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Show WHOSE PUBLIC LANDS? 21 tion of a tunnel through Hoosac Mountain for a railroad to connect Boston with Albany; and Zena Scudder asked for 700,000 acres to aid the extension of the Cape Cod Railroad and the establishment of steam communication from the Cape to Nantucket Island. Pennsylvania Congressmen asked for 2,380,611 acres to aid in building the Sunbury & Erie, the Hempfield, the Pennsylvania Central, the Williamsburg & Elmira, the Pittsburgh & Connellsville, the Ohio and Pennsylvania Railroads and the North Branch Canal, and to increase the common school fund and endow a normal school for the gratuitous education of female teachers.47 New York wished a "sufficient donation" of the public lands to secure the construction of a canal around the Falls of Niagara, and actually won the support of Wisconsin for this project.48 Maine sought grants for the Atlantic & St. Lawrence and the European & North American Railroads; Kentucky wanted 900,-000 acres for a railroad to connect Louisville with the Mississippi River and grants to aid four other railroads; and William Churchill wished one million acres to extend the South Carolina and Tennessee Railroad.49 Many other memorials requested grants to the older states for education. Strict constructionists from the South and opponents from the "Cong. Globe, 31st Cong., 1st sess., 1850-51, pp. 22, 131, 337, and 33d Cong., 1st sess., 1854, p. 195. 4SCong. Globe, 33d Cong., 1st sess., pp. 28, 516, 1461. S. Misc. Doc, 35th Cong., 1st sess., 1858, Vol. IV, No. 261 (Serial No. 937); H. Misc. Doc, 35th Cong., 1st sess., 1858, Vol. Ill, No. 131 (Serial No. 963). Later, during the Civil War when there was a strong movement to build a ship canal around the Falls at Niagara but with outright appropriations of money instead of land, petitions and memorials descended upon Congress in support of the move, from Ohio (4), Wisconsin (2), the Chicago Board of Trade, Detroit, The Merchants' Exchange of St. Louis, the Boston Board of Trade and citizens of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Senate Journal, 38th Cong., 1st sess., 1863-64 (Serial No. 1175), p. 1013. i9Cong. Globe, 31st Cong., 1st sess., 1850, pp. 108, 118, 160; 32d Cong., 1st sess., 1852, pp. 258, 673; House Journal, 31st Cong., 2d sess. (Serial No. 594), D. 120. West easily succeeded in referring these numerous memorials to hostile committees. They were never heard of again. The failure of their repeated efforts to secure a share of the public land led the New York Legislature to resolve in 1858 that the New York delegation in Congress be requested "not to vote any further appropriations of the public lands to the new States until some just general provision be made, by which the original States shall receive their equitable proportion of the said lands, or the proceeds thereof."50 With so many demands for land grants by both old and new states, it was natural for John Wilson, Commissioner of the General Land Office-known as an outspoken and at times crusty commentator-to recommend in his annual reports for 1853 and 1854 a land grant for education in the District of Columbia. He envisioned a university where instruction could be obtained in literature, mechanics, agriculture, and civil institutions on a scale comparable with the military and naval academies. The plan is reminiscent of an earlier proposal by Charles Lewis Fleisch-mann for the use of the Smithson fund as an endowment for a national agricultural college. Neither Fleischmann's nor Wilson's plan was seriously considered by others at the time they were offered, but both may have had some part in leading to the adoption of the Morrill Act of 1862. That act, however, did not include any benefits for the District.51 John Wilson made another contribution to the discussion of "whose public lands" during a concerted drive of the old states to 50 £. Misc. Doc, 35th Cong., 1st sess., 1858, Vol. IV, No. 261 (Serial No. 937). 51 "Memorial of Charles Lewis Fleischmann, in relation to the Smithsonian Legacy," H. Doc, 25th Cong., 3d sess., Dec. 14, 1838, Vol. Ill, No. 70 (Serial No. 346), and reprinted in H. Doc, 26th Cong., 1st sess., March 5, 1840, Vol. Ill, No. 128 (Serial No. 365); "Annual Report, Commissioner of the General Land Office, 1853," S. Ex. Doc, 33d Cong., 1st sess., Vol. I, No. 1 (Serial No. 690), pp. 84-85; H. Ex. Doc, 33d Cong., 2d sess., Vol. I, No. 1, Part 1 (Serial No. 777), p. 80. |