"Whereas the Congress not only made a liberal grant of land in the year eighteen hundred and sixty-two for this purpose, but has also followed up this policy once begun by still more liberal appropriations for the support of higher education in agriculture and the mechanic arts, resulting in the great chain of colleges for agriculture and the mechanic arts to be found in every State and Territory in the Union; and "Whereas the time has now come for the adoption of a similar policy in the field of elementary and secondary education: Therefore be it

"Resolved by the House of Representatives of the State of Illinois, the Senate concurring herein, That the Congress of the United States be respectfully petitioned to appropriate annually to each State and Territory in the Union a sum equal to one dollar per head of the population of said State or Territory as ascertained by the last census, for the purpose of establishing, maintaining, and extending in the elementary and secondary schools of said States and Territories, while not excluding other elementary and secondary subjects, such practical, industrial, and vocational training including agriculture, the mechanic arts, domestic science, manual training, commercial subjects, and such instruction in other similar subjects of practical nature as the interests of the community may seem to demand; and

"Resolved further, That our Senators in Congress be instructed and our Representatives be requested to use their best exertions to produce the passage of a law of Congress donating said sum to each State and Territory in the Union for said purpose; and

"Resolved further, That the governor of this State is hereby requested to forward a copy of the foregoing resolutions to our Senators and Representatives in Congress and to the executives and legislatures of each of the other States and Territories, inviting them to cooperate with us in this meritorious enterprise."

I wish to emphasize again very strongly that national aid to education, whether lower or higher, does not necessarily mean excessive Federal centralization and control. The extent to which the Federal Government shall have control of the funds which it devotes to education is a matter of expediency to be settled from time to time and from generation to generation as national and local needs and possibilities may dictate.

I should like to call attention to one other fact, and that is that the Federal Government, when it wished to develop by the expenditures of a comparatively small sum of money a system of educational institutions which should have a profound effect upon the development of elementary and secondary education, it chose to establish colleges, not high schools; colleges, not grade schools; colleges, not kindergartens. In other words, it recognized that in the develop ment of an educational system in a country, progress goes often from the socalled higher to the lower. You can not develop a good high-school system unless you have a good college system which can supply the necessary teachers, the necessary guidance, the necessary stimulation, the necessary leadership. You can not have good grade schools unless you have good high schools which furnish, taken as a whole, the training of the teachers employed in these elementary schools. The converse is of course equally true, that you can not develop your college beyond a certain low level of efficiency unless the high school can be brought up to a high level. Nor can you raise the level of your high school to what it ought to be unless the grade work is done properly.

I desire again to call attention to the importance to educational advance of securing a national formulation, a national organization of the educational idea and educational ideal.

There is a subtle moral and psychological reaction upon the people as a whole arising from the formulation and incorporation of a national ideal in a practical national policy which spells progress and success for movements which are able to find such national expression.

When, as suggested above, education is as regularly the subject of national debate and national conflict as the tariff, banking, and currency, internal improvements, we shall take another long step forward in our educational development.

What I have thus far said applies to all grades of education alike, and it is upon this foundation that in my advocacy of a national university I take my stand. If the views thus far advanced command your assent, I believe I shall have your consent to the further proposition I advance, namely, that one of the' essential elements of our American system of education is the kind of a university which the Federal Government can build and which shall stand, so to speak, at the apex of our educational pyramid, or if you choose to reverse the

simile, it is all one to me-which shall be the foundation stone upon which the pyramid of national education shall be erected; for all history shows that from the universities, from the highest schools have gone forth steadily these influences which have molded and shaped and fashioned the popular education in all times and in all countries.

I mean by a national university an institution sufficiently like the ordinary institutions with which you are all acquainted to be thoroughly familiar to you; an institution where the head need not confine himself to securing funds nor investing same, but seek investigators, and by your aid find students, etc.; a teaching and training as well as an investigating institution, manned with the best men in all departments in which the human intellect has exercised itself, drawn from the entire world, equipped with all that money can provide, for the purpose of stimulating and increasing our interest in the world of the spirit and the world of sense about us.

