The first representative law-making power in the Northwest Territory promptly turned its attention toward carrying out the declaration of the ordinance of 1787 in regard to encouraging "good government and the happiness of mankind" by the promotion of education. The Ohio University at Athens was founded by the Territorial legislature January 9, 1802. This was nearly a year before Ohio's admission as a State. The Indiana Territory, organized as we have said in the year 1800, comprised all of the Northwest Territory except the more thickly settled and lately separated Territory of Ohio. The same liberal policy toward education was early instituted in the Territory of Indiana, in harmony with the purpose of the early ordinance. The first general assembly of the Territory "begun and held at the Borough of Vincennes" passed "an act to incorporate an university in the Indiana Territory," which act was approved by Governor William Henry Harrison, November 29, 1806. The words preceding the "Be it enacted" are as follows:

"Whereas the independence, happiness, and energy of every republic depends (under the influence of the destinies of Heaven) upon the wisdom, virtue, talents, and energy of its citizens and rulers;

"And whereas science, literature, and the liberal arts contribute in an eminent degree to improve those qualities and requirements;

"And. whereas learning hath ever been found the ablest advocate of genuine liberty, the best supporter of rational religion, and the scurce of the only solid and imperishable glory which nations can acquire;

"And forasmuch as literature and philosophy furnish the most useful and pleasing occupations, improving and varying the enjoyments of prosperity, affording relief under the pressure of misfortune, and hope and consolation in the hours of death;

"And considering that in a commonwealth where the humblest citizen may be elected to the highest public offices, and where the Heavenborn prerogative of the right to elect and to reject is retained and secured to the citizens, the knowledge which is requisite for a magistrate and elector should be widely diffused;"

It was then enacted by the legislative council and house of representatives that an university be, and is hereby, instituted and incorporated within this Territory, "to be called and known by the name or style of the Vincennes University." The following persons designated by the ordinance composed the first board of trustees: William Henry Harrison, John Gibson, Thomas T. Davis, Henry Vanderburgh, Waller Taylor, Benjamin Parke, Peter Jones, James Johnson, John Baddollet, John Rice Jones, George Wallace, William Bullitt, Elias McNamee, Henry Hurst, Gen. W. Johnston, Francis Vigo, Jacob Kuykendoll, Samuel McKee, Nathaniel Ewing, George Leach, Luke Decker, Samuel Gwathmey, and John Johnson. Governor Harrison was elected president of the board. This body was empowered to make by-laws, ordinances, and regulations

Laws N. W. Territory, 1802, p. 161.

for its own government not inconsistent with the charter or laws of the Territory or of the United States. The trustees were to establish "as speedily as may be, an university within the borough of Vincennes, and to appoint to preside over and govern it, a president and not exceeding four professors for the instruction of youth in Latin, Greek, French, and English languages, mathematics, natural philosophy, logic, rhetoric, and the law of nature and of nations." The faculty was empowered to grant, with the consent of the trustees, degrees in the liberal arts to such students as were considered proficient in learning. It was also enacted that "no particular tenets of religion shall be taught in said university," but it was provided that whenever it was deemed necessary for the "good of the university and for the progress of education, departments of theology, law, and physic might be established, and whenever the funds of the university permitted, all students were to be educated gratis in all or any of the branches they might require." I Two other sections deserve to be quoted entire:

"And whereas the establishment of an institution of this kind in the neighborhood of the aborigines of the country may tend to the gradual civilization of the rising generation, and if properly conducted be of essential service to themselves, and contribute greatly to the cause of humanity and brotherly love, which all men ought to bear to each other, of whatever color, and tend also to preserve that friendship and harmony which ought to exist between the Government and the Indians: Be it therefore enacted, and it is hereby enjoined on the said trustees to use their utmost endeavors to induce the said aborigines to send their children to the university for education, who, when sent, shall be maintained, clothed, and educated at the expense of said institution."1 "Be it enacted, That the said trustees, as soon as in their opinion the funds of the said institution will admit, are hereby required to estab lish an institution for the education of females, and to make such by. laws and ordinances for said institution and the government thereof as as they may think proper."

