Ag Minute: Education and Ag - Morrill Land Grant Act
- Sangamon County News
- Aug 22, 2025
- 3 min read
Justin Morrill was a United States Senator from Strafford, Vermont, born in 1810. He ended his education at age 15, to become a storekeeper, but ironically left a legacy in higher education across the country that endures to this day. Through business ventures and good financial planning, he retired at age 38. Retirement led Justin Morrill to a second career in politics. In 1854, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a member of the Whig party. When the Whig party collapsed shortly thereafter, Morrill joined the Republican party. He was reelected to the House 5 times, serving a total of 12 years. In 1866, Morrill was elected to the U.S. Senate, beginning his first term in March 1867 and serving until his death in December 1898. Morrill, who spent a total of 44 years in Congress, was able to leave his mark in 1862 as the sponsor of the Morrill Land Grant Act.
Passed in the midst of the Civil War, the intention of the Morrill Land Grant Act was to establish institutions of higher education to “benefit the agricultural and mechanical arts.” Land was set aside in western states for both the construction of educational institutions as well as for sale to provide income to develop and support these institutions. Enactment was not without trial and tribulation. The agricultural college movement began in the 1830s and has several connections to Central Illinois. It was led by Professor Jonathan Baldwin Turner of Illinois College in Jacksonville, who proposed a plan for national funding to provide an agricultural, industrial, and mechanical college in each state. The original Morrill Land Grant Act bill was written in 1857 and passed by Congress in 1859, but vetoed by sitting President James Buchanan in the same year. Senator Morrill reintroduced the bill in 1861 with an amendment to add military education. It took until July 2, 1862 for it to be passed and signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln.
Since that time, two additional acts have been passed to aid in the development of historically black colleges and universities in 1890 as well as tribal colleges and universities in 1994. Largely known for research in agriculture and engineering, many land grant schools have grown to accommodate even more departments and areas of interest. The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, established in 1867, was one of 37 universities created under the first Morrill Land Grant Act. The U of I remains strong in the agriculture and engineering fields, but has expanded to develop a college of business, law school, college of medicine, and many other disciplines beyond what the Land Grant Act intended. At the same time, the U of I carries on its mission as a land grant institution as is stated in the history and mission of the university, “We began with the working class in mind. Thanks to the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890, the university was designated as a land-grant institution. This means that the government reserved land for the creation of a university that should aim to provide agricultural, scientific, military, and technical education to the people of the state of Illinois, no matter their background or socioeconomic level.”
Nationwide, colleges and universities carry on the land grant mission through their admissions, courses of study, and areas of research, offering students the opportunity to further their knowledge in agricultural, mechanical, military, and more technical fields. While in our own state the University of Illinois is the only land grant institution, there are numerous others surrounding Illinois including the University of Wisconsin, Iowa State, Purdue, the University of Missouri, and the University of Kentucky. To this day, land grant institutions maintain programs in agriculture and engineering, as well as Reserve Officers' Training Corps programs, continuing the legacy that Justin Morrill intended in the 1850s and enriching lives across the nation.
To learn more about Justin Morrill, follow the link below to his page in the U.S. Senate;
To learn more about signing the bill into law, follow the link below to a U of I page;
For a list of all land grant institutions following the acts passed in 1862, 1890, and 1994, follow the USDA page to;
To learn more about the University of Illinois’s history and mission, follow the link below;
