In this exhibit you can learn about the new system of higher education created by the Morrill Act of 1862, which used proceeds from Native lands in the West to fund agricultural and mechanical colleges throughout the United States. By Kenny Barnes.
HIGHER EDUCATION FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS IN VIRGINIA
A vital piece of legislation in the history of United States education, the Morrill Act of 1862 allowed for the creation of the land-grant colleges and is often praised for democratizing higher education across the country. At the time, a college education was not the foundation to financial success as it is widely considered today. The vast majority of Americans, including white men, never attended. Justin Morrill himself, for whom the act is named, never attended college and still managed to find great financial success which allowed him to retire and pursue his career in politics.
When VAMC earned land-grant status in 1872, it was given two-thirds of the state's Morrill Act funds. At that time, only white men were permitted to enroll at the school. The remaining third was directed to another school in Virginia, exclusively for African Americans. Nowhere in the 1862 Act did it specify that states were required to provide African Americans with equal access to education that came from Morrill Act funds. That would not be mandated until 1890. In some ways, Virginia’s path seemed progressive in giving one-third of the Morrill Act benefits to an African American school. Only three Southern states established African American schools prior to the 1890 mandate.
Pictured is the VAMC Class of 1888. It would not be until 1953, with the enrollment of Irvinig Peddrew III, that Virginia Tech had an African American student.
However, this step was not taken to level the playing field of higher education in the state. Instead, it ensured the separation of blacks and whites and helped lay the groundwork for the “separate but equal” precedent in the coming years. While students at Virginia Tech had options of study ranging from chemistry to foreign languages, the curriculum offered at Hampton Institute was more trade based, and included instruction in skills such as carpentry, blacksmithing, tailoring, painting, etc.
Armstrong, seated in middle with cane, surrounded by friends at Hampton Instiute, most likely in 1868. From 1866 to 1868 Armstrong served as assistant subcommissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau in several of Virignia's districts. Founded for African Americans in 1868, Hampton Institute later offered education to Native Americans from 1878-1923. Image courtesy of UVA Special Collections.
Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute was designated as Virginia’s second land-grant school, and received roughly $100,000 of Morrill Act funds. The school had opened its doors in 1868, with the founder, Samuel Chapman Armstrong, a brigadier general in the Union Army, declaring its purpose to be, “to train selcted Negro youth who should go out and teach and lead their people first bey exmaple, by getting land and homes; to give them not a dollar that they could earn for themselves; to teach respect for labor, to replace stupid drudgery with skilled hands, and in this way to build up an industrial system for the sake not only of self-support and intelligent labor, but also for the sake of character."
Rather than focus on collegiate level academics, Hampton Institute trained teachers and by the 1880s had evolved into a trade school that explicitly deemphasized academics in favor of “practical experiences in trades and industrial skills.” In fact, students were able to pay their way through school by working various jobs helping to build an expanding campus. Hampton Institute's most famous graduate, Booker T. Washington, used Hamton’s model when starting his own African American school in 1881, the Tuskegee Institute.
Virginia Hall at Hampton Institute, 1874. This was the Institute's main building, and included dormitory space, classrooms, a dining hall, and a chapel. Courtesy of Library of Virginia.
Students in a bricklaying class at Hampton Institute, 1899.
It would not be until the early 1900s that Hampton Institute turned its attention back towards academics, and over the next two decades the school worked towards accreditation of its college courses. In 1929, Hampton President (formerly principal) Dr. James Edward Gregg finally made the claim that “Hampton Institute is now a college.”
In the 1870s and 1880s, Black Republicans and some white Democrats, an unlikely coalition called the Readjusters, united for the common goal of reducing, or “readjusting” the state debt. The opposition, the Funders (most democrats), had been in control of the VA general assembly prior to and immediately following the Civil War. The party had investments in railroads, canals, and other transportation improvements prior to the Civil War, but once the conflict broke out and spending was directed solely to the military, they paused payments on their investments. In the following years, interest continued to compound through the 1870s. Insistent on paying the debt in full, the Funders cut spending on school from $433,000 in 1876 to $241,000 in 1878, and redirected funds to alleviate the massive state debt. As a result, the number of schools in Virginia fell from 3,442 for whites and 1,230 for African Americans in 1877, to just 1,816 for whites and 657 for African Americans in 1879. In just two years, the number of public schools in Virginia had fallen by nearly 50%.
Readjusters encouraging voters in Washington County to consider the expansion of public education that occured during their time in power, 1884. Image courtesy of Virginia Historical Society.
A Readjuster Party handbill for the 1880 presidential election. During the 1880 election, Virginia had two different Democratic tickets- one supporting the Funders, and one backed by the Readjusters. The Readjusters ended up winning nine districts in VA and the candidate they supported for President, Hancock, took the White House. Courtesy of Virginia Historical Society.
The Funders eventually lost control of the Virginia General Assembly to the Readjusters in 1879. The Readjuster Coalition remained in control of the general assembly until 1883. During their brief period of power, they not only reduced the debt by more than half, but they also passed some of the most progressive pieces of legislation Virginia had seen. To start, they reversed the actions taken by the Funders and redirected hundreds of thousands of dollars back towards public schools in the state. This reversal occurred so quickly that by 1880, just one year into the Readjusters' time in power, Virginia had more public schools than at any time in its history. From 1879-1883, the number of students and schools in Virginia increased by almost 250%. To educate the increasing number of students, the state needed more teachers. As such, the General Assembly passed legislation establishing schools that could educate and train future teachers.
Students play a football game in front of Old Virginia Hall at Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institue, 1900. Image courtesy of Virginia State University Special Collections and University Archives.
