cal Independent, an article from the pen of the Professor of Surgery, in which

the clinical portion of the Medical Department of our University, as at present organized, is advertised as the "greatest of all shams." Thus we find one of the Professors using his medical journal to laud the Medical College, and another of the Professors using his medical journal to disparage it. If we pursue our examination of this discussion by these Professors, we will observe that the discussion has degenerated into a personal controversy. Thus the Peninsular Journal alludes to the non-residence of a part of the Medical Faculty during the lecture term at Ann Arbor as a subject of complaint and productive of evil. The Professor of Surgery copies this article into the last November number of the Independent, and charges it with containing an insinuation which it alleges "is both cowardly and false;" and Professor Pitcher, in the last December number of the Journal, in replying to the article in the November number of the Independent from the pen of Professer Gunn, and in alluding to him as its author, remarks that "he has derived his principal claim to personal and public consideration from his connection with the University;" and in pursuing this controversy still further, it will be noticed that the medical class of the University has been led to enter the lists and endeavor to decide the combat between the Professors by adopting a series of resolutions in which one of the Professors is denounced, and an attempt is made to laud the other by the ambiguous resolve that his absence from their midst four days in the week is in no way detrimental to the class.

Your Committee are of opinion that publishing strictures by Professors upon the action of the Board of Regents, or upon each other, cannot be profitable, and must have an injurious tendency; that if either Faculty, or any member thereof, have suggestions to make in relation to the government or management of the University, and the mode of instruction, it would be more desirable, and the welfare of the Institution would be better consulted, by bringing such matters first before the Board of Regents as the constitutional guardians of the Institution. Your Committee believe that it must be apparent to every one that it cannot but be prejudicial to the interests of any institution to have any of its Professors constantly complaining of its management, and endeavoring through the public prints to exhibit "serious faults," "utter incompleteness," great shams and gress defects in its system of instruction, and that the agitation of this subject by members of the Faculty, under circumstances which may and do (whether justly or unjustly) lead persons to suppose them to be influenced by personal considerations, is not only unprofitable but positively detrimental to the best interests of the Institution, and must detract from the usefulness of the Professors thus engaged and impair more or less that harmony and amity between the gentlemen engaged in the controversial discussion of the subject, which it is so desirable always to preserve among

teachers in every school. With one part of the Medical Faculty insisting and publishing to the world that there is such a glaring defect in the course of instruction in the Medical Department as renders it not only incompetent to "afford perfect medical instruction," but such a one as renders it a mere quack school-if it pretends to do so, it cannot reasonably be expected that, even strengthened as it is by its connection with the University, it can long continue in its present prosperous condition.

The buildings and improvements on the University grounds cost upwards of $80,000-and with the grounds may be fairly estimated in round numbers at $100,000, which the Institution would forfeit by the removal if the legal objection herein stated be well taken. It would probably cost in addition to this a sum ranging from $30,000 to $50,000, (according to who should have the management of it,) to effect the removal and get the Department in operation in Detroit; and it would cost annually $2,500 more for a Professor of Chemistry and an assistant in the new laboratory which it would be necessary to erect in Detroit. Detroit would be a much more expensive place for students than Ann Arbor; besides the medical students would lose the benefit of the University library; they would also lose the advantages of the cabinet of minerals containing one of the largest and most complete collections in the country, and they would also lose the advantages of a complete suit illustrative of the geology of Michigan, as also the museum of natural history, all of which are at all times open to medical students as well as to the students in the other departments.

A university is an assemblage of colleges or schools of instruction in the higher departments of literature, science and the arts, united under one charter of incorporation and a uniform system of government. It is unusual, and we believe in European countries where universities rank highest, it is unknown to have the departments of a university in places distant from each other, and we think that the strength and vital force, and to some extent, the respectability of a university, lie in its concentration and in the visible union of all its parts as forming one grand whole; and that this must be materially impaired by the dispersion of its parts. The Medical Department may be regarded as a foot in the tripod of the University, which being removed the whole tripod loses a principal support, and inclines to an unnatural and deformed position; but it seems to us that the detached foot must sink in importance infinitely more than the remaining parts, and that it would by the separation but exchange its present prestige for that of a mere medical school; and we cannot resist the impression that by the removal of the Medical Department to Detroit it would be the loser instead of the gainer, in its character, its influence, and its usefulness.

It will be seen from what has thus far been said, that true clinical teaching can best be obtained either in the walks of private practice under the guidance

and direction of a competent private instructor, or by a residence in a hospital after graduation; and that the attempt of the schools to substitute hospital clinics to undergraduates has always failed to furnish the student with that skill and experience, without which he cannot become a successful practitioner of the art of medicine, and which too many who fancy they have become wise by walking a hospital, have only subsequently acquired by large sacrifices of human happiness and human life; that in the judgment of the most intelligent educators of our own and foreign countries, a more thorough course of preparation should be insisted upon as essential to the proper elevation of the medical profession; that the University of Michigan furnishes as much material for clinical instruction as is profitable to undergraduates, that from the experience of other institutions there is no reason to suppose that any improve. ment in these respects could be made by removing the Medical Department to Detroit which cannot be made where it now is. It moreover appears that the principal, if not the only reason which has caused the agitation of this question, is the personal interests and convenience of some of the Professors. It is submitted that this should not be considered a reason for changing the location of an endowed institution not dependent upon tuition fees for its support, and which should be regarded as the patron and not as the patronized, and whose interests and welfare are to be considered as paramount to the convenience of any Professor whose connection with the Institution is not indispensable to its prosperity or success.

