University of Virginia Library

XIII. Removal of William and Mary College

While the claim against the Government was in a state
of suspense, there arose before the watchful eyes of the
two protagonists the prospect of securing an endowment
fund in another quarter; and for some time, afterwards,
their energies seemed to have been diverted from the

pursuit of a legislative appropriation. In a letter which
Cabell wrote Jefferson from Williamsburg in May, 1824,
there occurs the following curt but pregnant sentence:
"A scheme is now in agitation at this place, the object
of which is to remove the College of William and Mary
to the City of Richmond." He acknowledged that, with
the exception of the professor of law, every member of
the Faculty favored the transfer. The College, in spite
of the broadening of its courses of instruction, and the
devotion and ability of President Smith, had been dwindling
in prosperity, and it was expected that transplantation
to Richmond, where a practical school of medicine,
rendered possible by hospital facilities, could be engrafted
on it, would arrest the progress of this decay, which
threatened it with ultimate ruin. It was anticipated too
that the new site in the capital of the State would restore
some of that prestige which it had formerly derived from
its location at the seat of Government.

The endowment of the College of William and Mary,
at this time, was about one hundred thousand dollars, the
largest fund in the possession of any institution situated in
Virginia. So soon as he was informed of the design to
remove the College to Richmond, it occurred to Cabell
that this endowment fund might be taken from it, and laid
out in the establishment of the series of intermediate
academies which Jefferson had always advocated. "We
were told some winters ago by the College party," he
said, "'we do not want a university—we want preparatory
seminaries over the whole face of the country.'"
From this arbitrary attitude on his part, there was, for a
moment, a generous revulsion of feeling. "To oppose
an institution struggling to save itself," he remarked,
"and to thwart the natural endeavors of literary men to
advance their fortunes, is truly painful." Then the feeling

subsides, and loyalty to the supposed interests of the
University comes back. "Are we," he adds, "to suffer
the labors of so many years to be blasted by an unnecessary
and destructive competition? Most assuredly, we
must not."

Jefferson was very much startled by the project of
transplanting the College. "It is a case of a pregnant
character," he replied to Cabell, "admitting important
issues, and requiring serious consideration and conduct."
It is plain that, like Cabell, he looked upon the plan of
removal as carrying in its bosom a very grave peril to
the welfare of the University. How far was he really
justified in taking this view? On its face, at least, the
attitude of almost unscrupulous hostility which he now
assumed towards the ancient College, his alma mater, in
its hour of pecuniary difficulty, appears to be discreditable
to himself and to the institution which he had founded in
the noblest spirit of liberty and equality. What can be
said in his defense? As we have seen, he had a very
exaggerated conception of the advantages which a seat
of learning would enjoy, if it were established in the
capital of the State. Had Williamsburg remained that
capital, he would have looked upon the College of William
and Mary as a far more powerful rival to contend
with than it was now, because it would, through that fact,
have been able to retain its original dignity and influence.
A university was an institution, which, in his opinion, bore
a direct relation to the civic duties of the people, and
where could this function of educating citizens be so fully
carried out as on the spot where the central administration
was at work? Remove the College of William and
Mary to Richmond, and with its large permanent fund, it
would soon recover its prestige, and the prosperity which
it had lost when Williamsburg ceased to be the capital.

As Richmond was necessarily the first city of Virginia, so
an old and highly endowed college, like the College of
William and Mary, replanted there, must also become the
first seat of learning in the State.

Jefferson, as revealed by the numerous quotations from
his letters already given, was always apprehensive that
something might occur which would lower the University
of Virginia to the level of the two principal subordinate
colleges of the Commonwealth, Washington and Hampden-Sidney.
It was a practical feeling which caused him
to be so solicitous for its prestige. This feeling had led
him, apart from any appreciation of architectural beauty,
to erect the splendid group of buildings at Charlottesville.
Without such buildings, he believed that it would
be hopeless to engage European professors of the first order
of talents and learning, and without that cast of instructors,
the institution, being young, would start without
distinction. It was the same sort of far-sightedness
that now caused him to oppose the removal of the College
of William and Mary, for it seemed to foreshadow a new
rivalry that might, in some measure, overcloud the dreams
of greatness in which he indulged for his own university.
Had the latter been underway, with a corps of foreign
scholars lecturing to large classes, he would probably have
accepted the thought of this future rivalry with far less
acrimony, and shown more tolerance and magnanimity
in anticipating it.

