22 LIFE AXD COR RESPOND EXCE OF THE \}770 



opinion of the Council, being under legal disqualifications. To this 

 strange menace the Trustees made the very proper reply, that there was 

 a very simple means of ascertaining whether any of them were disquali- 

 fied, and if on that account the Board had lost its chartered rights, and 

 that was, by a judicial inquiry, the matter being wholly out of the 

 province of the President or his Council. The Trustees, however, 

 thought it advisable "to defer to the Executive part of the Govern- 

 ment," and no Commencement was held.* In September, a newly- 

 elected Assembly met, and the President of the State, in his message of 

 the 9th of that month, brought the subject of the College before them 

 in the following terms: 



"The principal Institution of learning in this State, founded on the most free and 

 catholic principles, raised and cherished by the hand of public Ijuunty, appears Ijy its 

 Charter to have allied itself so closely to the Government of Eritain by niakmg tlie 

 allegiance of its Governors to that .State a pre-requisite to any official act, that it might 

 well have been presumed they would have sought the aid of Government for an 

 establishment consistent with the Revolution, and conformable to the great changes of 

 policy and government. But whatever may have been the motives, we cannot think 

 the good people of this .State can, or ought to, rest satisfied, or the protection of Gov- 

 ernment be extended to an Institution framed with such manifest attacliment to the 

 British Government and conducted with a general inattention to the authority of the 

 State. How far there has been any deviation from the liberal ground cf its first 

 establishment, and a pre-eminence given to some societies in i^rejudice to otliers 

 ■equally meritorious, the former inquiries of your Honorable House will enable you to 

 determine," 



The subject was referred to a Committee of the Plouse, and before 

 the end of September a majority of the Committee (three out of five) 

 made a report which was a mere echo of the message of the President. 

 They conclude by recommending that a Bill should be brought in 

 " effectually to provide suitable funds for the said College (remodelled), 

 to secure to every denomination of Christians equal privileges, and 

 establish said College on a liberal foundation, in which the interests 

 of American liberty and independence will be advanced and promoted, 

 and obedience and respect to the Constitution of the State preserved." 



* The following was the Minute and resolve of the Trustees of the College : 



"College of pHiLADELrniA, July 8th, 1779. 



"As the President of the State has thought proper to inform this Board, through 

 some of its members, tliat certain legal objections lay to the exercise of some of their 

 rights under their charter, and to advise the not holding a commencement at the time 

 appointed, the Board have, for the present, deferred holding the commencement from 

 ?.n expectation that some mode will be speedily adopted on the part of Government to 

 draw such their rights into question in a legal way, when this board will take the 

 proper steps to defend their charter according to law. 



"Resoh'L'ti, That Mr. Willing, Mr. Powell, and Mr. Hopkinson be a committee to 

 communicate the sense of the Board on this subject to the President." 



