The Northwest Ordinance: Essays on its Formulation, Provisions, and Legacy

The Development of Public Universities in the Old Northwest

V The Development of Public Universities in the Old Northwest JURGEN HERBST Professor of Educational Policy Studies and History, University of Wisconsin, Madison Tradition and Revolution lliE NORlliWEST ORDINANCE OF JULY 13,1787, and the Morrill Act oOuly 2, 1862, rank as the two most important documents in the history of the national government's influence over American higher educa, tion. That influence has been both traditional and revolutionary. It has been traditional in linking the nineteenth century experience of the American people to their European and colonial past. It has been revolu, tionary through curricular innovations and experiments that opened the doors of the country's universities to working men and women who never before had dreamed of enjoying the benefits of higher education. When in the Northwest Ordinance the members of the Congress of the Confederation wrote that "religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good gov, ernment and the happiness ofmankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged," they expressed their concern that government assume a 97 98 NORTHWEST ORDINANCE measure of responsibility for the support of higher edu~ cation. 1 In doing so they followed long standing tradi~ tion. Throughout the colonial period crown, royal governors, and provincial legislatures acted upon the Reformation legacy that secular government and estab~ lished church were jointly responsible for the establish~ ment, protection, and survival-though not neces~ sarily for the full financial support-of the colleges in their realm. Such responsibility had been first assumed in 1636 by the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony with its pledge of£400 for what was to become Harvard College. It was asserted again just before and during the Revolution when in 1775 the New Hampshire Assembly gave Dartmouth College a grant of £560, and when in 1775 and 1776 the Continental Congress added $500 each year and $925 in 1778 in recognition of the col~ lege's·role in helping defend and pacify the frontier. New Hampshire's largesse did not cease after the war either. In 1784 and 1787 the state authorized lotteries, in 1790 it appropriated funds, and in 1791 it granted land to the college. Even Vermont joined in, and in 1785 gave Dartmouth a grant of23,000 acres. The members of the Confederation Congress followed well~worn footpaths. 2 The authors of the Northwest Ordinance were as concerned with their responsibility for the future as they were mindful of the actions of colonial governments in the past. By 1787 it was already becoming obvious that attitudes towards higher education were changing. Americans had caught "college enthusiasm," as Ezra Stiles had reported from Newport, Rhode Island, in 1770, where he had learned of plans for new college foundations in New Hampshire, Georgia, South Caro~ lina, and Rhode Island.3 Within the following seven~ teen years two colleges had been chartered in Maryland, two in Virginia, one in what was to become Kentucky, two in Pennsylvania, one in Georgia, and three in South Carolina. Of these eleven foundations only one, the University of Georgia, could be considered a state JURGEN HERBST 99 institution. All the rest owed their existence to denomi~ national, local, or joint state~denominational initia~ tives.4 Colleges, it appeared, were being founded with the interest of particular groups in mind. Was there a need to ensure that the people of the new states as a whole would be well served by higher education? The members of the Congress of the Confederation had other reasons to be concerned. The enthusiasm for college founding by denominational and civic groups reflected a growing dissatisfaction with the aristocratic temper of the colonial colleges. Americans felt alien~ ated from colleges in which a privileged few were groomed for influential positions in government, church, and society. They disliked the classical curriculum with its emphasis on Latin, a subject that they felt did not help them in their daily task and concerns. Thus in many states they came to favor common and preparatory schools over the colleges. As John Whitehead has pointed out, it was only in South Carolina and Virginia, states which did not actively support their common schools, that appropriations for the universities contin~ ued. 5 Happy to throw off the burden of the colonial past, ordinary Americans opted for local educational institutions that responded to their desire for practical, down~to~earth education. They were quite willing for the colleges to fend for...