Address by John A. Hannah at the commencement exercises, Colorado State University

at the commencement Exe;rcises Colorado State University June 7, 1963

President Morgan, Chairman Waneka, I'm highly honored by the degree you have ju9t awarded me. I am grateful to Colorado State University, to your State Board of Agriculture and to your Faculty. Your generous and extravagantly flattering citation and words of introduction touch me deeply. I shall always wear with pride the hood you have given me this evening. Thanks to all of you.

President Morgan, Members of the State Board of AGriculture, members of the Faculty, members of the graduating class and your guests, ladies and gentlemen.

Colorful Colorado has always been a magnet for Americans not privileged to live in your beautiful state.. Your mountains, your climate, your zest for life in the Western tradition make this a most attractive mecca. All of this you know.

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It is/real privilege to come to Colorado again and to have the opportunity to see the many changes.that have come about at Colorado State University in recent years. · President Morgan, the members of your governing board, the faculty, the students, the people of Colorado are to be congratulated on the progress that has been made here. The solemn, steady progress that has thrust Colorado State into the front ranks of American universities. These are not the polite remarks of a casual guest. My afternoon spent in meetings with a considerable number of Michigan State alumni on your faculty, meeting with your board and the complete tour of your campus

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under the guidance of a Michigan State alumnus, Vice President Chamberlain, has made this a thrilling experience. This University today evidences

sound planning and execution of an intelligent plan for future development. I hope that I may have the opportunity to come back again in another five or ten years to see what can be the outstanding university of this country.

It might surpirse you to learn that there is an old mystical tie between Colorado and Michigan State University. Much of the early design for this institution was copied from an older sister, our Michigan State University, the oldest of the land-grant colleges. Even the name of your governing board, the basic original plan, reference to curricula

arrangement ~nd the like were largely borrowed from MSU. A considerable number o of graduates of Michigan State were early settlers in this state. George Eaton, one of the earliest graduates of MSU came to Colorado in April 1870, a

·few months after his graduation with the class of 1_{69. He was a member of ·}

the Union Colony which founded the city of Greeley. Eaton remained at Greeley engaged mostly in farming until September of 1879, when in the words of our alumni historian of that era, and these are the words of that historian, not mine, "Eaton was engaged. by Indian agent Meeker to go to the White River Agency to assist him in teaching the Indians how to cultivate the soil. The Indians rebelled against this idea and without further well known cause aroused in for:ce and massacred the members of the agency. Eaton's body was found by the soliders of General Merritt's command near the agency on the 11th of October. This mas'sacre is regarded as one of the most cruel and uncalled for of any in the history of our treatment of the Indians. No punishment has

ever-been meted out to the Indians for the crime and Eaton's body lies buried near the spot where it was found." And I again repeat those are not my words but copy from historical notes.

Now this little footnote to history is called to your attention, not alone to demonstrate the Michigan State University has indeed a tie to early Colorado, but to illustrate the more important point that the history of our country is very short and almost contemporary. Instruction began here at Fort Collins on this campus the very same year as the massacre of the White River Agency in which this early MSU alumnus met his death. While some men were still struggling on the frontiers of civilization

to win this portion of the West, others were struggling to lay a corner stone of the foundation for a great university to help build the great America we know.

And looking at Colorado and Colorado State University today, one findsit hard to believe that this episode occurred only 84 years ago. All of this progress has occurred in the life time of living people and the life time of a man covers a very short period in history. Remembering that so little tim~ has elapsed and so much has ·been accomplished, it is easier to understand why the land-grant universities, and particularly those which stand as independent institutions, are just beginning to come into their own. They are destined to play increasingly influential roles in the future and I speak to this point with some feeling and much experience and possibly bias, because Michigan State like Colorado State has had t<? work hard to gain the reQognition it deserves.

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One recent evidence that they are coming ·into their own is the fact that they are now generally known as universities, rather than as A&M colleges or state colleges. And this welcome and deserved change has come about only within the last ten years, decades after they had in

fact become universities. ·The change was made grudgingly in many

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instances. And now that long battle for vindication has been\von and we can

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reflect philosophically on the fact that educational prestige is achieved only long after it is deserved on the basis of performance.

