Argentine Government Orders Schools to Give Jewish Children “moral Instruction”

Further details on the segregation of Jewish children on separate benches in some of the public schools in Argentina reached here today. They reveal that Jewish pupils, exempt from the study of Catholicism, are given “moral instruction” in the schools in accordance with a decree issued by the Argentine Government introducing compulsory teaching of the Roman Catholic religion in all schools.

The decree was issued, the government said, because any child who has no knowledge of religion is an atheist, who commences by repudiating the name of God and ends by denying His existence and laws, thereby destroying the private and public morals on which Argentine national unity is founded. It therefore orders that “in all public schools or primary, elementary, secondary and special education, the teaching of the Roman Catholic religion shall be taught as a regular subject of study. Pupils whose parents express opposition to this principle by reason of belonging to another religion, are exempt on the ground of ‘freedom of conscience.’ These pupils shall be given moral instruction.”