Education: Caesar & God

To the stolid, austere Amish farmfolk of central Ohio, education beyond the eighth grade is a waste and a danger; it is enough that a child learn to read, write and cipher. This stubbornly held tenet of their strict, old-fashioned sect runs squarely into an Ohio law requiring children to remain in school until they are 16. From time to time in Amish country, parents have been prosecuted for violating the law, but more often, tolerant school boards ignore the Amish boycott of high schools, or make senseless obeisance to the law's letter by letting Amish schoolchildren repeat the eighth grade...

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