When I was still a kid, controversy raged in the Philadelphia area over whether an all-male prep school known as Girard College should be racially integrated. No ordinary boarding school, Girard College had been founded in 1848 according to the provisions in the much litigated will of philanthropist Stephen Girard. (A French born American patriot, Girard was the wealthiest man in America when he died.) While a bigot by today’s standards, Girard’s views reflected his times, and he believed his money would best be spent educating destitute white orphan boys in a strictly non-sectarian manner. It was the latter provision which first caused trouble. The United States Supreme Court summarizes:
The persons who are to receive the benefits of the institution he declared to be, “poor white male orphans between the ages of six and ten years; and no orphan should be admitted until the guardians or directors of the poor, or other proper guardian, or other competent authority, have given by indenture, relinquishment or otherwise, adequate power to the mayor, aldermen, and citizens of Philadelphia, or to directors or others by them appointed, to enforce in relation to each orphan every proper restraint, and to prevent relatives or others from interfering with, or withdrawing such orphan from the institution.” The testator then provided for a preference, “first, to orphans born in the city of Philadelphia; secondly, to those born in any other part of Pennsylvania; thirdly, to those born in the city of New York; and lastly, to those born in the city of New Orleans.” The testator further provided that the orphan “scholars who shall merit is, shall remain in the college until they shall respectively arrive at between fourteen and eighteen years of age.”
The testator then, after suggesting that in [**157] relation to the organization of the college and its appendages, he leaves necessarily many details to the mayor, aldermen, and citizens of Philadelphia, and their successors, proceeded to say: “there are, however, some restrictions which I consider it may duty to prescribe, and to be, amongst others, conditions on which my bequest for said college is made and to be enjoyed, namely: First, I enjoin and require,” &c. [See statement of the reporter.] This second injunction and requirement is that which has been so elaborately commented on at the bar, as derogatory to the Christian religion, and upon which something will be hereafter suggested in the course of this opinion.
This forced the Court (the case is Vidal v. Girard College) to grapple with the question of anti-Christian bigotry, for Girard had stipulated not only that there be no religious instruction in the school, but that no clergyman might ever set foot on the campus. It was argued that this was anti-Christian, because it violated the laws and public policy of Pennsylvania (said to be a Christian state). The Supreme Court ducked the religious questions as much as it could (I guess Wikipedia’s assertion of Girard’s atheism wasn’t available), but ruled that prohibiting formal religious instruction and barring clergy did not preclude the teaching of morality (including Christian morality):
All that we can gather from his language is, that he desired to exclude sectarians and sectarianism from the college, leaving the instructors and officers free to teach the purest morality, the love of truth, sobriety, and industry, by all apropriate means; and of course including the best, the surest, and the most impressive. The objection, then, in this view, goes to this, — either that the testator has totally omitted to provide for religious instruction in his [*201] scheme of education, (which, from what has been already said, is an inadmissible interpretation,) or that it includes but partial and imperfect instruction in those [**194] truths. In either view can it be truly said that it contravenes the known law of Pennsylvania upon the subject of charities, or is not allowable under the article of the bill of rights already cited? Is an omission to provide for instruction in Christinanity in any scheme of school or college education a fatal defect, which avoids it assording to the law of Pennsylvania? If the instruction provided for is incomplete and imperfect, is it equally fatal? These questions are propounded, because we are not aware that any thing exists in the constitution or laws of Pennsylvania, or the judicial decisions of its tribunals, which would justify us in pronouncing that such defects would be so fatal. Let us take the case of a charitable donation to teach poor orphans reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, and navigation, and excluding all other studies and instruction; would the donation be void, as a charity in Pennsylvania, as being deemed derogatory to Christianity? Hitherto it has been supposed, that a charity for the instruction of the poor might be good and valid in England even if it did not go beyond the establishment of a grammar-school. And in America, it has been thought, in [**195] the absence of any express legal prohibitions, that the donor might select the studies, as well as the classes of persons, who were to receive his bounty without being compellable to make religious instruction a necessary part of those studies. It has hitherto been thought sufficient, if he does not require any thing to be taught inconsistent with Christianity.
Looking to the objection therefore in a mere juridical view, which is the only one in which we are at liberty to consider it, we are satisfied that there is nothing in the devise establishing the college, or in the regulations and restrictions contained therein, which are inconsistent with the Christian religion, or are opposed to any known policy of the state of Pennsylvania.
