Arguing that universal public education was the best way to turn unruly American children into disciplined, judicious republican citizens, Mann won widespread approval from modernizers, especially in the Whig Party, for building public schools. Most U.S. states adopted a version of the system Mann established in Massachusetts, especially the program for normal schools to train professional teachers.[2] Educational historians credit Horace Mann, along with Henry Barnard and Catharine Beecher, as one of the major advocates of the Common School Movement.[3]
From age ten to age twenty, he had no more than six weeks' schooling during any year,[6] but he made use of the Franklin Public Library, the first public library in America. He enrolled at Brown University when he was twenty years old and graduated in three years[7] as valedictorian (1819). The theme of his oration was "The Progressive Character of the Human Race."[6] He learned Greek and Latin from Samuel Barrett,[8] who later became a famous Unitarian minister.[9]
Mann defended James Allen in a robbery trial by placing a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jury by pointing out that the victim had previously identified someone else as the man who robbed him.[12][13] The strategy worked, and there was a hung jury.[12]
Mann was elected to the Massachusetts legislature in 1827, and in that role was active in the interests of education, public charities, and laws for the suppression of alcoholic drinks and lotteries. He established an asylum in Worcester, and in 1833 was chairman of its board of trustees. Mann continued to be returned to the legislature as a representative from Dedham until his removal to Boston in 1833. While in the legislature, he was a member and part of the time chairman of the committee for the revision of the state statutes, and a large number of salutary provisions were incorporated into the code at his suggestion. After their enactment, he was appointed one of the editors of the work and prepared its marginal notes and its references to judicial decisions. He was elected to the Massachusetts State Senate from Boston in 1835 and was its president in 1836–1837. As a member of the Senate, he spent time as the majority leader, and aimed his focus at infrastructure, funding the construction of railroads and canals.[4][14]
In 1830, Mann married Charlotte Messer, the daughter of former Brown University president Asa Messer. She died two years later on August 1, 1832; he never fully recovered from the intense grief and shock that accompanied her death.[15]
In the spring of 1848 he was elected to the United States Congress as a Whig to fill the vacancy caused by the death of John Quincy Adams. His first speech in that role was in advocacy of its right and duty to exclude slavery from the territories, and in a letter, in December of that year, he said: "I think the country is to experience serious times. Interference with slavery will excite civil commotion in the South. But it is best to interfere. Now is the time to see whether the Union is a rope of sand or a band of steel."[37] Again he said: "I really think if we insist upon passing the Wilmot proviso for the territories that the south—a part of them—will rebel; but I would pass it, rebellion or not. I consider no evil so great as the extension of slavery."[38]
During the first session, he volunteered as counsel for Drayton and Sayres, who were indicted for stealing 76 slaves in the District of Columbia, and at the trial was engaged for 21 successive days in their defense. In 1850, he was engaged in a controversy with Daniel Webster concerning the extension of slavery and the Fugitive Slave Law, calling Webster's support for the Compromise of 1850 a "vile catastrophe", and comparing him to "Lucifer descending from Heaven".[39][40] Mann was defeated by a single vote at the ensuing nominating convention by Webster's supporters; but, on appealing to the people as an independent anti-slavery candidate, he was re-elected, serving from April 1848 until March 1853.
Life and Complete Works of Horace Mann (2 vols., Cambridge, 1869)
(1869)
Thoughts Selected from the Writings of Horace Mann
The Case for Public Schools
Mann, Horace. , with an introduction by his second wife, Mary Peabody Mann.
The Life and Works of Horace Mann
History of education in Massachusetts
Hanson, Robert Brand (1976). . Dedham Historical Society.
Dedham, Massachusetts, 1635-1890
Parr, James L. (2009). Dedham: Historic and Heroic Tales From Shiretown. The History Press. 978-1-59629-750-0.
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Cremin, Lawrence A. American Education: The National Experience (1982).
Curti, Merle. The Social Ideas of American Educators (1935) pp. 101–38
online
Downs, Robert B. Horace Mann: Champion of the Public Schools (1974)
online
Finkelstein, Barbara. "Perfecting Childhood: Horace Mann and the Origins of Public Education in the United States," Biography, Winter 1990, Vol. 13#1 pp. 6–20
Hinsdale, Burke A. Horace Mann and the Common School Revival in the United States (New York, 1898), in the Great Educators series
online
Kalvin, Louis. "The Educational Philosophy of Horace Mann" (PhD dissertation, New York University; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1936 7303222).
Kendall, Kathleen Edgerton. "Education as 'The Balance Wheel of Social Machinery': Horace Mann's Arguments and Proofs," Quarterly Journal of Speech (1968) 54#1 pp. 13–21.
Messerli, Jonathan. Horace Mann; a biography (1972) , a standard scholarly biography
online
Messerli, Jonathan. "The Early Education of Horace Mann: Home, Meeting House, and Village" Historian (1967) 29#3.
Murphy, Garry Paul. "Professional development of Massachusetts school teachers: An examination of the Horace Mann Teacher Program" (PhD dissertation, Boston College; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1990. 9101677).
Peterson, Paul E. Saving schools: From Horace Mann to Virtual Learning (Harvard University Press, 2010)
Stornello, Joe Allen. "Horace Mann and twentieth-century educational historians: Problems of ideology and knowledge in historical texts" (PhD dissertation, University of Missouri - Kansas City; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1998. 9900319).
Taylor, Bob Pepperman. Horace Mann's Troubling Legacy: The Education of Democratic Citizens (University Press of Kansas, 2010).
Vinovskis, Maris A. "Horace Mann on the Economic Productivity of Education," New England Quarterly (1970) 43#4 pp. 550–571.
online
Whiting, George C. "Horace Mann: A comparison of a traditional and a revisionist biography" (PhD dissertation, The College of William and Mary; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1989. 8923063).
Woodworth, Jed. "Horace Mann and the Revolution in American Childhood" (PhD dissertation, University of Wisconsin - Madison; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2016. 10190139).
