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Caption: Book - History of the University (Nevins)
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MORRILL BILL INTRODUCED 25 March 20,1854, Representative Washburne and Senator Shields presented the resolutions of the Legislature "relative to the establishment of Industrial Universities" to both branches of Congress at once. Three weeks later Yates asked Turner to draw up such a bill as he wanted, suggesting at the same time that it would be politic to omit the proposed clause for a connection between the universities and the Smithsonian Institution. This was done, but Yates took no action with the measure; and he was not reelected the following autumn.1 Out of these delays and false starts was finally shaped the Morrill bill, which was introduced December 14, 1857. Buchanan came into office this year, and it was thought that under him there was a better opening, though a prejudice growing out of the too-lavish land grants of the early fifties persisted. In early October Turner wrote to Senator Lyman Trumbull, of Illinois, urging him to take up the measure. The latter agreed that "the idea is a grand one, if it could be carried out and made practical." But he pointed out the prejudice, and stated that it was especially strong with reference to new States, which had obtained so much. He recommended that a member from an old State be induced to present the matter. Soon after, therefore, as Prof.-Turner's daughter states, it was determined to send all the documents and information to Representative Justin S. Morrill, a new member who had already shown himself a warm friend of agriculture, Early in 1856 the League sent one W. F. M. Amy to Washington " t o procure an appropriation of land for universities,** as Amy put it in a letter to Turner; and he succeeded in getting the subject before the Senate Committee on Lands. At the same time the State Board of Education petitioned Congress on the matter. 1
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