Mr. BIDWELL. Mr. Speaker, by the act of July 2, 1862, entitled “ An act donating public lands to the several States and Territories which may provide colleges for the benefitof agriculture and the mechanic arts, " there was granted, on certain conditions, an amount of land equal to 30,000 acres for each Senator and Representative in Congress to which the States were respectively entitled by the apportionment under the census of 1860. The purposes of this grant of lands are de clared, m the 4th section of that act, to be the “support and maintenance in each State of at least one college where the lending object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts.” Among the enumerated conditions the several States, in Order to avail themselves of the benefits of the law, were required to express their acceptance within 2 years from the date of the approval of the not. They are required to ay all expenses nrisin from the selection and sale of the lands an the man agement and disbursement of the money. No part of the principal is to be expended in either the construction or repair of buildings. The interest only can be used for these and other expenses, so that the fund itself must remain undimiuished and be a perpetual endowment for all time. This act was amended April 14, 1864, by extending the time of acceptance 2 years (which would can it to April 14, 1860) an by specially extening the benefits of the act, as well as the act of 1862, to WestVirginia. The following States have accepted the grant, and all of them received their agricultural college scrip, except Indiana and Ca iforuia, which have but recent y accepted, to wit: 1. RhdIsland. 12. Maryland. 2. Kentucky. 13. Ohio. 3. Vermont. 14. WestVirginia. 4. NewYork. 15. Indiana. 5. Peuns vlvaninv. 16. Iowa. 6. New crsey. 17. Kansas. 7. Massachusetts. 18. Michigan. 8. Illinois. 19. Minnesota. 9. NewHampshire. 20.Oregon. 10. Connecticut. 21. Wisconsin. 11. Maine. 22. California. But these being land States are obliged to make their selections within their own limits. The States of Nevada, Delaware and Missouri, and the Territories have not, as am informed, accepted. The 3rd clause of section 5 of the act of July 2, 1862, requires that “any State which may take and claim the benefit of the provisions of that act shall provide, within 5 years at least, not less than one college, ” as described in the 4th section of the said not. Itmustbea parentto everyone, Mr. Speaker, that to provide the institutions require by the law, more time should be granted. Colleges are not the growth of a day; they require time for a properbeginning, the very foundation upon which the superstructure is to rest; they require great care, intelligence, and skill in order to shape their future proportions to the rowing wants of agricultura developement; they de mand a judicious outla of vast sums of money, which cannot be well one if done in haste. These are some of the reasons which induced the committee to recommend the extension of the time for the several States and Territories to provide these colleges. If there is one branch of industry which, more than another, claims the indulgent and fostering care of the Government, that branch is agriculture. I would by no means disparage other pursuits, for all should be encouraged; all are essential to make a complete whole the sum, I may say, of our national industry. But, Mr. Speaker, wherewould bethe manufacturingintercsts which are deemed of vital importance to every independent nation, withoutagriculture as nbasis for their very existence and growth? Where would be your commerce whose sails are beginning to nhiten almost every sea? What your future as a nation without these commonplace but life giving and life preserving merations which are the only real creations of which the hand of puny man is capable, which produce seed time and harvest, and, at the bidding of industry, clothe the valleys with their annual robes of green and supply man with his daily bread, and make the desert wastes bud and blossom as the rose? Blot out this paramount. interest and hardly a nation would survive. Organized society and labor would cease, there would be no division of labor no manufactures, no commerce, none of the arts of peace and civilization. l P! Every civilized country must of necessity derive its principal means of subsistence from the soil; everything else is merely auxiliary. Keep the agricultural interest in a prosperous condition, and the future of our own country will be grand beyond the power of human concetion. Suc an interest, then, merits, and should receive the 1st care of the nation. It should be a leading object in legislation. It should be taught by prece t and example in schools colleges, and elsew ere, and made an object of respect. ll are deeply concerned in devising the most efficient means to secure its promotion. It will afford a field of study almost limitless. If the fertile, and what have been supposed almost exhaustless, soils of America are reserved in all their vigor of production, the est modes of returning to them what is annually taken away must be understood. Every ear the best lands are losing their vitality, which is carried 06" in the form of grain and other products, which O to cities and across the ocean to supply the markets of the world, and thence through sewers and rivers to the ocean never to return. The identical elements thus thrown away must be replaced or the soil be comes impoverished. lhey must be chiefly sought in another form and collected from other sources than those whitherthey have been transported in the form of marketable products, and the aid of science must be brought to bear to solve the adproblem, and hence the necessity of colleges whose leading object shall be agriculture. The preservation of timber is another important consideration. In many parts of our country there is already an absolute scarcity. In other parts, as the great prairies of the West, the normal condition of the country was timberless. The best mode of releuishin our wasted timber lands should be ise overe and put into execution. There can be no doubt, I think, as to the possibility of making rairics of the West wave with fields if properly sown and cultivated. The rearing and improvement of domestic animals is anoble employment, and advantage ous I might sa indispensable to national prosperity, and should ever be an object of public recognition. It will be sufficient to state, in order to see the value of this branch of the farming interest of the country, that there was in 1860, in the U.S. 6, 250,000 in roun numbers of horses, or, including mules, over 7,000,000; of neat cattle, over 25.5mooo; of sheep, over 22,000,000; of swine, over 33, 500,000, amounting, in value, to the enormous sum of over $1,000,000,000, or more than 1/3rd of the present national debt. The grain growing interest is enormous, amounting, in 1860, to a grand total of 1, 221, 468, 127 bushels of wheat, rye, corn, oats, and barley. These items alone would, in all probability, be sufficient, if reduced to dollars, to pay another 3rd of the national debt, and this too, in ever recurring streams, to be repeated as often as the earth shall repeat its annual circuit around its central sun. Agriculture must, tobe successful for all time, be in the hands of free and intelligent labor. There must be no mudsills, because agriculture will not thrive in the mud; and yet the mud contains within itself all the elements of fertility. Drain it, cultivate it, and bring forth its latent powers, and the reward will be fruits, flowers, and golden grain to gladden the heart and supply the wants of the laborer and this billustration may be not inapplicable to the laboring classes whom slavery, with haught pride, denominated as “the mudsills of socicty.” Cultivate these classes, and train them in the wayto intelligence, usefulness, and honor, and the choicest fruits of the human intellect and the most gifted minds may crown the labors of this nation. From these classes may Presidents, statesmen, poets, orators, and sporiyna heroes to perpetuate the blessings and the glo vice of this nation in peace, “for peace both her victories no less renowned than war, " and defend the emblem of our national freedom against all enemies from within or from without and I will embrace thisoccasion to say, Mr. Speaker, that when all citizens shall have an equal opportunity to become intelli out and understand the real issues that have renched this nation in blood, and labor shall be duly respected, there will be no more traitors within the length and breadth of this then glorious and happy country. Ever since the rebellion began no man has felt more desirous than myself to see every vestige of slayer, swept from the land. The war was the resut of injustice to an unfortunate and downtrodden race. I have believed, and still believe, that our only safety for the future is to plant ourselves on the enduring rock of equal and exact justice by that I mean equal protection and civil rights to all citizens, the igh, the low, the rich, and the poor. Every line of distinction is purely arbitrary and despotic in principle and intendency, and wholly inconsistent with the fundamental principles of democratic republican government. To me it seems that whatever may be denied the States recently in rebellion, they should not be denied the means of intelligence. Give them that with a bounteous hand, and surround them with a flood of light to light their future pathway to allegiance and goo government. I now yield the door to the Gentfrom Iowa, [Mr. GuIXNILL]