The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 43, July 1939 - April, 1940 Page: 293
576 p. : ill., maps ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The University Crosses the Bar
amend the Constitution so that the Legislature might make direct
appropriations for buildings. These were without success. Then,
I confess it, we tried the method of evading the Constitution,
for which notable precedents existed, but the Legislative con-
science was too sensitive for relief to be secured through this
channel. And then, just when the case seemed hopeless, oil was
discovered on University lands. That event gave the kaleidoscope
a sudden turn and the future took on a much more roseate color.
Many things then seemed possible, which, without that discovery,
had been hopeless. So plans began to take shape to bring about
the much desired but long delayed results.
Mr. Brackenridge was then the owner of five hundred acres
of land, lying along the Colorado River in the vicinity of the
Austin dam. In discussing our problems and plans with him, he
said to me one day, "Why don't you undertake something really
worth while for the future of the University. Give the Legisla-
ture and the people of Texas a shock. You have everything to
gain and nothing to lose. Let's go after this thing in a really
big way." He then offered to deed his five hundred acres to the
University if the Board of Regents and the Legislature would
accept them as the future and permanent home for the institu-
tion.5 As the result of that conference and his offer, a paper
was prepared for presentation to the Legislature, outlining the
existing conditions of the University and giving some forecasts
of its future expansion and needs. It drew such a picture of the
place and function of the University in the life of the State, such
a vision of its possible future, as only a man of Mr. Brackenridge's
intellectual endowments was competent to see and to paint. It
has always seemed to me that it is in cases like this that we
experience one of the fundamental weaknesses of the democratic
system, for, unfortunately, the decision of this matter lay in
the power of lesser men.
5There was a general belief around the University that at the time Mr.
Brackenridge offered to deed the 500 acres for the future home of the
institution the University had already, for some years, been in possession
of the land. My recollection is that Mr. Brackenridge had made provision
in his will (dated I think in 1913) bequeathing the land to the University
and, in anticipation of this eventual ownership, had permitted the Uni-
versity to make use of some of the land for certain purposes. At the time
he made me the offer referred to I had no doubt that the title was still in
his possession and subject to his control.293
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 43, July 1939 - April, 1940, periodical, 1940; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101111/m1/317/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.