XL. S. H. BARRACLOUGH. 



millions of acres of State lands, from the sale of which 

 there should be' established a perpetual fund, "the interest 

 of which shall be inviolably appropriated by each State 

 which may take and claim the benefit of this Act, to the 

 endowment, support, and maintenance of at least one 

 college, where the leading object shall be, without excluding 

 other scientific and classical studies, and including military 

 tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related 

 to Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts, in such manner as 

 the legislatures of the States may prescribe, in order to 

 promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial 

 classes in the several pursuits and professions in life." The 

 Act forbade the use of any portion of the aforesaid fund, or 

 of the interest thereon, for the purchase, erection, or 

 maintenance of any building or buildings ; but the several 

 States claiming and taking the benefit of the provisions of 

 the Act were required, by legislative assent previously 

 given, " to provide, within five years, not less than one 

 college" for carrying out the purposes of the Act. 



These Land Grant Colleges of the United States are the 

 product of one of the grandest examples of statesmanlike 

 legislation that the world has yet seen. "Like all great 

 enterprises having for their purpose the benefit of the 

 people by legislative enactments, this failed of complete 

 success through the indifference and folly, and the absolute 

 stupidity of many of those public servants to whom its 

 operation was entrusted; it has, nevertheless, produced 

 incalculable good, both directly in the foundation and 

 partial support of technical education, and also partly 

 through its influence upon the States, inducing them to 

 take up and carry on the work from the point at which the 

 General Government left it." 1 Since the passage of the 

 Morrill Land Grant Act in 1862 there has been a steady 



1 Prof. E. H. Thurston. 