Now, one of the fundamental purposes of a university system is to beget, diffuse, and establish, in the mind-nay, I will say also in the heart of the people the scientific spirit and the scientific method. If this can be accomplished, the face of the world will be changed. Now, this can be done in certain respects more easily and more thoroughly and more rapidly by means of a system of State and National universities than by any other means.

In what I am about to say I am not animated by any spirit of opposition to the historic private institutions of this country. He would be an ungrateful American indeed who would cast any slur upon Harvard and Yale and Princeton, and the scores of more recently founded private universities, like Hopkins, Chicago, and Leland Stanford, and Northwestern, which are such an honor to our country and our civilization. I should certainly consider myself an ingrate if I should say anything derogatory of Harvard, or Pennsylvania, or Chicago, or Northwestern, where as a student or professor or president I had an opportunity to prepare myself for public service, and to have some smail part in the glorious work of these institutions. All honor to them, and increasing power and glory and prosperity. But, friends, however great they may become-and may their shadow never grow less-they can never accomplish the purposes we have here in mind, namely, to incorporate in a visible form the national ideal of university education.

I have long been a warm admirer of President Eliot, in many respects the greatest figure in American education. He was kind to me personally when I was a freshman at Harvard. He was for more than a generation my guide, philosopher, and friend in the field of university education and administration. I think it is not too much to say that he revolutionized American higher education and revolutionized it to its great betterment.

But I know no more striking illustration of the fundamental weakness that doth beset us all than President Eliot's notion that he could make of Harvard a national university in the sense that we have been using the term here; that he could make a private institution, dependent for its resources upon the liberality and self-sacrifice of generous alumni, even though they should be still more liberal and more self-sacrificing, or upon the whims of rich men, even though they should be multiplied in number, situated upon the edge of the country, even in such a glorious city as Boston-that he could make an institution so located, and so fathered and mothered to be that embodiment of our national ideal of science and education and art which we are looking for. Other men have or have had the same notion for their institutions. Idle and vain hope. Neither Harvard nor Yale nor Columbia nor Princeton, nor all of them taken together, great as is their function, great as is their service, can hope to do this particular service for this country. Nor Mr. Rockefeller nor Mr. Carnegie nor both of them together, though multiplied by five and animated as now by patriotic unselfishness and far-sighted motives, can do this thing for the Nation, which after all only the Nation can do for itself. The State universities of Michigan and Wisconsin and Minnesota and Illinois and the 40 others no one of them alone nor all of them together, great as they may become-and we are all headed for great things-can hope to fill this place, incorporating in themselves in such a way as to satisfy the national longing, that deep felt, that unexpressed ideal of university education.

The reason is simple. No partial expression will satisfy this longing for wholeness. When that which is perfect shall have come, that which is imperfect will unite with it and help constitute its perfection-private and State institution, with the national university, making one complete system--or it will dry up and disappear. When that which is complete shall have appeared, that which is incomplete must become a part of it or be sloughed off or cast

into the scrap heap. No national university can exist except as the creation and organ of the national will, to be shaped and directed by it. Supported and sustained by this common will it will be the expression of you and me and all of us, we a part of it and it of us.

Such an institution would not injure but benefit every private and every State university. By its superior support, by its superior prestige, by its greater wealth, it would strike the popular imagination of this country in such a way as to give to the university idea itself an enormous impetus, the reflex effect of which would show itself in the increasing prosperity and development of every private and State institution.

The foundation of Leland Stanford did not injure the University of California, but helped it immensely. The foundation of the University of Chicago did not injure Illinois or Northwestern or Michigan or Wisconsin, but by the bold and striking way in which it raised high aloft the standard of science, and the magnificient way in which it followed this standard, it gave an impetus to the university idea which made the work of every one of these institutions more adequate and more easy.

