"The Honorable Legislature will permit us to add, that as it is well known that the Trustees have, as a Board, been divided on certain important subjects, although the minority has been very small, should the Legislature now provide for nine new Trustees, to be appointed by His Excellency the Governor and the Honorable the Council, and that without any facts being proved to the Legislature, or any Legislative report having been made, showing that the state of things at the college rendered the measure necessary, it must be seen by our fellow citizens that the majority of the Trustees have been by the Legislature, for some unacknowledged cause, condemned unheard.
Thomas W. Thompson,
Asa M'Farland.
"June 24, 1816."
The recommendations of the Governor in substance, became a law; the name of the college was changed to "University;" the number of the Trustees was increased to twenty-one; a Board of Overseers was created, to be appointed by the Governor and Council; the president and professors of the university were required to take an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, and of the State of New Hampshire; and the act provided that "perfect freedom of religious opinion should be enjoyed by all the students and officers of the university." The committee to whom the message, etc., relating to this subject, were referred, it should be remarked, did not undertake to decide in favor of either party to the controversy, but alleged that the troubles arose from certain defects in the Charter, and that they would recur again in some form, unless those defects were remedied.
The debates upon the historical and constitutional questions involved were able. The minority were ably led, both inside and outside the Legislature, but parliamentary tactics availed them nothing. Many of them joined in a written protest against the passage of the bill, the substance of which has already appeared in the action of the Trustees.
Directly after the passage of this bill Mr. Marsh prepared an elaborate argument, never published, setting forth the essence of the leading points of the case, as viewed by the majority of the old Trustees.
The following letter, addressed to Mr. Timothy Bigelow, Boston, is worthy of notice in this connection:
"Concord, July 27, 1816.
"Dear Sir: Dr. McFarland will do himself the pleasure to hand you this. In him you will recognize an old acquaintance. We wish to get the opinions of as many legal friends as we can upon the question of legitimate power in the New Hampshire Legislature, to pass the act relating to Dartmouth College, and with regard to the course the old Trustees ought to pursue. It is an interest, we think, common to all well wishers to New England.
"The old Trustees, I am confident, are willing to take just that course that their wisest and best friends recommend.