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by the people of Michigan, in 1835, under which she was admitted as a State into the Union, contained an entire article, consisting of five sections, devoted to the subject of education, which, among other things, provided that "the Legislature should" encourage, by all suitable means, the promotion of intellectual, scientifical and agricultural improvement; that the proceeds of all lands that had been or thereafter might be granted by the United States to this State for the support of Schools, which should thereafter be sold or disposed of, should be and remain a perpetual fund, the interest of which, together with he rents of all unsold lands, should be inviolably appropriated to the support of Schools throughout the State. The fifth section of said article reads as follows: "The Legislature shall take measures for the protection, improvement, or other disposition of such lands as have been or may hereafter be reserved or granted by the United States to this State for the support of a University; and the funds accruing from the rents or sale of such lands, or from any other source for the purpose aforesaid, shall be and remain a permanent fund for the support of said University, with such Branches as the public convenience may hereafter demand, for the promotion of literature, the arts and sciences, and as may be authorized by the terms of such grant; and it shall be the duty of the Legislature, as soon as may be, to provide effectual means for the improvement and permanent security of the funds of said University." The object of the grant of these lands by Congress, as expressed in the grant itself, was for the use and support of a University, and for no other use or purpose whatsoev

er.

This language clearly implied that a University was to be created and established by the State, which could use and ko pappa by this fund, and the State, by accepting the grant, became bound to provide and establish a University to use and be supported by this fund. The first constitution for the State provided that the funds arising

from the sale of these lands, and such others as might be reserved or granted to this State for the support of a University, should be and remain a permanent fund for the support of said University, and that it should be the duty of the Legislature to provide effectual means for the improvement and permanent security of said funds. These legal provisions clearly show that the Congress which granted these lands, and the people of the State who accepted them, understood the grant to be, not for the establishment of a University, but for the support of one, to be created and established by the State. As a further evidence of the understanding of this grant by the people of the State, the Legislature, by an act approved March 18, 1837, provided that as soon as the State should provide funds for that purpose, the Board of Regents should proceed to the erection of the necessary buildings for the University, on the ground to be designated by the Legislature, and in such manner as should be provided by law. This shows that the Legislature of Michigan, in 1837, understood and intended that the State should provide "funds" for the erection of the necessary buildings for the University, and that the proceeds of the lands granted by Congress for the use and support of the University, should forever be and remain a permanent fund, no part of the principal of which should be expended in the establishment of a University, or in the erection of buildings for the same; and that in accordance with the grant made by Congress, the entire income arising from that fund should be sacredly devoted to the use and support of a University. It will be seen that the grant of public lands by Congress to the State for the support of schools, from which the primary school fund originated, was in similar terms, and contained no words indicating more clearly that they were to be used for the support and not for the erection and establishment of primary schools, than are used by Congress, by the constitutional convention of Michi

gan, and by the Legislature, to declare that the grant to the State for the University was to be for its support, and not to erect buildings in different parts of the State for the establishment of a University and its branches, and yet no one, in or out of the Legislature, or the constitutional convention has ever thought of reducing the principal of this fund by appropriations to build school-houses all over the State; on the contrary, the constitution provides, and the practice of the State has always harmonized with that provision, that the proceeds of all lands that have been or hereafter may be granted by the United States to this State for the support of schools, shall be and remain a perpetual fund, the interest of which together with the rents of all unsold lands, shall be inviolably appropriated for the support of schools throughout the State. In 1838 the Legislature authorized the State Treasurer to deliver to the Board of Regents for the use and benefit of the University and its branches, special certificates of stock to the amount of $100,000, reimbursable after twenty years, in equal annual instalments of not less than ten nor more than fifteen years, bearing interest at six per cent., payable semi-annually in New York, and for the payment of the interest, and redemption of the principal, the faith and credit of the people of this State were pledged. The same act pledged all the "disposable income" from the University fund for the payment of the said interest, and the redemption of the said stock. Here was the first departure from the analogy of the legislation of this State relative to the primary school fund, and the University fund. The object of this legislation was to provide funds for the erection of buildings for the University and its branches, and all the "disposable income" of this University fund was pledged for the payment of this hundred thousand dollar loan, and its interest. No such legislation was ever had in relation to the primary school fund. The income of that fund has always been sacred

ly devoted to the support of the primary schools, and the State or (what is the same thing) the districts, have provided the school houses. What did the Legislature mean by the "disposable income" of the University fund? Did they intend, after erecting the University buildings, to shut them up and let them stand idle, and appropriate the whole income to the payment of this claim, until the $100,000 and the interest upon it should be fully paid from this income? Certainly not. No one will contend for this, for it would require the entire income for not less than ten or twelve years to do this. And it would be a strange policy that would borrow money, and pay interest upon it, to erect buildings not intended to be used for that length of time. It would have been much wiser to have waited until the income had accumulated sufficiently to pay for the erection of the buildings. The Legislature of 1838 could only have intended that the surplus income, after paying all the expenses of supporting the University, with its department of literature, science and the arts, its department of law, and its department of medicine, as provided for by the 8th section of the act entitled "An act to provide for the organization and government of the University of Michigan, approved June 21st, 1837," which enacts that the University shall consist of these three departments. The law department has not yet been established, and the Regents find themselves seriously embarrassed, by the reflection, that if they should establish it, the Legislature of 1860, or any future Legislature, may withhold the interest on the $100,000, and thus compel them to discontinue the law department, or the medical department of the University, or to cripple or dwarf the institution in some other way. The entire income of the University is required to pay its ordinary current expenses, so that there is not, and never will be, any "disposable income" to be appropriated to the payment of the $100,000. Besides, the Library needs, and should receive, liberal additions,

which the income of the institution at present will not permit. While Yale College has a Library of 63,500 volumes, Harvard University a Library of 116,500 volumes, which is annually being increased by an expenditure of about $5000, the University of Michigan has but about 7000 volumes. We cannot think that the State has any desire or intention to cripple or embarrass the action of the Regents, whom the people have elected to the important trust of promoting the higher education of their sons; and would it not be much more creditable, as well as honorable to the State, to be able to say at once that it established the University, at its own expense, than to have it said that after Congress had generously provided the means to support a University, the State had appropriated one-fifth of those means to defray the expenses which Congress (its benefactor) had reasonably expected would be paid by the State itself, and which the Legislature, and the constitutional convention have given strong assurance should be done. Indeed, the action of the people in the last constitutional convention preserves the integrity of the State in this respect, by declaring in the 2d section of the 8th article of the Constitution, that "the proceeds from the sale of all lands that had been, as well as of all that might thereafter be granted by the United States to this State for educational purposes, shall be and remain a perpetual fund." The relief herein asked for is not only just to the University, and due from the State, but it is essential to the complete organization and development of the institution with the three departments provided for by law. The State has been liberal, though perhaps none too much so, in making appropriations for the erection of buildings for Asylums, an Agricultural College, and other public uses; also in making loans to railroads and other objects, and in paying these loans without the hope or the expectation of reimbursement. And shall it longer continue to cripple one of its noblest institutions