Under article 8 of the enclosed Constitution for The State of Maine: formed in Convention, at Portland, 29th of October, A. D. 1819, … And recommended to the People for their adoption in town meetings, on the Sixth of December (Portland, 1819; possibly Poor, Jefferson’s Library description begins Nathaniel P. Poor, Catalogue. President Jefferson’s Library, 1829 description ends , 11 [no. 646]), the state’s legislators were to require “the several towns to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the support and maintenance of public schools; and it shall further be their duty to encourage and suitably endow, from time to time, as the circumstances of the people may authorise, all academies, colleges and seminaries of learning within the State.” The article also gave the state the authority to “alter, limit or restrain” any power invested in any literary institution accepting state funding (p. 16). It was included in the constitution approved by the United States Congress on 3 Mar. 1820, and it remains in effect (Laws of the State of Maine [Brunswick, 1821], 1:39; U.S. Statutes at Large description begins Richard Peters, ed., The Public Statutes at Large of the United States … 1789 to March 3, 1845, 1845–67, 8 vols. description ends , 3:544).