Your Committee are therefore of the opinion that the members of the Faculty will best manifest their devotion to the interests of the University by discontinuing the further controversial discussion in periodicals and newspapers of the subject of removing the Medical Department or of disturbing the integrity and concentration of the University and the visible union of its parts. That the present prosperous condition of the University should admonish us to be cautious about entering upon what at best may be regarded as a doubtful experiment-and that the Board of Regents will best subserve the educational interests of the State and more wisely execute their official trust by leaving the Medical Department where it has been located by authority of the Legislature and where it has in so short a time taken the lead of the older institutions which have sought their locations in large towns. Had not the question of extending the medical term to nine months been disposed of we would have presented some suggestions on that subject, but as it is we forbear, simply remarking that if the present compensation paid to the Professors in the Medical Department is not sufficient to enable them to devote themselves to the business of teaching during the lecture term, it would be much better for the University to command their exclusive attention even at an increase of compensation if that be necessary. The Board of Regents have not forgotten that the

organic act relative to the University provides for the establishment of a Department of Law, and that in the organic law this stands second in order, and precedes the Department of Medicine, though it has modestly given way and waited not only the organization but the full development of the other depart

ments.

The growth of the State, the development of its vast agricultural and mineral resources, its network of railroads, its expanding fisheries, and the important commerce of its inland seas, all increasing as they do the wealth of the people, and complicating their business relations, render the demand for the establishment of this department daily more important. The legal profession, too, feel that their claims upon the University have been quite long enough delayed, and the young men of the State who think they see, through that profession, the surest and most ready way to usefulness, wealth, and honorable distinction, urge with much force that they ought not to be obliged to seek in the law schools of other States that instruction which they had a right to expect, but which is denied them at home. The pressing and urgent demand for the establishment of the Law Department and the resources of the University forbid any increase of expenditure in either of the other departments. Indeed the Law Department cannot be established and supported and the present expenditures in the other departments be sustained unless the State shall relinquish its claim to the hundred thousand dollars of the proceeds of the Univer sity lands, and continue to pay permanently the interest thereon to the University.

We therefore close this already too extended report by submitting for the consideration of the Board of Regents the subjoined resolutions, all which is most respectfully submitted, and we request to be discharged from the further consideration of the subject.

Resolved, That the Medical Department of the University of Michigan ought not, in the judgment of the Board of Regents, to be removed to Detroit, or elsewhere.

Resolved, That each candidate for admission to the Medical Department of the University shall furnish satisfactory evidence of his good moral character to the President, and if not a graduate of this or some other university or college, he shall possess a good English education; a knowledge of natural philosophy, and the elementary mathematical sciences, including geometry and algebra, and such an acquaintance with Latin as will entitle him to admission into the Freshmen class of the classical course of the University, to be ascertained and certified by the proper Professor in that course. This resolution shall take effect on the first day of July next.

Resolved, That from and after the expiration of the approaching Medical

Term, all the Medical Professors shall be required to reside at or near the University during the Medical Lecture Term.

ANN ARBOR, Sept. 28, 1858.

D. MCINTYRE,
B. L. BAXTER,

Committee.

TO THE BOARD OF REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN:

The undersigned, one of the Committee appointed to inquire and report on the subject of removing the Medical Department of the University from Ann Arbor where it now is, submits the following report:

First. I find nothing in the laws of this State or Territory, from the act of August 26, 1817, by which the "Catholepistemiad or University of Michigania" with its “Thirteen Didaxum,” was founded, down to the present time, which restrains the action or power of this Board on the subject. On the other hand I find many provisions of law, several of which are now in force, which not only authorize, but expressly require, the establishment of branches of the University in different parts of the State. See on this subject articles 2198, 2200 and 2201 of the Compiled Laws, requiring a branch in each Judicial Circuit. See also articles 2197 and 2207 of the same. The former action of this Board which established branches of the University in different localities, was not in violation of law. It is not perceived why the Medical Department may not be regarded as a branch of the University within the meaning of these laws; but whether it may or may not, I see no positive law that requires it to remain in one place rather than in another. See also, as bearing on the question generally, The People v. the Trustees of Geneva College, 5 Wendell, (N. Y.,) Reports, 211.

Second. I do not think it admits of a doubt that a large city or town is best adapted for the Medical Department, and therefore that the city of Detroit, being by far the largest city in the State, and containing in fact a greater population than all the other cities of the State put together, is the best place for it. This position is greatly strengthened by the fact that this Board has deemed it advisable to establish the clinical course of that Department, in the city of Detroit.

Third. I am also of the opinion that the interests of the University as a whole, in a practical point of view, and regardless of all notions of an ideal unity, may be best promoted by keeping all branches or departments of it in one locality. Which way the balance of benefits might be found to predominate, with reference to the Medical Department on a more careful examination of the