for buildings or any other purpose necessary for its support. The expression in the constitution that "the available school fund shall be distributed to the several counties according to their scholastic population" could only have been intended to fix the ratio for distribution, and to mean simply that whatever amount of the fund the legislature may leave for them after making other appropriations from the fund shall be so distributed-that is, to the counties, and not that the university, the Agricultural and Mechanical College, the Normals, and any other public school the State may establish shall be excluded entirely from support from that fund. This would be counter to the right of State sovereignty, as it would estop the State from supporting other educational institutions from that source, no matter how ample the fund or great the necessities of such institutions. No State would so stultify its sovereignty of action or right to support its institutions in any way circumstances might render advisable. After all, it were better perhaps to discard mere abstruse technicalities of construction in such matters and let the college, the free schools, and the university all have the benefit of appropriations from general revenue when it has the funds to afford them. Their special endowments should not be a perpetual bar to any aid it may be desirable for the State to extend to them in lands, money, or bonds. And this more especially for the reason that one generation is not expected to legislate for all future generations, and even organic laws have to be changed or liberally construed to meet new conditions. The right of the legislature to grant appropriations to the university from the general fund, which remained dormant or purposely disregarded till recent years, has been ably demonstrated in published arguments by Governor Roberts, General Maxey, and Professor Gould.

LEGISLATIVE ACTION.

In the twentieth legislature, although the State had nearly a million dollars of indemnity funds returned by the Federal Government at its disposal, all that the legislature would do for the university was to lump the claims, to avoid acknowledging specific indebtedness for any of them, and allow the university but $40,000 of the indemnity funds and make it a "loan of $125,000 to be in full settlement of all demands of the university against the State," which was certainly an ingenious and convenient mode of disposing of the vexed question in a legislative way by substituting a loan for the indebtedness. Still, as one legislature is not bound by the enactments of another, however specious, the claims, amounting to several hundred thousand dollars, may some day be allowed, though it is not likely that such will ever be the good fortune of the university. In noticing these old claims the San Antonio Express thus argued the question as to some of them:

Among the items of the university claims is one for $40,000 of university funds, which, as shown by the comptroller's books, was transferred to State revenue account

for buildings or any other purpose necessary for its support. The expression in the constitution that "the available school fund shall be distributed to the several counties according to their scholastic population" could only have been intended to fix the ratio for distribution, and to mean simply that whatever amount of the fund the legislature may leave for them after making other appropriations from the fund shall be so distributed-that is, to the counties, and not that the university, the Agricultural and Mechanical College, the Normals, and any other public school the State may establish shall be excluded entirely from support from that fund. This would be counter to the right of State sovereignty, as it would estop the State from supporting other educational institutions from that source, no matter how ample the fund or great the necessities of such institutions. No State would so stultify its sovereignty of action or right to support its institutions in any way circumstances might render advisable. After all, it were better perhaps to discard mere abstruse technicalities of construction in such matters and let the college, the free schools, and the university all have the benefit of appropriations from general revenue when it has the funds to afford them. Their special endowments should not be a perpetual bar to any aid it may be desirable for the State to extend to them in lands, money, or bonds. And this more especially for the reason that one generation is not expected to legislate for all future generations, and even organic laws have to be changed or liberally construed to meet new conditions. The right of the legislature to grant appropriations to the university from the general fund, which remained dormant or purposely disregarded till recent years, has been ably demonstrated in published arguments by Governor Roberts, General Maxey, and Professor Gould.

LEGISLATIVE ACTION.

In the twentieth legislature, although the State had nearly a million dollars of indemnity funds returned by the Federal Government at its disposal, all that the legislature would do for the university was to lump the claims, to avoid acknowledging specific indebtedness for any of them, and allow the university but $40,000 of the indemnity funds and make it a "loan of $125,000 to be in full settlement of all demands of the university against the State," which was certainly an ingenious and convenient mode of disposing of the vexed question in a legislative way by substituting a loan for the indebtedness. Still, as one legislature is not bound by the enactments of another, however specious, the claims, amounting to several hundred thousand dollars, may some day be allowed, though it is not likely that such will ever be the good fortune of the university. In noticing these old claims the San Antonio Express thus argued the question as to some of them:

Among the items of the university claims is one for $40,000 of university funds, which, as shown by the comptroller's books, was transferred to State revenue account