The apparently ungenerous and inconsistent spirit of
hostility which he displayed perhaps had its origin, in a
measure, in two additional reasons of a more definite
character. Jefferson must have tacitly recognized, although
he never directly admitted the fact, that one of
the important deficiencies in the course of studies which
he had projected for the University was the entire absence

of hospital facilities. Without those facilities, a medical
school, independently of anatomy, must always remain
principally an historical school, a school of theory, a descriptive
rather than a practically illustrative school.
Richmond, on the other hand, even in those times, offered
the clinical advantages which the village of Charlottesville
entirely lacked. Was not the University's medical
school bound to sink at once to a subordinate position,
should the College of William and Mary be put in possession
of all the facilities for a practical medical education
which that city abundantly afforded? A second, and
perhaps as important a reason for his opposition, was to
be discerned in the fact that the capital of the State was
the home of John Marshall and of a coterie of Federalists
of great distinction. Their influence, in time, might
control the whole political spirit of the transplanted College,
and thus be able to spread the poison of their dangerous
principles of a centralized government throughout
the atmosphere of Virginia and the South.

So soon as Jefferson had fully taken in the menace which
he was convinced would follow the removal of the College,
he began to devise the means to defeat the project,
and in doing so, allowed no sense of loyalty or gratitude
to his alma mater, no recollection of his own great principle
of equal opportunities to all and special privileges
to none, to shake his will or palsy his energy. In the
fixity of his purpose, he did not stop at the mere frustration
of the ancient College's plan of re-establishment elsewhere,
but even aimed to destroy it on the very ground
on which it stood by transferring its funds, in whole or in
part, to his own seat of learning. "When it was found,"
he wrote to Cabell on May 16, 1824, "that that seminary
was entirely ineffectual towards the object of public education,
and that one on a better plan, and in a better situation,

must be provided, what was so obvious as to employ,
for that purpose, the funds of the one abandoned,
with what more was necessary to raise the new establishmen?
And what so obvious as to do now what might
reasonably have been done then, by consolidating the two
institutions and their funds? ... The hundred thousand
dollars of principal which you say still remains to
William and Mary, by its interest of $6,000, would give
us the two deficient professors, with an annual surplus
for the purchase of books."

Comprehending, perhaps, that it would be impolitic
to show such a naked hand, Jefferson pressed upon Cabell
the wisdom of "saying as little as possible on this whole
subject." "Give them no alarm," he added; "let them
petition for the removal, let them get the old structure
completely on wheels, and not until then put in our claim."
Seated under the serene roof of Monticello, at a remote
distance from all the persons who were anxious for the
change, and insensible to the memories of the youthful
years spent in Williamsburg, he was not in a position, or
the mood, to understand the weight of the influences,
which, after awhile, made his coadjutor disposed to modify
his attitude of hostility. As the months passed on,
the transplantation became the subject of still hotter
public debate; and Cabell was so much impressed by the
arguments in its favor, that he informed Jefferson, in
December, that he had decided to vote for the measure,
provided that the College would consent to be brought under
the control of the General Assembly. What did he
mean by the expression, "control of the General Assembly"?
Its purport, he said, was that the Assembly should
have the power to "reduce the capital of the College, leaving
a moiety here (Richmond), and transferring the residue
to Winchester and Hampden-Sidney, or other points in

the State connected with the general system." "It
would be utterly impracticable," he added, "to procure
any portion for the University"; and he, with great earnestness,
urged Jefferson to abandon "every such idea, if
any plan of the kind had ever been formed."

The short interval of four days had hardly vanished
before Cabell's views underwent again what he described
as "a material change." He had, as we have just seen,
contemplated a compromise, in order, as he expressed it,
to avoid the appearance of illiberality. Subsequent reflection,
he said, had convinced him that he ought to vote
against the removal. In taking this course, he added, "I
oppose the wishes of my nearest and dearest relatives
and friends." Indeed, no one among them condemned
this new decision with more brusqueness and pungency
than his own brother, William H. Cabell, a former Governor
of the State, and during many years, the President
of the Court of Appeals. His letter is worthy of reproduction
in full as throwing a vivid light on the social penalties
which Cabell was now inviting by his apparently
unreasonable and inequitable loyalty to the supposed interests
of the University. If his own brother could not
restrain his impatience, it may be clearly perceived what
a flood of censure he had to encounter from less kindly
critics.

"Do you think it possible," wrote W. H. Cabell, "that
Smith and Company (the President and Faculty of the
College) can ever make the people of Virginia consider
William and Mary, when removed, as the rival of the
University? It would be as easy to believe that the frog
could swell himself to the size of the ox. The indirect
means which the friends of the University have been
forced to adopt, in obtaining money from the Legislature,
have excited strong hostility in many quarters against