But the young Indians, it seems, had a greater relish for following Tecumseh on the war path than for the civilization of books. Only one Indian was ever allured within the walls of the institution. The young warriors, as was remarked at the time, "showed a far greater natural predisposition for disfurnishing the outside of other people's heads than for furnishing the insides of their own."

After this indication of their philanthropic interest and Christian sympathy with their aboriginal neighbors, we find in this educational law of the Territorial legislators the further enactment, which we must transcribe in full:

"That for the support of the aforesaid institution and for the purpose of procuring a library and the necessary philosophical and experimental apparatus, agreeably to the eighth section of this law, there shall be raised a sum not exceeding $20,000 by a lottery, to be carried

Indiana Territorial Laws.

into operation as speedily as may be after the passage of this act, and that the trustees of the said university shall appoint five discreet persons, either of their body or other persons, to be managers of the said lottery, each of whom shall give security, to be approved of by said trustees, in such sum as they shall direct, conditioned for the faithful discharge of the duty required of said managers; and the said managers shall have power to adopt such schemes as they may deem proper to sell the said tickets ['tickets' had not been said'] and to superintend the drawing of the same and the payment of the prizes; and that as often as the said managers shall receive $1,000 they shall deposit the same in the hands of the treasurer of the said board of trustees, and the said managers and trustees shall render an account of their proceedings therein at the next session of the legislature after the drawing of said lottery." This clause legalizing a public lottery in the name of higher education was the last of peculiar interest in this long law, except that the professors during their professorship" and the "students while at college" were to be exempt from militia duty.

We do not find that much interest was subsequently taken in the successful operation of the lottery. Public sentiment in the State, no doubt, soon condemned such a financial policy, and it soon ceased to operate. It was revived and used as a means of income to the Vincennes University at times in later years, but never without protest, and the institution of the lottery has long since been finally abolished. This practice, formerly existent in many American States, has permanently disappeared from every State of the Union save one.

Any one who is attracted to questions of casuistry will find in this early legislation some interesting reflections. Perhaps these pioneers thought the end justified the means; or it might have been they thought that, as corporations have no souls, so nobody was answerable to any power, temporal or eternal, for the moral conduct of the State. There is evidence that they held the belief, in harmony with a doctrine often seen in practice in later days, that the State might do what, by the law of right and the public welfare, the individual should be prevented from doing. For we find in the Territorial laws an enactment, approved September 17, 1807, to the effect that

"No person, in order to raise money or other property for himself or another, shall publicly or privately put up a lottery of blanks and prizes, to be drawn or adventured for, or any prize or anything to be raffled or played for; whoever shall offend herein shall forfeit, to the use of the Territory, the whole sum of money or property proposed to be raised or gained."

It may be that the Territory intended by this means to guard the moral welfare of the people; or it is barely possible that it rather proposed to allow no infringement upon its peculiar monopoly. At least the legislature proposed to see to it that if the lottery device existed at all, the profits should accrue to the public, in the interests of education.

Thus, Vincennes University was the first institution for higher learning established by and under the act of the Territorial public; and it was the first such institution of learning within the limits of Indiana. To it was given the seminary township reserved by the act of Congress in 1804, and power was granted to sell 4,000 acres and to receive bequests, and to hold not exceeding 100,000 acres of land. In the wil derness, among hardy pioneers, before the State took its place in the Union, and years before any system of common schools for its people had birth, the representatives of the people made provision for the higher education.

