your ballots. The polls will remain open until half-past eight, only a few moments longer. READER. I am requested by the Chair to announce that the hour for the closing of the polls has now arrived, half after eight, but that five minutes grace further will be given for the deposit of any belated ballots. In five minutes the polls will be closed, and the Tellers will leave with the box. READER. (8.35.) I am instructed by the Chair to state that it rests with the house to decide if the polls shall be closed. As there are many who have not yet voted, the Chair would like to know if it is the wish of the house to close the polls now. Mrs. GREEN. I think in mercy to the Tellers it should be done. A MEMBER. I move, out of consideration to the Tellers, the polls be closed now. Seconded. Mrs. AVERY. Please do not consider the Tellers in this; we are at the disposal of the house, and we will stay here as long as is necessary. CHAIRMAN. It is moved and seconded that the polls be now closed. All in favor will please say "aye;" contrary, "no." Carried. The polls are closed. Dr. MCGEE. I move we adjourn. Seconded. CHAIRMAN. It is moved and seconded that we adjourn. All in favor will please say "aye;" contrary, "no." Carried. Thursday Evening Session. CHAIRMAN. (Mrs. Jewett, 8.41 p. m.) The meeting will be in order. We will begin the evening session. The first business before the meeting is the report of the Committee on the National University. Mrs. BOYNTON. May I ask the indulgence of the house for a few moments before this regular business begins? It is in reference to a motion which was entered by this house yesterday upon the minutes, for reconsideration of a vote which was taken, as we believed, under a misapprehension. The Congress very kindly entered upon the minutes the motion to re consider this vote. I wish to explain why we want the vote reconsidered. We believe that it was taken under a misapprehension of the case. The question was in reference to the Honorary Vice-Presidents General. If you remember the Regent of the Manor House Chapter made a motion that hereafter we should have but thrteen. CHAIRMAN. Will you kindly wait a moment and allow the Chair to make an explanation? This matter you speak of can as well be taken up to-morrow. To-night the order of business is reports. Mrs. BOYNTON. Very well, Madam Chairman., as the house entered the motion on the minutes, it must be taken up some time. I do not wish this Congress to adjourn before my duty is done in the matter. I am perfectly willing to take whatever time the house sees fit, provided the time is given sometime. CHAIRMAN. The Chair announces that Mrs. Walworth will read the report upon the National University. Mrs. Walworth reads report, as follows: REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE NATIONAL UNIVERSITY. To the Continental Congress, Daughters of the American Revolution: Your committee respectfully report that the probability of an early realization of the plan for a National University is much stronger, and the prospect brighter than it has been at any time since we enlisted for the work. And this, too, in a year which has been given over to the excitement and anxiety of a war. Strangely enough, this war spirit has strengthened the interest in this plan for a National University. The thought of nationality has grown broad and definite in the minds of the pcople; the value of education and cultivation has been forcibly impressed upon them in their closer contract with the people of other nations and races. And especially have they had brought home to them the serious need of the training of our citizens in political science, the science of the administration of government, and need of educational and scientific discipline in international law and the art of diplomacy, all of which will prepare Government officials of every class for the demands of great emergencies. It is true that some of our colleges and universities have courses in political science, but very little importance is attached to them; and where is it possible for such a pursuit to be conducted in so full and practical a manner as here at the seat of the National Government? The time is ripe for the establishment of the university during the next year, and we believe the next Congress will pass the bill, if this one does not. A striking illustration of the need of this National University and of the certainty of its future is found in the fact that a commission was sent to Washington this winter from a convention of the various agricultural or land grant colleges in the country to ask that in the departments of the Government, the Treasury, Interior, State Departments, etc., rooms should be set aside and lectures be provided for students from those outside agricultural colleges and that they, the colleges, would provide scholarships to cover the expense. Here is an urgent demand for the very thing that we propose to give as a fulfillment of the efforts and recommendation of the first President of the United States, General Washington. It is also a further confirmation of the principle we urge, that no sectarian university can possibly supply this need. The university must be the final development of our public school education, and must be controlled by the Gov ernment. Following the recommendation that you adopted at your last Congress, this committee has sent out petitions to be signed by the members of every Chapter of our Society, asking the Senate of the United States to pass the bill now pending in favor of the university. The great pressure of relief work for the war delayed this distribution of petitions until a few weeks ago, yet many of them are already re⚫ turned, and this committee now express their thanks to the Chapters who have responded so promptly; and we ask that all other Chapters will send the names as soon as they can conveniently. Chapters in different States have to this date returned petitions in the following proportion: New York, eleven Chapters; Connecticut, six Chapters; New Hampshire, four Chapters; Georgia, four Chapters; Pennsylvania, three Chapters; Delaware, two Chapters; South Carolina, Indiana, Illinois, Massachusetts and Ohio, each two Chapters; North Dakota, Minnesota, Virginia, Michigan, Tennessee, District of Columbia, each one Chapter, making the returns from forty-six Chapters and four hundred and twenty-five yet to be heard from, as we are sure they will be. With these returned petitions have come letters asking three questions: Will this university be supported by the Government? Will the tuition be free to worthy students? Will women be admitted or equal terms with men? I would state first of all that this university will be in no sense of the word a college-that is, it is intended for post-graduate work. Students will have been graduated from other colleges and universities before they are eligible to study here-so it will in no way interfere with any university now existing in this country. Of the three questions, I will answer the last one first. This university will undoubtedly be open to both men and women on equal terms. But women must, of course, come up to the full standard of requirements demanded from men, as graduates of other colleges or universities. 