Land-grant institutions have traditionally pursued a threefold mission of extending access to higher education, cultivating practical fields like agriculture and engineering, and contributing to economic development. The land-grant concept was established to offer advanced instruction to the working class, to educate farmers and assist with the success and growth of agriculture as well as to educate future engineers to assist industry and encourage economic development through scientific research. Today, that outreach responsibility to benefit the public has increased to several other applications of science and technology, ranging from nutrition to petroleum engineering, as well as online instruction, all while the universities are facing public funding challenges.
Over the years, land-grant status has implied several types of federal support. The first Morrill Act provided grants in the form of federal lands to each state for the establishment of a public institution to fulfill the act’s provisions. At different times money was appropriated through legislation such as the second Morrill Act and the Bankhead-Jones Act, although the funding provisions of these acts are no longer in effect.
A key component of the land-grant system is the agricultural experiment station program created by the Hatch Act of 1887. The Hatch Act authorized direct payment of federal grant funds to each state to establish an agricultural experiment station in connection with the state’s land-grant institution. The amount of this appropriation varies from year to year and is determined through a formula based on the number of small farmers in each state. A major portion of the federal funds must be matched by the state.
To disseminate information gleaned from the experiment stations’ research, the Smith-Lever Act of 1914 created a Cooperative Extension Service associated with each land-grant institution. This act authorized ongoing federal support for extension services, using a formula similar to the Hatch Act’s to determine the amount of the appropriation. This act also requires states to provide matching funds in order to receive the federal monies.
Passage of the First Morrill Act of 1862 reflected a growing demand for agricultural and technical education in the United States. While a number of institutions had begun to expand upon the traditional classical curriculum, higher education was still widely unavailable to many agricultural and industrial workers. The Morrill Act was intended to provide a broad segment of the population with a practical education that had direct relevance to their daily lives.
The Second Morrill Act of 1890 sought to extend access to higher education by providing additional endowments for all land-grants, but prohibiting distribution of money to states that made distinctions of race in admissions. However, states that provided a separate land-grant institution for blacks were eligible to receive the funds. The institutions that, as a result of this act, were founded or designated the land-grant for blacks in each of the then-segregated Southern states came to be known as “the 1890 land-grants.” The Native American tribal colleges are sometimes called the “1994 land-grants,” in reference to the year they were granted land-grant status.
There is one land-grant institution in every state and territory of the United States, as well as the District of Columbia. Certain southern states have more than one land-grant institution as a result of the second Morrill Act, and some western and plains states have several, including 1994 land-grant tribal colleges.
Justin Smith Morrill, a U.S. Representative and later a U.S. Senator from Vermont, sponsored the land-grant legislation that bears his name and is generally credited as having secured its passage. Prior to Morrill’s support for land-grant legislation, Jonathan Baldwin Turner, a Yale-educated farmer, newspaper editor, and college professor, made education for the working class his cause in the mid-19th century. His “Plan for a State University for the Industrial Classes” advanced ideas that are now fundamental to the land-grant system, such as experimental research in agriculture.
Morrill first introduced a land-grant bill in Congress in 1857, which after much struggle was passed in 1859 only to be vetoed by President James Buchanan. In 1861, Morrill introduced another land-grant bill that increased to 30,000 acres the grant for each senator and representative and added a requirement that recipient institutions teach military tactics. The newly felt need for trained military officers to fight in the Civil War, along with the absence of Southern legislators who had opposed the earlier bill, helped the Morrill Act through Congress in just six months. President Abraham Lincoln signed it into law on July 2, 1862.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) plays a large role in the administration of federal land-grant funds and the coordination of agricultural land-grant activities at the national level. The USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), for example, administers both Hatch Act and Morrill-Nelson funds. A portion of the Hatch Act funding supports regional research, enabling scientists to collaborate and coordinate activities and thus avoid duplication of research efforts. The Extension Service of the USDA administers Smith-Lever funding, cooperating with state governments (which also provide funding for extension programs) to set priorities and facilitate the sharing of information within the entire Cooperative Extension System.
Because the 1890 land-grants do not receive Hatch Act or Smith-Lever funds, special programs have been created to help finance agricultural research and extension at these institutions. The Evans-Allen program supports agricultural research with funds equal to at least 15 percent of Hatch Act appropriations. Another program funds extension activities at the 1890 land-grants with an emphasis on reaching socially and economically disadvantaged people.
Today, America’s land-grant universities continue to fulfill their democratic mandate for openness, accessibility, and service to people, and many of these institutions have joined the ranks of the nation’s most distinguished public research universities. Through the land-grant university heritage, millions of students are able to study every academic discipline and explore fields of inquiry far beyond the scope envisioned in the original land-grant mission.