Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York

King's College

Following a decade of fundraising, primarily through interest-bearing loans made from the proceeds of public lotteries, those who had been legally entrusted with responsibility for this revenue petitioned for a royal charter to establish a new college on "a very valuable parcel of Ground on the west side of the Broadway" in the Province of New York.^[8] In 1754, King George II of Great Britain issued a charter establishing King's College as a legal corporation. The founding charter contained provisions for the government of this corporation, which consisted of a board of governors or directors, toward its formal mission: "the Instruction and Education of Youth in the Learned Languages and Liberal Arts and Sciences."^[8] According to the charter, this "body Corporate and politick" is granted final authority "to make and set down in writing, such Laws, ordinances, and orders, for the Better Government of the said College, and Students, and Ministers thereof, as they shall think best for the General Good of the same," thereby establishing the board's exclusive right to make and amend the rules governing the college, as long as they do not conflict with local, state, or federal laws.^[8]

The charter originally established the board of governors of King's College with 41 members, replacing the ten-member Lottery Commission appointed by the New York Assembly to oversee lottery funds allocated to the establishment of the college.^{[9][page needed]} These board members named in the charter would be replaced by successors chosen by the board when positions became vacant.^[8] The board of governors originally included several ex officio members, including, crown officials, members of the colonial government, and ministers of various Protestant denominations:^[10]

A further twenty-four individuals were named in the charter, serving without terms with their successors to be selected by subsequent governors. College faculty were not provided seats ex officio on the board of governors, at variance with contemporary practice at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, where the faculty was engaged in the governance of their colleges, but was very much in line with practice of other colonial colleges governed by external boards.^[11]

The charter permitted Protestants to serve as governors but excluded Roman Catholics and Jews. Only three members would be Anglicans: the Archbishop of Canterbury, the rector of Trinity Church, and the President of Columbia University, and they were offset by four ex officio members selected from New York's Dutch Reformed Church, French Protestant church, Lutheran Church, and Presbyterian Church.^[11] In practice, the board was dominated by Anglicans, members of the Trinity Church, and the Dutch Reformed Church. Of the fifty-nine men who served as governors, only three ex officio members were not from the Anglican or Dutch Reformed churches.

More than half of the fifty-nine New Yorkers who served as governor made their livings as merchants. The next most common occupation among the governors was law (20 percent), followed by ministers (16 percent), and there was only one doctor.^[12] The governors met 102 times in 22 years and most meetings were attended by around fifteen governors. A quarter of the governors attended fewer than ten meetings, and another half were absent, leaving a core of sixteen governors. Academic matters such as faculty appointments, the curriculum, and admissions requirements were overseen by degree-bearing ministers, while governors drawing from the city's mercantile and legal ranks oversaw financial matters such as construction of collegiate buildings or the salary of the college steward. This informal division of duties survived the reorganization of the King's College into Columbia College and persisted into the 1960s.^[13]

In terms of politics, the ratio of Loyalists to Patriots during the American Revolution among the governors was more than eight to one.^[14] The college was severely affected by the revolutionary war, which forced the college to shut down for eight years and a number of governors fled to Canada and the West Indies.

Columbia College

In 1784, it became the Board of Regents of Columbia College after the former King's College was reinstated. The 1784 charter also stipulated that eight of the seats on the board should be held by ranking state officials ex officio, with the remaining 24 regents to be appointed, two each, from the state's 12 counties, with only three places reserved for New York City residents. The number of regents was subsequently expanded to 33 by the New York State Legislature, with 20 of them residents of New York City, including a mix of prominent politicians and clergymen such as John Jay, Samuel Provoost, Leonard Lispenard, Gershom Mendes Seixas, and John Daniel Gros.^{[15][page needed]}

It was renamed in a new 1787 charter as the Trustees of Columbia College in the City of New York, and the college was relieved of its duties as a state institution, returning to earlier status as a privately governed college serving the city. None of the college's trustees were to be state officials, and all replacements were to be elected by incumbent board members.^{[15][page needed]} Only until 1908 did the board start accepting alumni nominations.

Columbia University

The board arrived at its final name of The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York by an order from the Supreme Court of New York on July 17, 1912, 16 years after Columbia College was renamed as Columbia University.^[16]

Although the trustees usually approve faculty recommendations for hiring and dismissal of Columbia faculty, in some cases they have taken a more direct role. Notably, in 1917 they fired psychologist James McKeen Cattell for his anti-war and anti-conscription views, a case significant in the history of academic freedom.^[17][18]