The Morrill Act, first proposed by U.S. Rep. Justin Morrill of Vermont in 1857, grants each state 30,000 acres of federal land for each senator and representative it has. The land is to be used for the endowment and maintenance of at least one college for agriculture and mechanical arts. The construction of these land-grant colleges will not occur until after the Civil War. A second Morrill Act will be passed after the Civil War to extend the original act’s provisions to Southern states.