ABSTRACT
A spirit of individualism and independent localism, the dispersed population pattern, and traditional class and caste divisions worked against the establishment of statewide common school systems. Although most academies were limited to male students, some coeducational institutions existed from the time of the Revolution. Public Schooling with a Southern Accent Publicly assisted education, at the lower as well as higher levels of learning, had long been an accepted fact of life in many parts of the South. Educational conventions publicizing the need for public schools and rallying support for the necessary expenditures were held in various localities in the 1840s and 1850s. In the pro-slavery South, concerns about social control actually worked against the development of public education. American Education religious groups in the South as well as throughout the North continued to work for black enlightenment and manumission until the outbreak of the Civil War.
