In Ward McAfee's Religion, Race, and Reconstruction: The Public School in the Politics of the 1870s, the issue of public school lay at the heart of the Republican-Democrat rivalry and the Reconstructionist vision. Although the mandates of the Republican-sponsored Congressional Reconstruction enabled all Americans to vote, regardless of wealth or race, the Republicans felt that more work needed to be done to propel America forward in the latter half of the nineteenth century (McAfee 22). The Republican Party believed that public schooling was the key instrument that would transform the American nation. It would also create an educated middle-class that would thrive in the capitalist system (McAfee 3). Thus, they sought to diminish the influence of the Roman-Catholic church and its schools in the North and overcome the inherent prejudices of white racism against African-Americans in the South.
In the 1870s, the Reconstruction was a colossal attempt by the Republican Party to create a culturally homogeneous culture. The Northerners believed that cultural unity would enable the backward South to progress; together with the North, the South would form a solid foundation for the dynamic progress of the capitalist system established in the North (McAfee 5). In addition, the education of the recently freed blacks would provide a new pool of supporters for the Republican Party and also effective workers for the capitalist system (McAfee 5). According to the Republican Party, the objective of Reconstruction was to heal the scars caused by slavery and illiteracy (McAfee 6). Therefore, public schooling would be the panacea to solve the nation's ills. However, from the perspective of the Democrats, the Republican Reconstruction sought to remove the powers of the states and centralized it in the federal government (McAfee 4).
The Cincinnati Bible War encapsulated the fiery passions that exploded between the Catholic and anti-Catholic factio...