The same thing would be true in a larger degree of a national university, organized along proper lines, put under proper influence.

Such a national university as I have suggested, located at the site of the Federal Government, supported by appropriations from the Federal Treasury, controlled and regulated by Federal law, would easily become, as it ought, the crowning institution of our university system, private and State alike; (1) it could supplement the shortcomings of our other institutions as well as emphasize their excellences; (2) it could undertake many enterprises of national scope which no single institution, public or private, can afford to undertake; (3) it could offer to our best qualified young men and young women opportunities which only a nation like ours can afford to offer.

Such an institution located in the National Capital would exercise a vigorous and salutary influence on the course of Federal legislation itself. Its pointed spires and gilded domes would of themselves be powerful though mute monitors, calling attention to the claims of science to be the guide of legislations.

Such an institution located in the center of political power of the greatest Nation on earth would attract in large numbers the bright and promising youth of other countries, who as students here would imbibe those fundamental American ideas which we fondly believe are destined to work out the salvation of the world when they shall have done their perfect work, while these youth would gain added respect for our society and our ideals, which, carried back home and incorporated in their own policies, would contribute powerfully to that mutual understanding which is the surest basis for international peace. Such an institution located in Washington could utilize for purposes of instruction and investigation the wonderful resources heaped up by the Government of the United States in its scientific departments. The National Library, the museums, and collections of all sorts lie largely fallow at present, waiting for the people of the United States to make their utilization possible in the various schools and colleges of a national university. Such an institution located at such a strategic point will wield a subtle ever-deepening and widening influence over the whole American people in the direction of increasing their interest and belief in science as an important element in private and national life. It will be their university, and they will come to take an increasing pride in and appreciation for the work it is doing, and thus will by this reflex effect be trained to gradually entertain an ever-deeper respect for the standards and ideals of higher education itself.

Friends, such an institution is coming, as surely and irresistibly as the tides of ocean. Will you help it or will you oppose it, or worse than either, will you do nothing?

This National Educational Association could secure the establishment of this institution in a short time if it would only go after it in earnest. Ignorance and apathy and prejudice have thus far been most potent in preventing the realization of this dream of Washington.

Private institutions, religious and secular, have opposed thus far successfully the movement. Private individuals, men of wealth, men of no wealth, men of ideas, men of no ideas have set themselves against this project. It is up to you and the like of you to help bring this about in our day and generation. This great power can be set to work in the interests of science and art and education, supplementing, reinforcing our defective and weak system of education. Every day its coming is delayed represents so much pure loss to the

causes in which you are interested, to the welfare of this Nation, and to civilization in general by all that it might contribute if it were now at work.

This institution, this national university, would be one of the most important elements in making this Nation of ours in reality what it is in our dreams and hopes and fond anticipations, the leader of the world in art, in science and education, and in civilization.

STATEMENT EXPLAINING THE BILL.

If you will allow me, I would like to read to you a statement of the bill which will explain its main scope:

This bill provides that there shall be established in the District of Columbia an institution of higher learning to be known as the National University of the United States.

Its purpose is to promote the advance of science, pure and applied, and of the liberal and fine arts by original investigation and research, and such other means as may appear suitable to the purpose in view.

Furthermore, to train men and women for posts of responsibility in the public and private service of State and Nation; also to cooperate with the scientific departments of the Federal Government and with the various colleges and universities, public and private, throughout the country. This last purpose is one of the most important. I will append a fuller statement later of this feature.

It is to be a graduate institution. Students will not be admitted until they have secured the degree of bachelor of arts or science at some reputable college in this or other countries or for a full equivalent training.

The ultimate authority in the government of the institution is vested in a board of trustees appointed by the President of the United States; but this board must consult and consider the counsel and advice of a national advisory council consisting of one representative from each State in the Union, this representative to be the president of the State university in those States in which there is a State university, and in those States where no such institution exists, a person to be appointed by the governor of the State.

