and maintain a stable home lifeunless they prefer to migrate or live like nomads. I find the opponents of Public Law 78 trying to enlarge. glamorize. and promote the cruel and tragic life of the nomad. I wish they would analyze more thoroughly the pathetic plight they are perpetrating on poor people. The reason a migrant child cannot be educated is not because he works but because he moves. His education is interiupted and disruptedin one school and another. often one grade and another. with different texts. different teachers. different classmates. different counselors. Parents who move their children from place to place. school to school. miss and deny their children other stabilizing factors such as church. teams. youth groups. regular work. hobbies. a home. Well. if there is anything good that can be made of a migrant life. I would like to hear. I will share it with the nomads. Furthermore. every migrant child who matriculates in a new school interrupts and disrupts that school. Everything he does affects the permanent students. almost invariably adversely. Even those with no imagination and little understanding of our educational system can appreciate this deplorable conditionand the detrimental consequences to the permanent school. It would be better in most communities to have separate schools for the permanent and migrant student but this would be unconscionably expensive for the small schools and such a scheme would be criticized as discriminatory. The best way to eliminate the deplorable. cruel conditions of migrant life islike eliminating the cruelties of warto eliminate the cause or sourcethe migrant family way of lifeor war. There is little we can do to improve substantially the conditions of war or the migrant family life. It seems to me outrageous to hold out false hopes for the migrant way of life and to dupe families who are already in a deprived condition. economically. educationally. mechanically. emotionally. socially. The answers are to be found. not in the promotion. but. in the elimination of the necessity of the migrant family way of existence.