Republicans Passed the Land-Grant College ActIt's misleading for either major American political party to imply that events which occurred 150 years ago have any bearing on current politics. Abraham Lincoln's Republican affiliation, or Andrew Jackson's Democratic affiliation, are irrelevant because the two parties have changed so much in the years since. The GOP as we know it today shouldn't be commended for having passed a bill six generations ago.
In 1862, the Republican-controlled 37th Congress passed the Land-Grant College Act. The law, written by Representative Justin Morrill (R-VT), distributed federal land to states to fund the establishment of colleges and universities throughout the country. The dozens of land-grant colleges include the Cornell University, Iowa State University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Arizona, and the University of Illinois, among many others.
Besides, the Morrill Act passed by comfortable margins in both houses, which means that either (a) the act had bipartisan support, or (b) enough Southern states had left the Union that there weren't many Democrats left in Congress. I'm too lazy to do the research, but maybe someone will be able to tell me which of these was the case.
Seeing as the Civil war ran from 1861-1865, I'm going with most of the Southern states were already gone. You're a humanities major, learn your history (and don't give me crap since I was also Econ just like you).
ReplyDeleteI'm not stupid; I know when the Civil War occurred. So obviously the Southern states were gone by 1862. My question was about whether there will still enough Northern Democrats around to put up any opposition to the bill.
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