So that the board of trustees is a group of 13 people, 12 in addition to the Commissioner of Education. These are to be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate for a term of 12 years, so arranged that after the first term there will be one going out each year. Then, there is to be in addition to this board an advisory council, made up of one person from each State, to secure the interest of and privilege to each State in the university. This council is to be composed of the president of the State university in each State where there is a State university, and where there is not any such the governor of the State is to appoint the member for the State.

This form of organization secures two great advantages. In the first place, it secures the efficiency, economy, promptness, and vigor of administration characteristic of a small board vested with full authority to act.

That board is composed of 13 members. It is made an uneven number in order to avoid the frequency of ties.

The advisory council may at any time, however, exert a suspensive veto in such a way that the board must reconsider any action vetoed by the council, but may reaffirm its action by a two-thirds vote in spite of the advice of the council.

The administrative features of the university are to be under a board of control. But, suppose the board of trustees should do something that this advisory council, made up of one man from each State, does not agree to. Now, that action can not go into effect until after six months, when this advisory council, made up of one man from each State, shall act. If the advisory council does not ratify what the board of trustees has done, then the board of trustees can override the advisory council by a two-thirds vote, and if they do not get a two-thirds vote the action of the board is annulled.

In this way the board of trustees secures the advice of a national representative body, reflecting the sentiments and opinions of each State of the Union.

The institution is authorized to accept gifts and donations of money or property from any private citizen or public body, provided these gifts be given with no conditions attached for the general purposes of the university. If any money is offered with condititons it can only be accepted with the consent of the Congress of the United States.

I do not think any money should be accepted with any strings to it, but Congress could do it if it wanted to do it.

Mr. PLATT. You mean that you would not have funds created for library purposes or anything like that?

Mr. FESS. No; I mean you can not accept any funds from men who give conditionally, like the gifts of Carnegie or Rockefeller with certain conditions which they reserve.

Mr. PLATT. Then you would not consider such a thing as this: That this money should be used for the purpose of books, considering that as a condition?

Mr. FESS. Oh, no.

The act carries with it an appropriation of $500,000 for the fiscal year 1914, and provides that the board of trustees shall proceed to organize under this act and carry out the intent and purpose of the same, as soon as the members shall have been appointed by the President.

I do not think that we ought to take the position that the Senate originally took, when the matter was so favorably considered therethat there would be no outlay at all. If the Government undertakes this work the Government ought, I think, to proceed on the basis that it can be made a success, and I do not believe in the idea of saying that there is to be no money involved. This is the richest Government in the world, and if a national university is worth anything the Government can certainly afford to make sufficient appropriation to organize it and get it started.

The scope of the work of the university will not interfere with any other institution of higher learning, as it can not duplicate such work. It is not to be an additional university similar to those already established. Such an institution is both unnecessary and undesirable. As Harvard is above Antioch because of its wider scope and greater equipment, so the national university must be above Harvard. As the college feeds the university in America, so the college and university must feed the national university. The latter can not interfere with the former, but must largely depend upon them.

For the same reason the national university can not interfere with either local or denominational institutions, but will be a substantial advantage to them. The national university is to be the climax of American educational structure, beginning with the kindergarten and ending in this consummation. It is the virtual assembling of the countries' richest material found in this greatest center of scientific activity of the world, by opening it to the research graduates under the direction of the finest group of experts in the world.

The CHAIRMAN. Do I understand that this university will be established for the purpose of even higher education than that which is already given by the different universities in the different States?

Mr. FESS. Yes, sir. The idea, Mr. Chairman, is that when we find anywhere in the United States an unusually brilliant person who has great promise and yet no place in America for him to go to continue his original research, which fact compels him either to go to Europe-Berlin or Paris-or else cease his investigations, we should be able to provide that place here. It seems to me that the Government would be justified in opening up the way, even by a sys