The Territorial University at Vincennes was not fully open for instruction till 1810. Rev. Samuel Scott was its first president. Mr. Scott preached the first Protestant sermon in Indiana, and founded the first Protestant church in the State, the "Indiana Church” (Presbyterian) as it was called. He opened a private school in Vincennes in 1808, and this school became the nucleus of the university. To secure sufficient income for the institution it was allowed that elementary branches be taught in connection with it. The school at Vincennes was in continuous existence, in some capacity, until it was converted into the "Knox County Seminary" in 1825, an act which was afterwards declared to be illegal. But during these years, from 1810 to 1825, while it was nominally a public institution, it received no support from State taxation; its trustees had allowed their organization to lapse, and the State entirely withdrew care and attention from its affairs. In 1822 an act was passed by the general assembly for the practical confiscation of its lands for the support of the new "State seminary "at Bloomington, and in 1824 the State formally declared the Vincennes institution extinct. This act of 1822 recited the fact that the trustees of Vincennes University "had sold portions of such lands, and had negligently permitted the corporation to die without having executed deeds to purchasers, and the act provided for the sale of the Seminary township in Gibson County, and for the use of the money as a "productive fund for the benefit of the State seminary," previously established at Bloomington. Subsequent acts, in 1825 and 1827, were passed providing for the sale of the seminary townships in Gibson and Monroe Counties, on the assumption that the lands granted to Vincennes University, in 1806, were still the property of the State. Out of these acts, under which 17,000 acres of the Gibson County lands were sold and the proceeds returned to the State treasury for the benefit of the seminary and college funds, came the subsequent litigation between the trustees of Vincennes University and the State of Indiana. This litigation it will be proper to describe briefly in this connection.

The withdrawal of State care and attention from this early school is not fully explained. The removal of the capital of the Territory, and consequently of public influence, from Vincennes to Corydon, in 1813; the carelessness and the suspension of organization in its own board of 12524-No. 10-3

trustees and the indifference of its friends; the rise of similar "academies" and "seminaries" in other portions of the State; the desire to have the State's "seminary" near the centre of population, which was then moving rapidly toward the north, and, perhaps, political influenceall these worked adversely to the continuance of the school at Vincennes as a State institution. But after the school had continued for some years as the Knox County Seminary, the old corporation was resuscitated by an act of the legislature in 1838, making provision for supplying vacancies in the board of trustees. A clause, however, was inserted in this act intended to prevent the renewal of any claim to the seminary township taken from it in 1822. But in 1845 the trustees of Vincennes University, thus revived, laid claim to the Gibson County lands, and to the proceeds of previous sales made by the State, which had been transferred to the Indiana University, formerly the State seminary, and suit was brought to test the question of title. On January 17, 1846, in order to make legal a suit against a State, and to relieve the occupants of the lands of responsibility and litigation, an act was passed by the State legislature authorizing "the trustees of Vincennes University to bring suit against the State of Indiana, and for other purposes." This suit, in the Marion County circuit court, resulted in a decree in favor of the trustees in the amount of $30,099.66 as the proceeds of previous sales. On an appeal to the supreme court of the State, this decision was reversed, the court holding that the act of the Territorial legislature of 1806 granting the lands to the Vincennes University was nugatory, because no such power was vested in it by act of Congress, and that they were not, at the time of this sale and disposal, in existence as a corporation, having allowed their corporation to lapse. In this suit Mr. Samuel Judah appeared far the trustees and Mr. O. H. Smith and Mr. Geo. G. Dunn for the State.

The trustees of the Vincennes University were not satisfied with this decision, and they sued out a writ of error from the Supreme Court of the United States, which, at the December term, 1852, reversed the decision of the supreme court of the State, holding that when the Territorial legislature of 1806 incorporated a "board of trustees of the Vincennes University," the grant of a township in the Vincennes district by the Congress of 1804, and which was located by the Secretary of the Treasury in 1806, attached to this board, although for the two preceding years there had been no grantee in existence; and holding further that, if the board of trustees, by a failure to elect when vacancies occurred, or through any other means, became reduced to a less number than was authorized to act by the charter, the corporation was not thereby dissolved, but its franchises were suspended until restored by legislative action. By this decision the State recovered to the Vincennes University the sum of $66,585, one-fourth of which was retained as attorney's fees. It will be interesting to note on this topic that the trustees subsequently brought suit against Mr. Judah to compel him to