Page:History of Public School Education in Arizona.djvu/94



By the act of Congress of June 20, 1910, provision was made for the meeting of a constitutional convention in Arizona. This convention was instructed to provide also for the election of officers for the new State. This election was held about December, 1911. The State was admitted into the Union February 14, 1912. The enabling act under which the State was admitted began by declaring for the maintenance of a public school system to be open to all, free from sectarian control, and always conducted in English. Sections 16 and 36 and 2 and 32 of the public land were set aside for an endowment, and while the congressional act of June 20, 1910, expressly declares that the internal improvements act of September 4, 1841, the swamp-lands act of September 28, 1850, and the agricultural act of July 2, 1862, should not apply to Arizona, there was granted in lieu of these and all other donations and in addition to the four sections named above, land for educational purposes, as follows:

If there should be any surplus after these bonds were paid, it was to be added to the permanent school fund. Thus, in addition to the four sections in each township, there was given to the new State a total of 2,000,000 acres of land (or a total of more than 10,000,000 acres in all), most of which went directly to education, and there was the further promise of the usual 5 per cent of the net sales of public land by the Federal Government after the Territory had become a State. This sum was to be “a permanent and inviolable fund,” and

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