Over the years, many of the will’s provisions survived legal attack, but it was in 1968 that the “white orphans” provision was struck down.
Because the Will was so often successfully defended, it was considered sound and defensible. So it was until the 1950s, when courts began to consider social changes, and political expediency, when interpreting the constitutionality of a man’s last wishes.
In this century, the most controversial aspect of the Will involved its “white only” restriction. Racial barriers were rightfully and finally coming down throughout the country. Minorities were beginning to unite and to gain political clout. Spurred by the Supreme Court decision ruling segregation in the nation’s public schools to be unconstitutional, Philadelphia councilman Raymond Pace Alexander, a Negro, sponsored the resolution which asked the City Solicitor to seek a court ruling on Girard’s “white only” restriction. He claimed that since the City of Philadelphia administered the College through the Board of City Trusts and, since the school is supported by public funds through tax exemptions, the Board could not abide by the racial restriction. The resolution asked the Board to admit all orphans regardless of race. On May 28, 1954, the Philadelphia Council approved the resolution. Thus began legal maneuvering and controversy that lasted from 1954 until the Will was set aside in 1968 and Girard College accepted the first non-White students.
Male students, of course. I remember when the place was integrated, and I thought it was wonderful. Which it was. It struck me as unfair that this dead, white, colonial-era, man could continue to discriminate long, long after his death. (Yet part of me wondered, if one will can be disregarded, what about others?)
Eventually, the school was forced to admit “functional” orphans. And girls. Can’t have tax-exempt sexism, can we?
To broaden the base of potential students, in 1977, the Court authorized the admission of “functional” orphans. These are children who receive inadequate care from their natural parents because of separation, divorce, desertion, disability, or “any other reason.”
On September 3, 1982, the Orphan’s Court approved the Board’s petition to permit the College to accept girls, another significant deviation from the Will. Since the court had set aside several “all male” school provisions, the Board wisely chose not to waste money for further litigation. Instead, they chose to provide this free education to as many children as the facility could accommodate, without regard to race, sex, religion, nationality, orphan status, or family economics. The qualifications for admittance today are: be from a single-parent home of limited income, have an IQ of at least 100, be on grade level in basic subjects as determined by testing administered by the College, be in good physical health, have no serious behavioral or adjustment problems, have a good reference from a previous school, and be between 6 and 11 years of age.
That covers a lot of kids, and it’s probably the best way to keep the school alive (the days of orphanages being long gone), but there’s just something about the idea of child from a single parent families being an orphan which just rankles me.
The word “orphan” once meant something. But now, it means nothing. Why is there no preservation of orphans movement?
And get this! Now, priests are allowed!
Ironically, with all the changes to the Will, the Philadelphia Inquirer, on May 5, 1973 reported that “Girard College bars a priest.” The priest came to the College to attend an organ recital. The recital was advertised as being open to the public. Based on the religious restriction in the Will, he was denied admittance. Finally, within the last year, the Board turned its head and permitted a Black ordained minister to enter the grounds and since then other clergy have been admitted to the campus.
Times change, of course. And so do words.
My dad died 16 years ago, and my mom died 7 years ago. I’ve only thought of myself as an orphan (well, an “adult orphan“) since 1999, but now I know I was an orphan long before that.
I don’t see why the definition of orphan has to be so exclusive.
Actually, in another case, the chocolate magnate’s will which had created The Hershey School (with similar exclusions based on race, sex, and orphan status) was similar rewritten by the courts, and the word “orphan” was changed to include “social orphans”:
In 1976, the Deed of Trust was modified again to permit the enrollment of students without regard to gender. It was at this time that the deed was also modified to expand the definition of “orphan” to include any child not receiving adequate parental care at home, thus allowing for the enrollment of “social orphans.”
“Of quite great significance is the definition of an orphan where you don’t have to have either parent dead if you are what we call a `societal orphan.’ That means a broken home or parents who are very ill and who need this sort of help.”
I don’t know how hard it is to become a societal orphan, but it might be a fiction the school needs in order to boost enrollment.
More than anything, the definition of “orphan” seems to depend on who wants to be one.
Definitions seem to change not according to rules of logic, but according to the nature of the benefits the definitions convey.
When words define rights, expect them to change.