On the other side of the coin is another fact that academic prestige often persists long after it ceases to be merited on the basis of true distinction;

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The separated land grant colleges, aH-universities_,of which there were a total of ·2 4, had been well accepted for years by their blood relatives, the state universities that are unified land grant colleges of which there were also 24 but now the hand of fellowship is being extended with less and less reservation by all other universities, public an private alike.

And it is good for the future of America that this is so. Where there is so much to be done, so many students to educate, so much research to be done, so many new demands to satisfy that we cannot afford to handicap

any university through an artificial educational caste system. Working

together in harmony and in mutual respect, we shall have more than we can do well to meet the challenges with which we are confronted.

It is interesting to take a minute to inquire into why and how the universities

And the answers may suggest whether they will play increasingly influential

roles in the future. And I believe they will. Their groWing recognition is not a particular tribute to those who serve these institutions today. This generation of leaders are not supermen who have conquered where others failed in earlier years. Their success is instead another vindication of the land grant plj,iosophy first expounded more than a century ago and given formal endorsement and a chance to prove its validity by the federal land grant act of 1862.

That philosophy was explained at great length last year when we were in the midst of a nationwide land grant centennial celebration. Boiled down to the essence, theland grant educational philosophy is based

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on a conviction that liberal and practical education should be made available at minimum cost to all who are qualified to seek it.

Senator·Morrill of Vermont, the author of the land grant college act, was plugging primarily for an education for farmers and the mechanics but he saw something beyond that first objective. In his eloquent speech on behalf of his first bill, he exhorted his Congressional colleagues in these words, and t-his is a quote, "Pass this measure and we shall have something to enable the

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farmer:t~

raise two blades of grass instead of/.' Something for cheap scientific

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education, ·something for every man who loves :illd:cl~aNl!bd~mxw~"''X intelligence and not ignorance, something to remove the last vestige of pauperism from our land, something for peace and good order, something to enable the people to .bear the enormous expenditures of national government."

In his veto message Pres_ident Buchanan made this profound comment. And this is the quote, "It is extremely doubtful to say the least whether the bill

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would contribute to the advancement of agriculture and the mechanic arts."

Three years later Abraham Lincoln urged the Congress to re-pass the Morrill Act. It was passed and he signed it into law in 1862. Time has vindicated President Lincoln and Morrill and those who voted

with him and time has vindicated those colleges and universities which have worked faithfully to put Morrill's ideas into practice and to transmute his dream into reality. Time has repudiated the view of Buchanan and the prejudices of those who thought that nothing good could come from a college that admittedly sought to offer practical education to the children of working

people, the so-called industrial classes of that day. The professions and

vocations for which we prepare young people have gained in social

acceptability as they have grown in importance to our economic well-being. A family no longer apologizes for a son who is not preparing to be a doctor,or

g lawyer, or a surgeon. Other professions have been pushed up to take their

places along side the so-called learned profession.

An engineer is no longer referred to as an educated mecharuc as he once was called. The business executive or successful farmer is fully

a<;:cepted in our society, in legislative halls, and in politicallep.dership. Our alumni are occupying more and more positions of power and prestige. They speak with p-ride of the colleges from which they came and they support them vigorously and generously. This accounts in part for the recent success of the land grant colleges.

Americans are not snobbish or class conscious, they :ljulll:gt'!::x!xlx:

tend to judge the man himself and what he do.es rather than by such artifical standards as who is grandfather was and what college he attended.

This has worked for the benefit of the colleges once called cow colleges. The more important reason for the growing prestige of the land grant universities is that the soundness of their educational philosophy has been demonstrated so consistently over such a long period of time that no one questions it seriously. The American people have come to agree that all legitimate activities are good subjects for academic attention. They have come to agree that it is desirable for increasing numbers of young men and women to be prepared through education to contribute economically, socially and politically to the strengthening of our way of life.

The value of making educational opportunities readily

available has come to be accepted, and the institutions that first testified to that value through their works are being deservedly accepted for what they are. The value of the contribution universities can make to the economic development of the country through research is being recognized. This is

a relatively recent development. Research has come to be a meaningful word

in the vocabularies of business and industrial leaders, city councils, chambers . of commerce, the real estate promoters. It is this lure with which they hope

to. attract new industries and create new jobs as new industries have been attracted to New England and California and thousands of new jobs created thereby.

And happy is the community today that has a research oriented

university. in its midst. There is nothing wrong with this approach. Universities

should and do serve the industrial segment of our economic system and they should and do serve other segments. Universities are gratified that the business and

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industrial community is turning to them fqr help in recognition of their vital importance. They only wish support from business and industry for universities matched the volume of demands for help.

