Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1915-11-05
Iege. President Thomas's paper was as

to its genius, must be a public institution
of the commonwealth which has given
it the right to live. When John Har-
ward, Governor Winthrop, and the Puri-
tans of Massachusetts Bay established
Harvard College they had no other
thought than that they were founding
an institution for public service in the
colony. Their purpose was to provide
the Instrument for a necessary part of
public education. They essayed respon-
sibility for a well defined stratum in the
educational" endeavor of the common
wealth. 1t was far from their thought
to conduct a private experiment in
accordance with the views and desires
of a certain section of their people.
They were not engaged in promoting
the luxury of a certain type of educa-
ton which certain of them had enjoyed
in the old world and which they felt
would be an ornament to a chosen few
in their new;commonwealth. They had
rather in mind a definite public need of
Importance to every member of the
colony.
That their immediate purpose would
now be considered narrow and restrict
ed, ever s~ectarian, does not refute the
public quality of their ambition, They
were minded to train up a supply Of edu-
Gated ministers when their present pas
tors should lie in the dust. In their situa-
ton this was a public purpose, and the
response of their institution to other
needs when they arose, such as law and
medicine, establishes the sincerity and
breadth of their patriotic purpose.
The first bylaws of Harvard College
prescribed that no meeting of the cor
poration could transact business unless
the Governor, the Lieutenant Gov
ernor, or the Treasurer of the Province
were present. Down to 1850 the in
stitution was administered by votes of
the Legislature itself, even in such mat
tiers as the appointment of instructors
and the fixing of salaries. AS Senator
Hoar once said, 1.-The college was not
so much the child of the commonwealth
as part of the commonwealth itself"
1t was with no thought of departure
from its public position as an integral
part of the educational work of the
province that the powers of government
of the institution were transferred to a
Board of President and Fellows. The
college was still a part of the colony
itself and it's governing officers were
held to be as truly public officers as any
officials of the State. One hundred and
fifty years after its founding the lega'
basis of Harvard College was in a sec.
ton of the constitution of the Common
wealth of Massachusetts, entitled "The
University" which is the legal basis OF
the institution to this day.
The clergymen who laid their book:
on the table at Saybrook for the foun.
dation of a college in the New Haver
colony were no less animated by an am.
bition to serve the general good. If
mistake not, the same broad patriotic
purpose has obtained in the building
and maintenance of every institution o.
higher learning in New England, ever
down to those of recent origin, anC
whatever the particular legal form OF
ever the sympathetic or formal relation
to any religious body, the noble fellow
ship of New England colleges, in purpose
and spirit, is a part of the common life
not one whit less devoted to the inter
ests of the commonwealth than institu
tons indebted to the State through pub
lie acts for all their property and directly
responsible to the State in their meth.
DDS of government.
Cooperation of public and private
philanthropy in the support of higher
education is the historic New England
method. The New England First Fruit.
after speaking of John Harvard's be
quest of one-half of his estate anC
another gift of three hundred pounds
says-"and the publique hand of thu
State added the rest" There is no neet
of recital to this company of the multi
piled instances of State appropriation
to established New England colleges
There is not one of the six Yankee com
monwealths which has not at some tim,
contributed, or is not now contributing
to the support of institutions which la,
no claim to being State universitiei
in the legal or technical sense. Elk
cept in Maine and Connecticut tina
is to this day the prevailing method, a
it is the recognized practice in Grea
Britain, which appropriates annual,
over $40, 900, 900 to endowed schools
governed by schemes" including thu
great municipal universities such al
Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester ant
the like.