Board of Regents of the University of Michigan

The Board of Regents of the University of Michigan is the legal corporation that controls the University of Michigan, comprising the campuses at Ann Arbor, Flint, and Dearborn. The Board of Regents was created by the Organic Act of March 18, 1837 that established the modern University of Michigan. The terms of the Regents and their method of selection have undergone several changes since 1837, but the Board has served as a continuous body since then.

Although the Board of Regents was formed as a new legal entity in 1837, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in 1856 that it was legally continuous with the Board of Trustees of the University of Michigan that was formed in 1821, and with the Catholepistemiad, or University, of Michigania that was formed in 1817. The present-day University of Michigan recognizes 1817 as the year of its founding, and this article considers all of these bodies.

Michigan is one of four states with public university governing boards elected directly by the people (along with Colorado, Nebraska, and Nevada).harvnb|Hebel|2004] The Board of Regents is one of three elected university governing boards in the state (the others being the Michigan State University Board of Trustees and the Wayne State University Board of Governors).

Current Board

The current Board of Regents consists of eight Regents, two of whom are elected on a partisan statewide ballot every two years to an eight-year term, plus the President of the University of Michigan as an ex officio member. The Regents (excepting the President) serve without compensation, and meet once a month in public session. As of September 2007, the Board consists of six Democrats and two Republicans:

* Mary Sue Coleman, "ex officio", 13th President of the University of Michigan
* Julia Donovan Darlow, Democrat from Ann Arbor, first elected in 2006
* Laurence B. Deitch, Democrat from Bingham Farms, first elected in 1992
* Olivia P. Maynard, Democrat from Goodrich, first elected in 1996
* Rebecca McGowan, Democrat from Ann Arbor, first elected in 1992
* Andrea Fischer Newman, Republican from Ann Arbor, first elected in 1994
* Andrew C. Richner, Republican from Grosse Pointe Park, first elected in 2002
* S. Martin Taylor, Democrat from Grosse Pointe Farms, first elected in 1996
* Katherine E. White, Democrat from Ann Arbor, first elected in 1998

Legal independence and the Homeopathic School

Prior to 1850, the University of Michigan in its various incarnations was a product of the Michigan Legislature (or its territorial equivalents), and the Board of Regents and its predecessors were subject to oversight and control by the Legislature. The state constitution of 1850 elevated the Board of Regents to the level of a constitutional corporation, making the University of Michigan the first public institution of higher education in the country so organized.harvnb|Guevara|2005|p=17] The Legislature did not give up its control easily, and the Board of Regents engaged in a number of battles with legislators before the matter was settled, several of them involving the establishment of a school of homeopathic medicine.

In 1851, a group of citizens who supported the homeopathy movement petitioned the Legislature to force the Board of Regents to add professors of homeopathy to the medical school staff. The board took no action, but Dr. Zina Pitcher wrote a detailed account of their thinking to leave for their incoming replacements (the first class of elected regents in 1852):harvnb|Hinsdale|1906|p=106]

...shall the accumulated results of three thousand years of experience be laid aside, because there has arisen in the world a sect which, by engrafting a medical dogma upon a spurious theology, have built up a system (so-called) and baptized it Homœopathy? Shall the High Priests of this spiritual school be specially commissioned by the Regents of the University of Michigan, to teach the grown up men of this age that the decillionth of a grain of sulphur will, if administered homœopathically, cure seven-tenths of their diseases, whilst in every mouthful of albuminous food they swallow, every hair upon their heads, and every drop of urine distilled from the kidneys, carries into or out of their system as much of that article as would make a body, if incorporated with the required amount of sugar, as large as the planet Saturn? [harvnb|Michigan Dept. of Public Instruction|1852|p=325-326]

Nothing further happened until 1855, when the Legislature revisited the subject and modified the Organic Act to include the provision that "there shall always be one Professor of Homœopathy in the Department of Medicine."harvnb|Hinsdale|1906|p=107] The Board of Regents again took no action to comply. In 1867, the Legislature used the power of the purse and passed a statewide property tax to benefit the university "provided the board of regents would comply with the law of 1855, and appoint at least one professor in the medical department of the university."harvnb|Wing|Gay|1890|p=350] Although the money was desperately needed, the regents again refused to comply, and two years later the money was released by the Legislature without restriction.harvnb|Hinsdale|1906|p=57] By 1871, the expressed public desire for a Homeopathic School led the Board of Regents to consider establishing one at Detroit, separate from the Medical School. In 1875, the school was actually established, but in Ann Arbor, not Detroit.harvnb|Hinsdale|1906|p=107-108]

In 1895, the positions were reversed, and the Legislature tried to force the regents to move the Homeopathic School from Ann Arbor to Detroit. The regents refused, and the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the state constitution explicitly defined the powers of the Board of Regents independently of the Legislature, while every other corporation the constitution created had its powers specified by the Legislature. Justice Claudius Grant wrote: "No other conclusion was...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."harvnb|Shaw|1920|p=168-169]

