The United Kingdom and Human Rights - College of Social ...

26 The United Kingdom and Human Rights Thinking
schools from 1696, with its Act for Settling of Schools,
before Frederick William I of Prussia in 1717 provided for
compulsory schooling, an enlightened enthusiasm not
matched by the measures for its implementation. British
American colonies with Quaker or Dissenter traditions
had earlier provided universal schooling, beginning with
schools in New England towns in the 1630s and
Massachusett's 1642 requirement that children be taught
to read and be trained to work. The background against
which education became seen as a state duty and
ultimately as an individual's right was in fact set by
Luther's 1524 letter to the German municipalities,
followed by the establishment of town and village
schools in Saxony in 1528 and later in Wurttemburg and
other principalities. In Scotland John Knox's 1560 First
Book of Discipline established ideas about virtuous
education and godly upbringing still prevalent in
Scotland, while Comenius (1592-C.1670), a Moravian
exile and disciple of Bacon, was responsible for publicising
ideas about education throughout Europe. At the
same time the English thinker, James Harrington, was
advocating compulsory education in his Oceana (1656),
although his thought had more impact in America than
in England. The first advocate of co-education was Mary
Wollstonecraft in 1792, although many who have
followed her pioneering feminist path would denounce
that particular idea as denying women opportunities of
full development in a supportive environment prior to
going into a mixed world.
The Development of International Human Rights
Standards
The fourth contribution resulted from the United
Kingdom's role in the spread of human rights ideas and