t was definitely decided that the Legislature had no
constitutional right to interfere in or dictate as to the management of
the University. The question was once more the Homeopathic issue, which
took the form of a legislative action to compel the Regents to remove
the School to Detroit. This time the Regents reversed their earlier
policy and the measure was stoutly resisted by the Board. Judge
Claudius B. Grant, '59, in delivering the opinion of the Supreme Court,
laid down the principles now accepted as governing the relations of the
University and the Legislature. The Board of Regents, he maintained, was
the only corporation whose powers were defined in the State
Constitution, whereas in the case of every other corporation established
by the Constitution it was provided that its powers should be defined by
law. "No other conclusion was, in his judgment, possible than that the
intention was to place the institution in the direct and exclusive
control of the people themselves, through a constitutional body elected
by them." Otherwise the Regents would become merely "ministerial
officers" with no other duties than to register the will of the
Legislature.

The independent status of the University has also been more firmly
established in late years by other legislative enactments and decisions.
As early as 1863 it was recognized that the Regents had power to hold
and convey real estate, though they had no authority over the land
granted by Congress for the support of the University, nor over the
principal of the fund established through the sale of that land. In 1890
such property was declared exempt from taxation, and in 1893 the Board
of Regents was declared to be alone responsible under contracts made by
it for the benefit of the University. In the new Constitution of 1908
the Regents were given the right of eminent domain, and on a number of
occasions since that time have been able to acquire "private property
for the use of the University in the manner prescribed by law." It is
difficult to see how the growth of the University during the past twelve
years with its constantly expanding building program could have taken
place without this salutary check upon the exorbitant demands of
property owners in the neighborhood of the Campus.

This financial autonomy of the Regents, once an appropriation is made by
the Legislature, has not gone unquestioned, however, particularly by the
Auditor-General. The University fund fr