90 
It is worth while to note in the discussion of this bill that the opposition, as rep- v 
resented by Mr. Cobb, chairman of the Committee on Public Lands, discussed very 
strongly two points — first, that the bill was unconstitutional, and, second, that it 
was against public policy. It was further argued that the effects of the bill were 
uneven and therefore to that degree unjust. 
The constitutional argument was based on the doctrine of limited powers in a 
federal government. It was argued that the bill was an interference with the rights 
of the States in controlling matters of education which were local. The power of 
Congress to donate the public lands was distinctly denied. 
On April 23 the bill was reported back to the Senate and referred to the Committee 
on Public Lands. On May 6 the bill was reported back to the Senate by Mr. Stuart 
without recommendation. Here the bill had a tortuous road. It seems impossible 
not to conclude that the opponents of the bill used every effort to avoid a vote. Mr. 
Push, of Ohio, in the progress of the debate submitted a veto of President Pierce of 
a bill for the benefit of the indigent insane. The aim of this was to emphasize that 
the proposed measure was not entirely different from the one hitherto vetoed and 
therefore against public policy. President Pierce had argued against the constitu- 
tionality of the measure referred to above. Senator Pugh, of Ohio, desired to rein- 
force that argument and apply it to the bill for the aid of colleges of agriculture. He 
further argued that the entire subject of education was a local question with which 
the States only should deal. He protested against the measure as an invasion of the 
rights of the States. He further argued against the measure from the standpoint of 
the disposition of the public lands. Mr. Rice, of Minnesota, joined in this protest, 
not only on constitutional grounds, which he affirmed, but on the grounds that it 
gave the monopoly of lands within the limits of one State to another State and thus 
brought about conflicting interests. He argued that it was not only unconstitutional, 
but unjust. His words are: "I look upon the success of this measure as bringing 
death almost to Minnesota; not sudden destruction, but that slow, lingering decay 
which eats into and gradually destroys every community whose energies are con- 
fined by combinations of nonresident proprietors. The State that I represent is one 
of the richest, largest, and fairest in the Union. Pass this bill and within six months 
the agents of nonresidents will traverse her limits for the purpose of culling out over 
the entire State the choicest lands held by actual settlers, thus blighting, like the 
locusts, every region that may attract them by its richness or its beauty." (Globe, 
Pt. I, 2d sess., 35th Cong., p. 717.) 
Senator Mason, of Virginia, used these remarkable words (p. 718, supra): "To 
my conception it is one of the most extravagant engines of mischief under the guise 
of gratuitous donation that I can conceive could originate in the Senate. It is using 
the public lands as a means of controlling the power of the State legislatures. It is 
misusing the property of the country in such mode as to bring the appropriate func- 
tions of a State entirely within the scope of the bill under the discretion of Congress 
by a controlling power, and it is doing it in the worst and most insidious form — by 
bribery, direct bribery of the worst kind; for it is an unconstitutional robbing of the 
treasury for the purpose of bribing States." Senator Mason further argues that 
"direct appropriations were just as legitimate as this use of the public lands." 
Senator Greene, of Missouri (supra, 720), argued also that the donation of lands was 
equivalent to the donation of money. 
Senator Simmons, of Rhode Island, argued strongly for the appropriations in the 
seminary grants, the grants for common schools, and the appropriations to support 
the schools for army and navy officers. 
Senator Clement C. Clay, jr., of Alabama, taunted the Democratic members who 
seemed to favor the bill as forsaking their historic constitutional ground and 
attempted to give the measure a party flavor. He argued against it as extravagance 
in the presence of the country's need, that it was really not desired by the honest tillers 
of the soil, that the measure itself was intended to promote agriculture, and that its 
result would be the education of men for other pursuits in life. He regarded the bill 
as humiliating to the States, and made a strong plea for its defeat on the ground that 
it opened the door and practically left no limit to Federal patronage of private inter- 
ests within the States. 
Notwithstanding this vigorous debate the bill was passed in the Senate, by a vote 
of 25 to 22, on the 7th of February, 1859. On February 26 President Buchanan 
sent his veto to the House of Representatives. The President's objections to this 
bill were, first, the poverty of the country at the time the bill was passed; second, 
he objected to the intermingling of the functions of the General and State govern- 
ments in the matter of education, believing that they should be kept distinct and 
separate; third, he thoroughly believed the bill would work injury to the new States: 
fourth, he doubted whether the bill would contribute to the advancement of agricul- 