them and the University. Here is a good opportunity
of soothing the public mind by showing that there is no
disposition to sacrifice everything to the University, but
that the advancement of the cause of literature had been
the real principle. The friends of William and Mary
ask no money from the Legislature. They ask only that
the College may be removed to a place where its present
funds may be employed advantageously for the public,
and I think, and all with whom I have conversed, think,
advantageously to the University. ... The short and
long of the affair is that I really think it would ill become
the friends of the University, who have got for that
institution so much of the public money, now to oppose
the wishes of a large portion of the State to remove another
institution, already endowed, to a place where it
will be made more useful to the public than it is now.
... As a friend of the University, I would, if I were
in the Assembly, aid the removal with all my heart, and
I should be happy, if you could take the same view of the
subject. I believe it would tend to remove some of those
jealousies and heart burnings which your earnest zeal for
the University, has, however unjustly, excited towards
you. To oppose the removal is attributed to motives of
interest, to that sort of feeling that actuated the dog in
the manger, and to seize on the funds without the consent
of the professors would be to abandon all respect for
those laws which protect property. ... I have taken up
more time on this subject, because I have been much concerned
at the strange lengths, as they seem to me, to which
your zeal for the University has unknowingly carried you,
—lengths to which, I believe, no man in the Commonwealth
is willing to go, except, perhaps, a Visitor of the
University,—lengths which excite the surprise and concern
of all your friends."

Having finally determined to oppose the transplantation
of the College, Cabell refused to yield to the remonstrances
and reproaches of friends, and remained indifferent
to the acrimony and obloquy of enemies. In this
course, he was sustained by his repeated communications
with Jefferson, who marshalled his arguments against the
College, and in favor of the University, with consummate
vigor and plausibility.

Jefferson seems to have taken it for granted that, even
if the General Assembly should permit the College's removal,
the funds in its possession would be distributed.
As he looked at it, there was some benefit to be expected,
no matter what should be the upshot of the controversy:
if the College remained in Williamsburg, there would be
no further cause for apprehension on the score of competition;
if, on the other hand, it was re-established in Richmond,
it should, in return, for the advantages of this new
situation, give up the whole or, at least, the larger part
of its endowment for the erection of the district academies.
In his enthusiasm over the prospect of carrying out
this part of his original plan of public instruction, by the
use of the funds of the older institution, he seems to
have accepted with philosophy Cabell's prediction that the
University would not be directly benefited pecuniarily by
the removal. He foresaw, in the creation of the academies,
a full compensation for this, for he was confident that
they would prove to be a means, not only of preparing
students for entry into his own establishment, but also of
raising up a well-informed body of yeomanry. "This
occasion of completing our system of education is a godsend,"
he exclaimed, "I certainly would not propose that
the University should claim a cent of these funds in competition
with the district colleges." This letter was
shown to numerous members of the General Assembly.

Chapman Johnson promptly and emphatically denied the
State's right, under the charter of the College, to dispose
of the latter's funds as Jefferson had suggested. It was
generally thought that, whether the Commonwealth possessed
this right or not, a distribution, during that term,
at least, would not be authorized by the Legislature. In
the meanwhile, a resolution was submitted, but not
pressed, that pointed out the supposed injustice of permitting
the College's transfer to Richmond without forfeiting
a portion of its endowment for the benefit of other
sections of Virginia. Early in the session, Cabell reported
that the College's petition was losing ground, but
that there was no prospect as yet of the adoption of Jefferson's
plan for the use of its funds. "This measure,"
he said, "was too bold for the present state of the public
mind. We will not bring it forward as an original proposition,
but should there be occasion, as a substitute for
the measure of removal to this place. The hostile party
... report that you have sent orders to the Assembly
to plunder the College and bribe the different parts of
the State."

Jefferson's sensibilities seemed to have been wounded
by the animus rather than by the pertinency of this accusation.
"The attempt," he replied, "in which I have
embarked so earnestly, to procure an improvement in the
moral condition of my native State, although in other
States it may have strengthened good dispositions (towards
me), it has certainly weakened them in my own.
The attempt ran foul of so many local interests, of so
many personal views, and of so much ignorance, and I
have been considered as so particularly its promoter, that
I see evidently a great change of sentiment towards myself.
... It is from posterity we are to expect remuneration
for the sacrifice we are making for their service, of

time, quiet, and present good will. And I fear not the
appeal. The multitude of fine young men, who will feel
that they owe to us the elevation of mind, of character
and station they shall be able to attain from the result
of our efforts, will ensure us their remembrance with gratitude."

The confidence with which Cabell had anticipated the
failure of the College's petition was suddenly shaken by
a change in the Assembly's attitude. In January (1825),
he unexpectedly informed Jefferson that there was now
an increasing danger that the advocates of removal would
be able to obtain a decisive vote in their favor; but there
was one device, he said, by which they could yet be
thwarted, and this was to bring in a bill to appropriate
the funds of the College to the establishment of the system
of district academies. "Delay is all we want," he
exclaimed, "so as to get the representatives of the people
away from the Richmond parties, and to give the
people the power to act. I beseech you to prepare a bill
immediately and send it as quickly as possible by mail.
... Let the funds be equally divided among the districts
whatever they may be. Give me but this bill, and I think
I will yet defeat them."