The Act Incorporating Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institue was approved March 6, 1882 by the Virginia General Assembly, which then included 13 African American members.
All public schools were segregated at the time, so in addition to schools to educate whites, Virginia also needed an institute for the education of African American teachers. With appropriations of $100,000 initially and $20,000 annually, Virginia established Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute in 1882. When its doors opened the following year in October 1883, it had just 7 faculty members and one building. Initially 62 students were enrolled, but by the end of that year, the number had reached 126, just five fewer than VAMC in its first year. From 1883-1902, the school offered a wide range of collegiate curriculum. The school offered three departments for first year students: Academic, Normal, and Preparatory.
The Preparatory course of study included instruction in mathematics, English, history, and geography and was offered to students who were not at the academic level required to complete courses in the “Normal” department, where the majority of students studied. The “Normal” department trained students to be teachers and featured a three-year program with instruction in Arithmetic, Physiology, English Grammar, US History, Voice Culture and Elocution, Spelling, Penmanship, Music, Physical Geography, Civil Government, Algebra, Bookkeeping, Botany, Chemistry, Rhetoric, Psychology and Moral Philosophy, Latin, Law, and Economics.
For those students attending VA Normal who did not want to be teachers, there were two options. First, the school offered a college prep program to help prepare students for the rigor of college level curriculum. This allowed students who did not have access to adequate schooling in their youth to still pursue college education, making higher education more accessible to the African American community. The College department of study, also known as the “academic course”, included a more rigorous curriculum than the Normal department, and its competitive nature made it comparable to other college programs in the state. Unlike the Normal department which graduated its students in 3 years, the College Department took longer, and it wasn’t until 1889 that the school had its first official college graduate (all the others had graduated as certified teachers, without a college degree). From 1889 until 1902, it graduated forty-nine students, forty-eight men and one woman. Hundreds graduated from the “Normal” department and went on to educate the next generation of Black Virginians.
The first graduating class of Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute pose alongside faculty, 1886. Image courtesy of Virginia State University Special Collections and University Archives
At the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1901-02, Chairman John Goode emphasized that the Democratic Party was "pledged in its platform to eliminate the ignorant and worthless negro as a factor from the politics of this State without taking the right of suffrage from a single white man." Image courtesy of University of Virginia Special Collections.
In 1884 the Readjusters lost control of the VA legislature to the Democrats, who worked to undo many progressive Readjuster policies. For Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute, the Democrats’ return to power, many of whom had white supremacy ideology, meant forfeiting control of the school to people who were actively working to disenfranchise and oppress the African Americans. The Democrats altered the schools Board and Visitors and it became majority white for the first time in the schools history. The school's annuity was also cut from $20,000 to $15,000. Although all faculty at the school remained non-white, African Americans no longer had any control over the curriculum offered at Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute, and by the early 20th century the school no longer offered students a wide range of normal and academic instruction. Instead, in 1902 the school was forced by the Virginia General Assembly to abandon its college program in favor of industrial education and change its name to Virginia Normal and Industrial Institute. It wouldn’t be until 1923 that African Americans were able to earn a bachelor's degree within Virginia’s public higher education system.
Only after the changes to curriculum were made did the legislature restore the full $20,000 annuity. Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute already provided African American students in the state a viable option to pursue industrial education, as required by the Morrill Act. The decision by the VA General Assembly to end the collegiate program at Virginia Normal was not made to ensure African Americans had adequate access to industrial education. Instead, it was to ensure African Americans in the state weren’t receiving a college education comparable to whites.
As the 1900s and 1910s progressed, VA Normal and Industrial Institute saw a slow expansion of curriculum. Although it remained a state-funded institute, federal funds allowed the state to increase the annuity to the school five times in ten years, reaching $30,000 by 1918. With the extra funds, the school improved its infrastructure and established an agricultural program and additional vocational courses in auto-mechanics and electricity. This funding and expansion proved vital to the school in the following decade.
Alice Jackson Stuart
In 1920, Virginia Normal and Industrial Institute was designated as Virginia’s African American land-grant university, taking the distinction from Hampton Institute. Gov. Wesmoreland Davis argued that Hampton had been granted land-grant status in 1872 simply because no other school for African Americans existed in the state. Now, with Virginia Normal and Industrial Institute having been in successful operation for close to forty years, it made sense to redirect the Morrill Act funds to them. By 1922, regular collegiate curriculum was reinstated and the school continued to expand its infrastructure with the addition of a library, science building, and numerous residence halls. In 1930, the school's name officially changed to Virginia State College for Negroes. Legal action in the same decade promoted the founding of the college's graduate schools. The Gaines vs. Missouri 1938 Supreme Court case had set the precedent that Blacks had to be admitted to segregated white schools if the state’s black school didn’t offer the program they sought. Alice Jackson Stuart, a Black woman, was denied admission to UVA’s graduate program in French due to her race in 1935. Jackson’s threat of legal action against the state forced them to redirect funds to Virginia State, allowing them to open their graduate school in 1937. The only reason the VA legislature opened the graduate school was to ensure the separate but equal precedent remained in their public higher education system.
In 1946, Virginia State College for Negroes dropped the end of its name and became Virginia State College. Today, it is Virginia State University. Although open to all races, today VA State’s racial makeup is almost 94% Black. Virginia’s largest land grant school, Virginia Tech first opened to only white students, and today less than 5% of students are African American. Although legal segregation ended in the mid 20th century, the landscape of higher education in Virginia remains separated by race.
Denial letter from UVA to Stuart. The reason for denial read, "The admission of white and colored persons in the same school in contrary to the long established and fixed policy of the Commonwealth of Virginia." Image Courtesy of UVA Special Collections.
