Separate schools in Manitoba

When Manitoba entered confederation in 1870, education was provided in schools operated by the Catholic, Anglican, and Presbyterian churches. The School Act of 1871 confirmed this intimate relationship of religion and education by creating a dual public system in which Catholic and Protestant denominational rights in education, as protected, it was thought, by section 22 of the Manitoba Act of 1870, were continued and funded by the province. Twenty years later, however, the provincial government, heeding the wishes of the English-speaking Protestant majority, effectively froze out separate schools from public funding. The Manitoba school question, as it became known, would touch fundamental issues in the life of the province and the nation. A compromise was reached in 1896 between Premier Thomas Greenway and Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier. The agreement allowed for 30 minutes of religious education at the end of the school day and permitted the hiring of a Catholic teacher where numbers warranted. In areas where 10 or more students used a mother tongue other than English, they could be taught in “French or [an]other such language and English according to the bi-lingual system.” The agreement would be abrogated in 1916 by the Manitoba government of Tobias Crawford Norris.