1 In regard to the second question, will tuition be free? There will certainly be large numbers of free scholarships, and opportunities given to ambitious students all along the lines of learning, and to those who devote themselves to specialties. It is mainly in these departments of special studies that the National University-the national opportunity, I would call it—will be of greatest value. The time has come when Americans, like the learned men and women of older lands, devote themselves to special lines of investigation, and it is for such special students, often persons of genius or of extraordinary mentality, and for others, that a grand,. comprehensive and thoroughly equipped university should be sheltered under the care of the Government and thus become, as we have said, the culmination of our broad system of public education. In reply to the third question: Will the University be supported by the National Government? I shall state a fact which exists, and that some of you may not realize is true. There does exist now, in this city of Washington what may be practically called a National University, and it is now supported by the National Government, and partly by the liberal fund of the Smithsonian Institute. The departments of this great university have each one of them had a gradual, a natural and a vital growth from small beginnings to large and influential conditions. Is not the Government supporting what is practically the university at the present time? For evidence of this I would refer you to the March number of "Harper's Monthly" last year, in which there is a most interesting article which explains this matter, which is written by W. J. McGee. All of these departments of learning need only to be combined and organized as a whole by means of an administrative faculty to give us the most remarkable university the world had ever seen. The departments referred to are the Geological Survey, the Naval Observatory, the Coast and Geodetic Survey, the scientific bureaus of the Agricultural Department, which have been called a nursery of applied sciences, the Museum of Natural History, the Fisheries Commission, the Geographical Survey, the Bureau of Education, and above all, the Congressional or National Library and Smithsonian Institute, the National Zoological Park and the Bureau of American Ethnology. Appropriations for the support of the scientific bureaus, exclusive of the Smithsonian, in 1897 was $8,000,000. The employes are over 5,000. In a full account of this scientific work under the Government I refer you to "Harper's Monthly, March, 1898, an article "Our National Seminary of Learning," by W. J. McGee. All of these, and others not mentioned, are educational departments full of vitality and splendidly equipped for purposes of investigation. They are controlled by men celebrated as scientists, investigators of the great problems of nature and science. These bureaus and departments are the foundation and the nucleus for this great seat of learning of the future. When this National University is approved and chartered by the Congress of the United States, the millions of the millionaires of the Nation will be poured into its treasury. Look at the vast sums given in a few years to Columbia anl Barnard, to the Universities of Chicago and California. Are the millions exhausted? Is the interest in learning less? Has the pride of the average American grown cold? Already the statement 's made that ex-Senator Henderson offers to be one of the hundred to give $1,000 each. Let the bill pass Congress, and the contributions will continue to come in hundreds of thousands; and you should remember, Daughters of the American Revolution, that you have already, in 1896, pledged yourselves to found a chair of American history in this university. We entreat you then not to scatter your efforts, but reserve your means and your interest to identify you with this grandest of educational institutions, the National University, which will keep you in touch with the Government. Its importance is yet more apparent in the work of the women, who coming into the field later than we, have organized an association for one purpose of advancing the movement for this university. That is, the George Washington Memorial Association-they are now pledged to work along the same lines as those we have always followed, that is, in full coöperation with the United States Senate Committee and the Committee of One Hundred. Thus while our efforts are for the education of the public and the favorable action of Congress, the efforts of the George Washington Memorial Association is for money to make the plan more quickly practical when the bill is passed and the charter obtained, therefore we may work in full sympathy and accord even though our work is distinct. ELLEN HARDIN WALWORTH, CHAIRMAN. What will you do with this report? Seconded. Chairman. CHAIRMAN. It is moved and seconded that we accept the report. All in favor will please say "aye;" opposed, "no." It is accepted. Mrs. NEWCOMB. I would like to say on the part of the District that the reason only one of those circulars was returned was the fearful storm of last week; six Chapters could not meet, therefore they could not turn them in. Many committees had been appointed. Mrs. THOMPSON. Is a resolution in order? CHAIRMAN. Touching what? Mrs. THOMPSON. Touching a circular issued here? |