Jefferson received this letter on January 21 (1825),
and by the following evening, he had drafted the bill
and deposited it in the post. "I am so worn down by
the drudgery," he stated in enclosing it, "that I can
write little now." By the 28th, it had reached Cabell's
hands. "I shall keep it as private as possible," he replied,
in acknowledging its arrival. "The opposite party
are triumphing in anticipation, but I think we will yet
defeat them." He now published a very able letter in
the Constitutional Whig, over the signature of "A Friend
to Science," in which he quoted at length from the Plan

for Public Education which had been drafted by Jefferson
in 1817. The object of this was to be able, when the trap
was sprung, to point out that the plan was not a new one,
but had been matured some years before the question of
removing the College to Richmond had come up, or the
suggestion put forth of dividing its funds for the benefit
of the district academies. He again admitted that the
public mind was "not prepared for so bold a measure";
"but," he added, "if I am not mistaken, it will enable us
to defeat the scheme of removal."

His prediction turned out to be correct, for, on February
7, he was able to announce that the College's petition
had been denied by a majority of twenty-four votes.
"But," said he, no doubt to Jefferson's keen disappointment,
"our friends and myself concur in thinking that it
would be improper to bring in the bill for dividing the
funds of the College. ... My friends assure me that
the essay under the signature of 'A Friend to Science,'
with the extracts from your letter and bill ... broke the
ranks of the opposition completely. ... Richmond is
now hors de combat." This was the end of the controversy.
The College of William and Mary remained on
its original site, and the bill for the distribution of its
funds, which had been used as such a powerful instrument
to prevent its removal, was not again revived. There is
no just ground for supposing that, had the ancient College
been re-planted in Richmond, it would have become a
ruinous competitor of the University. It had a moral
and a legal right alike to establish itself there, and the
part which Jefferson and Cabell took in balking that right,
forms the only chapter in the history of the University
of Virginia which is darkened by the spirit of an illiberal
and ungenerous policy,—a policy, indeed, only relieved
from the taint of positive unscrupulousness by the fact that

it was dictated, not by personal selfishness, but by the
supposed welfare of a great institution, struggling to get
upon its feet, in the midst of numerous influences destructive,
not simply of its success, but of its very existence.

The Committee on Claims in the House of Represenatives
had recommended the payment of the interest due
the State of Virginia on advances made during the War
of 1812–15, but the majority in favor was only one, and
Jefferson, in February, 1826, admitted that it had still a
long gauntlet to run before it could pass the House itself.
In the meanwhile, however, the rents from the dormitories
and other buildings offered the supplementary resource
needed for the expenses of the moment.

So far unable to secure the approval of the interest
claim by Congress, and hesitating to go to the Legislature
for an independent appropriation while that measure
was pending, both Cabell and Jefferson heartily favored
the resuscitation of Jefferson's Bill for Public Education,
drafted in 1817–18. The Garland bill, now before the
General Assembly, authorized the establishment of twenty-four
district colleges; but the Jefferson bill was considered
by Cabell to be preferable, provided that it should
be so altered that the local districts would be required
to contribute at their own expense the land and buildings
that would be needed. Under the terms of this bill,
should it become law, the University would acquire from
$25,000 to $32,000, which would be sufficient to complete
the Rotunda and Anatomical Hall. This indirect
measure for obtaining money for the institution, however,
ended in disappointment, for the State was not yet ripe
for any broad and costly scheme of public instruction.

In addition to the appropriations by the General Assembly,
a very considerable sum was collected from the
persons who had signed the original subscription list.

We referred, in the history of Central College, to the
large amount which was promised by the friends of learning
in many parts of the State for the erection of that institution.
As the time for the payment of these contributions
was spread over several years, most of the instalments
only matured after the incorporation of the University.
On November 23, 1822, the balance still due
was estimated at $18,440. By September, 1823, $4,828.77
of this sum had been paid in; $2,069.88 more
was collected by September, 1824; $2,734.89 by September,
1825; and $644.85 by September, 1826. The
residue outstanding on September 30 of that year was
$8,161.68. So long as there were other funds available
for the building, the Board of Visitors determined that
it would be inexpedient to press those among the subscribers
who were delinquent; but when there arose a
danger of these obligations lapsing, an agent was employed
to collect the remaining sums. In the end, of the
$43,808 originally subscribed, only $4,500 proved to be
desperate, and a large proportion of this had become so
only because some of the subscribers had emigrated to
other States or had sunk into insolvency. The Board
had considered it unwise to base on the last collections
any stipulations which required punctuality in their fulfilment.
They had reserved this money while still unpaid
as a supplementary and contingent fund, to form a part
of the general revenue as it dribbled in, and only to be
used in covering up errors in estimating the cost of particular
buildings.