are in the rear of church, in 2d street, near 6th avenue; the
rooms are dark and cheerless, and without the needful
facilities of sufficient recitation rooms, etc.

From a comparison of the schoolhouses with the splendid, almost
palatial edifices, with manifold comforts, conveniences and elegancies
which make up the schoolhouses for white children in the city of New
York, it is evident that the colored children are painfully neglected
and positively degraded. Pent up in filthy neighborhoods, in old and
dilapidated buildings, they are held down to low associations and
gloomy surroundings.

Yet Mr. Superintendent Kiddle, at a general examination of colored
schools held in July last (for silver medals awarded by the society
now addressing your honorable body) declared the reading and spelling
equal to that of any schools in the city.

The undersigned enter their solemn protest against this unjust
treatment of colored children. They believe with the experience of
Massachusetts, and especially the recent experience of Boston before
them, there is no sound reason why colored children shall be excluded
from any of the common schools supported by taxes levied alike on
whites and blacks, and governed by officers elected by the vote of
colored as well as white voters.

But if in the judgment of your honorable body common schools are not
thus common to all, then we earnestly pray you to recommend to the
Legislature such action as shall cause the Board of Education of this
city to erect at least two well-appointed modern grammar schools for
colored children on suitable sites, in respectable localities, so that