This ruling established the precedent that the Board of Regents is an independent branch of the state government, answerable to the people of the state, not to the Governor or Legislature. The Homeopathic School at the center of the battle was eventually merged into the Medical School in 1922. [harvnb|Michigan State Medical Society|1922|p=145]

List of Members of the Board of Regents of the University of Michigan (and its predecessors)

Catholepistemiad, or University, of Michigania (1817-1821)

The Catholepistemiad, or University, of Michigania, was established by the Governor and Judges of Michigan Territory in 1817, following a plan devised by Chief Justice Augustus Woodward. The Catholepistemiad was self-governed by the professors (or "Didactors") that held its thirteen professorships ("didaxiim"). In fact, the thirteen didaxiim were divided up between just two men, who thus controlled the entire institution: [harvnb|Hinsdale|1906|pp=11]
* Rev. John Monteith, President (and holder of seven professorships)
* Father Gabriel Richard, Vice-President (and holder of six professorships)

Board of Trustees of the University of Michigan (1821-1837)

In 1821, the Governor and Judges of Michigan Territory renamed the Catholepistemiad to the University of Michigan, and placed control of the University in the hands of a Board of Trustees consisting of 20 citizens plus the Governor. Their previous positions abolished, Father Richard and Rev. Monteith were both appointed to the Board of Trustees; Monteith left that summer for a professorship at Hamilton College, while Richard remained on the board until his death in 1832.

As it was common during this era for the Governor to be absent, the various men who served as Acting Governor are included in this list "in italics", but no specific dates should be inferred as to when exactly they were Acting Governor. Also, no predecessor/successor relationship among specific Trustees should be inferred from their relative position in the table. Using the terms in office cited in the historical sources, at some points there are up to 22 simultaneous Trustees, even though only 20 were called for.

Source: Names and dates harv|Bentley Historical Library|2006, party affiliations harv|Kestenbaum

Notes

References

* Citation
last = Bentley Historical Library
year = 2006
title = Regents of the University of Michigan
url = http://bentley.umich.edu/exhibits/regents/regents.php
* Citation
last = Bentley Historical Library
year = 2007
title = Regents of the University of Michigan: Historical Background
url = http://bentley.umich.edu/exhibits/regents/history.php
* Citation
last = Guevara
first = David L.
year = 2005
title = Institutional Autonomy and Public Institutions of Higher Education
url = http://www.educationlawconsortium.org/forum/2005/papers/guevara.pdf
publisher = Education Law Consortium, University of Georgia
* Citation
last = Hebel
first = Sara
year = 2004
title = State Regents: Should They Be Elected or Appointed?
url = http://chronicle.com/weekly/v51/i08/08a00101.htm
date = October 15, 2004
journal = The Chronicle of Higher Education
volume = 51
issue = 8
pages = A1
* Citation
last = Hinsdale
first = Burke A.
year = 1906
title = History of the University of Michigan
editor-last = Demmon
editor-first = Isaac
publisher = University of Michigan
url = http://books.google.com/books?id=z6sWAAAAIAAJ
accessdate = 2007-08-16
* Citation
last = Kestenbaum
first = Lawrence
title = The Political Graveyard
url = http://politicalgraveyard.com
contribution = University of Michigan Board of Regents
contribution-url = http://politicalgraveyard.com/geo/MI/ofc/uofm.html
* Citation
last = Michigan Dept. of Public Instruction
year = 1852
title = System of public instruction and primary school law of Michigan. Prepared by Francis W. Shearman, superintendent of public instruction
publisher = Ingals, Hedges
publication-place = Lansing
url = http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1425567509/
oclc = 48522069
* Citation
last = Michigan State Medical Society
year = 1922
title = The Journal of the Michigan State Medical Society
volume = 21
* Citation
last = Shaw
first = Wilfred
title = The University of Michigan
year = 1920
publisher = Harcourt, Brace and Howe
publication-place = New York
url = http://books.google.com/books?id=WH4IAAAAMAAJ
* Citation
editor-last = Shaw
editor-first = Wilfred
year = 1942
title = The University of Michigan, An Encyclopedic Survey
publisher = University of Michigan
publication-place = Ann Arbor
url = http://bentley.umich.edu/bhl/digpubs/encysurv.htm
oclc = 1349782
* Citation
last = Wing
first = Talcott E.
last2 = Gay
first2 = Helen W.
year = 1890
title = History of Monroe County, Michigan
publisher = Munsell
publication-place = New York
url = http://books.google.com/books?id=UJEPx_u92h8C
oclc = 957977

Further reading

* Citation
last = Chase
first = Theodore R.
year = 1880
title = The Michigan University Book. 1844-1880.
url = http://books.google.com/books?id=MNOH6G68Q1kC
publisher = Richmond, Backus
publication-place = Detroit
oclc = 68793919

External links

* [http://regents.umich.edu/ Regents of the University of Michigan]
* [http://quod.lib.umich.edu/u/umregproc/ Proceedings of the Board of Regents of the University of Michigan (1837-2005)]