Johann Georg Eccarius
Record of Karl Marx's speech
on education and church funds

at the meeting of the General Council, August 17, 1869

The Bee-Hive.
Nr. 410, 21. August 1869

... Mr. Marx said that nobody had spoken against the principles embodied in the
Geneva resolutions, which it was proposed should be re-affirmed. As to the
means, the Church fund had been originally an educational fund, but was at
present misapplied. It would be good policy to declare that it should be converted

5 into a school fund according to the requirements of the present day. As to political economy, religion and other questions, they could not be admitted into the
primary, nor even the higher schools, that was a kind of education which must
rest with the adult, and must be left to the lecture room, to such schoolmasters as
Mrs. Law. Nothing but the physical sciences, truths that were independent of all

10 party prejudices, and admitted but of one interpretation, were fit subjects for
schools. In conclusion, it was agreed that education must be compulsory and
gratuitous, and that the Church funds ought to be devoted to the education of
the people. ...

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