We who have studied and served in land grant institutions smile a little ruefully because this recognition of the importance of research to industry is so belated. What is being asked of us now is exactly what we have been doing for the basic industry of agriculture for three -quarters of a

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century. Since the passage of ,

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the Hatch Act in 1887. It is now generally recognized that what the land grant colleges did through teaching research in Extension to mak~":A.merican agriculture more efficent brought indirect but enormous· benefits to non-agricultural industry as well. This is an old story an~ well worth re-telling.By making farming more efficient we feed

increasing numbers of Americans to work in industry which could plan for growth and development with assurance that there would be an ample supply of labor. And America's industrial pre-eminence has its roots in American

agriculture. It is surprising that it has taken business and industry so lon~ prosperity

to recognize the potential value of research to their RR§:lR~RR~~. And perhaps we threw them off scent by calling our research centers "agricultural

Experiment Stations." If we had called. them something else, like "Biological Research Centers," or even "Agricultural Science Research Centers," they might have caught the notice of the industrial and business world long ago.

Deserved, recognition is sweet. All of us are gratified by recent events.

What should concern us more is the qu,estion: What of the future? This is· of particular concern to those who receive their degrees this evening from Colorado State University. The value of today's degree will vary in value as the fortunes of Colorado State University varies. If Colorado State continues to grow in strength and usefulness as I am sure it will, then the diplomas certifying the completion of the course of study here become more valuable. Should

you permit the prestige of your Alma Mater to falter the value of your degrees will falter, too. The fortunes and future of this university will in a sense and to a degree rest in your hands.

The future is bright for all higher education. There will be no diminution in the demand for college graduates in a society becoming

increasingly complex and difficult to manage. There will be no lessening in the f:lX deman_d for research of the kind that universities are uniquely qualified to perform. The American people will not give up their belief in the importance of education at all levels. · The land grant universities are in a particular strong position because of their long experience in both basic and applied research and experience on which they can build expanding programs of vital importance in many fields.

The next great forward thrust in scientific discovery and strength of the development will be in the biological sciences, a very real llm:axk:xfxxx~

land grant colleges. Clark Kerr, the president of the University of California, discussed this point in a recent address at Harvard University. This is what he said: "The fastest growing intellectual field today is ·biology . . . _The 'code

~ml:d~ of life can now be read; soon it will be ~nderstood, and after that, used. It is an intellectual discovery of unique and staggering proportions.. The secrets of the atom may hold no grc~.:· ;._' significance, much as they have changed and are €-}:;::.;:,

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changing human activity on this planet, than the secrets still hidden in the

genetic code. If the first half of the twentieth century may be said to have

belonged to the physical sciences, the second half may well belong to the biological. Resources within the universities will be poured into the new

biology and into the resulting new medicine and agriculture, well supported as

medicine and agriculture already are."

It would have delighted Senator M0 rrill to have heard

agriculture equated with medicine as an intellectual area of great importance. The land grant universities, including this one, have been involved in an exten~ive program of technical assistance to nations overseas.

As

a consequ~nce: they are assembling valuable bodies of knowledge and

faculties of remarkable experience and knowledge of world affairs.

These overseas activities undertaken for the !:::est of altruistic

·reasons will pay on-campus dividends in the years ahead. It is difficult to

think of any major enterprise in this country that will not be related in some r

mannerJ:o ,and affected in some manner by, international affairs. Business,

industry, commerce and government will be recruiting more and more young

people to serve overseas, or in domestic responsibilities requiring some knowledge o~ international affairs. Faculty members who themselves have had

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experienc~abroad bring an important first hand experience and appreciation

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of the interdependence of today' s world into their class room teaching. But there is at least one cloud in the bright skies. Questions

There are no ready made answers. No design for a printing press to

turn out painlessly the millions of dollars that will be needed. We are not

persuaded that the United States cannot afford what it must have. If it is to grow in strength and prosper materially more higher education is one

of the prerequisites. We are not influenced by those who haggle a:ru± at the

size of the investment required, noting the alacrity with which we build super-highways and the relative ease with which we finance them, and noting the cost

of flying to the moon and how willingly we ante up the necessary millions of

dollars.

