DOCUMENT NUMBER 17

Record Book Board of Supervisors, No. III, March 2, 1866.

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE SENT TO THE BLOOMINGTON AGRICULTURAL CONVENTION BY THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

To the Honorable Board of Supervisors of Champaign County:

By a resolution passed by your Honorable body at its last meeting, Clark R. Griggs, A. H. Bailey and Daniel Gardner were appointed a Committee to attend a Convention to be held at Bloomington on the 14th day of December 1865, for the purpose of discussing the subject of future legislative action appertaining to the location of the Agricultural College. The two last named gentlemen, not being able to attend the Convention, appointed as their substitutes, W. H. Pierce, and J. C. Sheldon.

Your Committee thus organized beg leave to report, that they in accordance with the instructions of the aforesaid resolution attended the Convention. Your Committee will not attempt to give a full detail of the doings of the Convention, supposing that most, if not all of the members of the Board have read them as published in the papers; but will only refer to the proceedings in a general way. We would most especially ask the attention of the Board to the resolutions passed and the Committee who reported them. The resolutions are as follows.

WHEREAS, The true principles of education, like the true principles of civil government, everywhere require the greatest practicable union, co-operation, and concentration in all its higher departments, combined with the utmost practical diffusion in its lower departments; therefore,

RESOLVED, That the State of Illinois should at present attempt to build only one University of the highest order, and that the energies and resources of our people should now be directed to that one end, and the undivided funds of our Congressional grant be appropriated thereto.

RESOLVED, That we approve of the principle of location adopted by a former State Convention, and presented to the State

Legislature at its last session by a committee of State Agricultural Society.

RESOLVED, That we approve of the general principle adopted and approved by all parties at the last session of the Legislature, that, in preparing the charter for the University, all mere details of organization and government should be left to the future necessities of the people and the existing Board of Trust; and that the charter of the University should limit their freedom only on those points indispensable to a fundamental law.

RESOLVED, That a committee be appointed to urge these views upon the next Legislature.

RESOLVED, That we urge upon the people the necessity of keeping the principles embodied in these resolutions before aspirants to office, and that they emphatically reprobate any man as a candidate for the Legislature who is unfavorable to these views.

RESOLVED, That we request the Chicago and Springfield papers, and all other papers in the State, to publish the proceedings of this Convention.

(Signed by each member of the Committee).

From the known views of the Committee who drafted these resolutions, and especially the Chairman, Prof. Turner, you will not be surprised that such views as are embodied in the second and fourth resolutions were presented to the Convention. The whole batch were at first attempted to be forced through the Convention, but by resolutions offered by one of your Committee, they were taken up for consideration seriatem. Your Committee did not see much to condemn in the other resolutions but strenuously opposed, by speeches and their votes, the passage of the second and fourth resolutions, as did a number of others from different portions of the State. Your Committee would here say that only twenty four counties out of the One hundred and two were represented in the Convention, that the whole affair seemed to be gotten up to further the interests of parties who urged and supported at the last session of the Legislature, the Bill known as the State Agricultural Society Bill, which provided to locate the College by a Committee appointed by the Governor, as the

language of a resolution offered by Mr. Galusha, one of the Committee on Resolutions plainly shows, which resolution we herewith submit:

RESOLVED, That the Committee which has presented the report now before this meeting shall constitute the committee contemplated in the resolutions, and that we instruct them to secure the revision of the bill presented to the Legislature of the State at its last session by a committee appointed by the State Agricultural Society, and cause 1,000 copies of the bill to be printed also that they be instructed to secure the appointment of sub-committees in each of the representative and senatorial district in this State, whose duty it shall be to present a copy of said bill to each and every person whose name shall be before the people as a candidate for nomination that they will use all laudable endeavors, if nominated and elected to secure the passage of said bill, and that in case any candidate shall refuse or neglect to give such pledge such sub-committee shall publish the fact of such refusal throughout the district in which such candidate resides through the newspapers published therein.

From the language of this resolution and that of those offered by the Committee on Resolutions, it was plain that the views of Prof. Turner and those acting with him were to be the programme for the action of the next legislature. We strenuously opposed this last resolution, but as it seemed to be a cut and dried affair, it passed. From these resolutions and the action of the Convention, your Honorable Board and the citizens of Eastern Illinois and particularly the citizens of Champaign County can plainly see that if they would forestall and defeat the projects of those who would place the matter of location in the hands of a Committee, the foremost of whom will be Prof. Turner of Jacksonville, they must bestir themselves and act boldly and promptly.

Your Committee beg leave to add a few suggestions to the Board, and through you to the people of the County, suggestions drawn from conversation which we had with gentlemen from different portions of the State, in attendance at the Convention. The efforts made at the last meeting of the Legislature by the people of this county will not be lost. In every part of the State

the "Champaign Elephant" is now known and recognized as a power and one whose claims cannot be set aside by any trifling effort. In all parts of the State, they now know what we have to offer and that it is in the most tangible shape and sooner brought into actual use and occupation than any proposition yet made from any portion of the State. Many who were in attendance have no expectation of the location of the institution in their own locality and readily concede the propriety and justice of locating it in Eastern Illinois and will give their aid to that end. Others who hope to secure the location did not hesitate to say that if they failed that this county would be their next choice. From these facts and numerous others we might name, we cannot but urge the Board and the people of the County to vigilant and determined action. If it need be that money be expended to attain this end, let it be appropriated, not grudgingly and in a stinted manner, but freely and promptly. Nor is this all, every citizen of the County should consider himself a committee of one to urge at home and abroad, this matter. Many other points throughout the State will strongly compete for the location by offers of money, land and buildings, nor will they scruple as to the way in which they may attain this end. Champaign County is rapidly taking a position as one of the foremost agricultural Counties in the State; her soil and geographical position eminently points her out as the proper location of the great Agricultural School, from whose portals shall go forth the sons of toil, learned, elevated and better prepared to subdue and cutivate the broad and fertile prairies of our great State.

And having reported, your committee pray to be discharged.
W. H. PEARCE,

C. R. GRIGGS,

J. C. SHELDON,

Committee.

From the Central Illinois Gazette,

Urbana, Ill., Friday, March 2, 1866.

DOCUMENT NO. 18

Statements by Champaign County committee and reply by McLean County committee, reasons for locating university in Logan County. Printed Circular, Turner manuscripts, Springfield.

THE CHAMPAIGN OFFER

COMPARED WITH BLOOMINGTON, AS SET FORTH IN THE REPORT OF THE JOINT COMMITTEE.

Assessed value of the Bloomington lands, as stated by the committee, $18 per acre; 432 acres, valued by the committee at $15,000, equal in round numbers to $347 per acre.

Assessed value of 160 acres of land at Champaign as stated by the committee, $20 per acre. This a tenth in favor of Champaign equal to $381.70 per acre, making $61,000.

The committee report for Bloomington 100 acres belonging to the State, not taxable, at $20,000 or $200 per acre.

In the report of this committee, 810 acres of the Champaign land are put down as assessed at $15 per acre. One-sixth less, omitting fractions, would make the Champaign land worth $290 per acre, making $234,900. The ten acres which the building stands on is reported by the committee at $2,500-worth, in the estimation of some members of the committee, $500 per acre.

The building is reported at a cost of..

County bonds....

Railroad freight

Fruit and shade trees.

$120,000

100,000

35,000

2,000

Which makes the aggregate bid of Champaign as follows: