The trustees were disappointed, however, in the expected revenues from the Tombigbee lands. The government in 1820 found it necessary to adopt measures for the reduction of the enormous debts of those who had contracted for lands in more prosperous times.
Liberal discounts were offered to its debtors, also the privilege of giving up the lands they had purchased. There was a great depreciation in the value of the lands at this time, and the purchasers were glad to surrender them to the government.
The trustees offered an abatement of one-half. But all, with one exception, gave the land to the government, as the greater portion of it was found to be of no value. This source of revenue to which the trustees had looked forward with such sanguine expectations had been destroyed, heavy debts had been contracted, and there were no means of discharging them. So the trustees and friends of the Institution assumed the debts individually.
The college had a difficulty from another source. In 1818 there was an assembly of the clergy of all denominations in Washington. Some of the clergy, believing Mr. M'Allister's opinion to be unorthodox, publicly denounced the Institution.
This did the College an injury that the trustees could not repair. Rev. R. F. N. Smith, an associate of Mr. M'Allister, was placed at the head of the Institution, but this helped matters very little.
The source of revenue having been exhausted, Mr. Smith resigned. From 1821, an academy was kept up under various instructors on a small scale.
In 1825, a measure was introduced into the Legislature to institute suit for the recovery of the money loaned, but the majority voted against it.
To afford the Legislature an opportunity of placing the institution more immediately under its control and management and to give to it that patronage and support to which it would be entitled as a State Institution, the Trustees voted to give the power of filling vacancies in their body to the Legislature. The act was passed in January, 1826. This right was exercised for many years.
In May, 1826, the Trustees were notified that the selectmen of the city of Natchez were going to make an appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States in the suit commenced in 1813, for the property given by Congress and claimed by the city of Natchez. The Trustees not being able to bear the expenses of a suit appointed a committee to compromise with the city, which they succeeded in doing.
About this time the Legislature was considering the idea of establishing a State Institution, and its executive committee at its session in Feb. 1829, was ordered to appoint three agents to inquire into all the means and resources in the state applicable to the purposes of general education; to confer with the Trustees of Jefferson College and ascertain the condition and prospects of the Institution and whether it was practicable for the Trustees to surrender the charter to the State, and on what terms it would be done.