We are not persuaded that America is too poor to educate her

sons and daughterp, just because there are suddenly so many of them. We are

a little ashamed to have us beg poverty when we read the recent UNESCO estimate that

to give each child eight years of primary eeucation in the following countries would cost, at current prices, about 0.-8 percent of the national income in the

United States, 1. 7 percent of the national income in Jamaica, 2. 8 percent of the national income in Ghana, and 4 percent of the national income in Nigeria.

At Michigan State University we know something about Nigeria

because we helped to establish the Univer$ity of Nigeria and we are lending assistance

considerable as~ to it. The people of Nigeria, the most promising country

in all of ~?lack AFrica are hungry for education as are the people of many of the

world's new nations. They mean to have education for their people no matter

what the cost. They see education as the only means by which they can lift

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They are seeking to emulate the people of America. They give widespread

education, not our natural resources, not our political system, the credit for making this the strongest country in the world. We have set them an

example and they mean to follow it. This is the American example the Russians are following, too. The Russians are not only following our example, they intend to out?o us by offering free education to their ablest youth, through the

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highest level in their best graduate schools and this education free. They intend

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to beat us if they can by copying our dedication to widespread educational

opportunity for all able young people.

One difference between the developing countries and our own I

is that many of them are willing to establish priorities, and they put education

in top place.

If we are indeed at the breaking point in taxation, as some contend, . then we too must have the courage and .the wisdom to determine what is mor~

important, and what is less important, and allocate our tax funds accordingly. Once upon a time the American people had this all straight in

their minds. The early pioneers built a schoolhouse soon after they had built their homes, often before they built the church. They opened the doors of

Colorado State University here at Fort Collins while Indians were massacring

well-meaning farmers 150 miles to the west. They established the land grant colleges and pledged a large share of the national treasure of public lands to their support in the middle of a civil war when the very survival of the

They k.new what was important. They chose education, and they backed their choice with their scanty dollars.

Do we of this day have less wisdom, less vision, less courage

than those whose heirs we are? What we have today was made possible by those who made their choice, and properly, in days long faded into history. What

legacy do we leave to the generations to come after us?

Is it to be only a notation that we loved our comforts and our conveniences and our luxuries too much, that we could not bring ourselves to

sacrifice when sacrifice was indicated, that we were not smart enough to put first things first?

WJ:at we urgently need is a national declaration of purpose. We need to declare our renewed intention to do whatever is needed to insure broadening of educational opportunity for our young people to insure that our . schools, colleges, and universities will continue to grow in strength as

instruments of social usefulness, and to insure that coming generations will inherit an· educational fl!JllFlfl!Xtrn:xi:t:JDdXn· legacy better and finer than we inherited from those who have gone before.

The need for such a declaration of purpose is not the need of the colleges and universities. It is the need of the nation itself. The crisis in education is not the crisis of the colleges and universities. It is a crisis of young Americans who may be denied their educational heritage, and for their fathers and mothers. Colleges and universities are but the agencies of the American people through which they have in the past lifted themselves farther

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economically, socially, politically, culturally -- than any other people anywhere

in a comparable period of time. What happens to these institutions is not

important in itself. What is important is what the American peopl~ decide

should happen to this nation, now and in the future.

If they want the nation to develop and prosper, they will see to it that their colleges are adequately maintained. All kinds of colleges --private and public, large and small. In this day and age, above all others, it

is true that if we want to move ever forward, we must rely increasingly upon

more and more higher education, teaching and research. The explosion of knowledge

must be kept up with and encouraged.

No:w and finally, as we congratulate all of you who are today

completing your work at this university and receiving your degrees and setting

out in a variety of directions, and say to each of you that we wish for you

·success and happiness. We would also· remind you that you who are graduating

this evening will have much to say when tomorrow's decisions are made. Your

advice and counsel will have weight with your fellow citizens. You who have

received the benefits of higher education at a land grant university supported

with tax funds have good reason to appreciate the value of the opportunity Colorado

generosity

State University represents and the ~s:ity" of the taxpayers of this state who

have ma~e your education possible.

And you have an obligation to· help persuade your fellow citizens

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that doors of opportunity must remain o:pen to those who will follow you. If..-,our

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Millions of young people throughout the world envy what you have here. Do you value it enough to preserve, protect, and defend it for those to follow you? We believe you do. We must believe that, or the future holds little promise for any of us and little promise for our country. Thank you.