Article IX Trust Lands

N.D. Const.

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Section 1

All proceeds of the public lands that have been, or may be granted by the
United States for the support of the common schools in this state; all such per centum as may
be granted by the United States on the sale of public lands; the proceeds of property that fall to
the state by escheat; all gifts, donations, or the proceeds thereof that come to the state for
support of the common schools, or not otherwise appropriated by the terms of the gift, and all
other property otherwise acquired for common schools, must be and remain a perpetual trust
fund for the maintenance of the common schools of the state. All property, real or personal,
received by the state from whatever source, for any specific educational or charitable
institution, unless otherwise designated by the donor, must be and remain a perpetual trust
fund for the creation and maintenance of such institution, and may be commingled only with
similar funds for the same institution. If a gift is made to an institution for a specific purpose,
without designating a trustee, the gift may be placed in the institution's fund; provided that such
a donation may be expended as the terms of the gift provide. Revenues earned by a perpetual
trust fund must be deposited in the fund. The costs of administering a perpetual trust fund may
be paid out of the fund. The perpetual trust funds must be managed to preserve their
purchasing power and to maintain stable distributions to fund beneficiaries.

Section 2

Distributions from the common schools trust fund, together with the net
proceeds of all fines for violation of state laws and all other sums which may be added by law,
must be faithfully used and applied each year for the benefit of the common schools of the
state and no part of the fund must ever be diverted, even temporarily, from this purpose or
used for any purpose other than the maintenance of common schools as provided by law.
Distributions from an educational or charitable institution's trust fund must be faithfully used
and applied each year for the benefit of the institution and no part of the fund may ever be
diverted, even temporarily, from this purpose or used for any purpose other than the
maintenance of the institution, as provided by law.
For the biennium during which this amendment takes effect, distributions from the
perpetual trust funds must be the greater of the amount distributed in the preceding biennium
or ten percent of the five
-
year average value of trust assets, excluding the value of lands and
minerals. Thereafter, biennial distributions from the perpetual trust funds must be ten percent
of the five
-
year average value of trust assets, excluding the value of lands and minerals. The
average value of trust assets is determined by using the assets' ending value for the fiscal year
that ends one year before the beginning of the biennium and the assets' ending value for the
four preceding fiscal years. Equal amounts must be distributed during each year of the
biennium.

Section 3

The superintendent of public instruction, governor, attorney general, secretary
of state and state treasurer comprise a board of commissioners, to be denominated the "board
of university and school lands". Subject to the provisions of this article and any law that may be
passed by the legislative assembly, the board has control of the appraisement, sale, rental,
and disposal of all school and university lands, and the proceeds from the sale of such lands
shall be invested as provided by law.

Section 4

The public officers designated by law shall constitute boards of appraisal and
under the authority of the state board of university and school lands shall appraise all school
lands within their respective counties which they may from time to time recommend for sale at
their actual value under the prescribed terms and shall first select and designate for sale the
most valuable lands.
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Section 5

After one year from the assembling of the first legislative assembly the lands
granted to the state from the United States for the support of the common schools, may be
sold upon the following conditions and no other: No more than one
-
fourth of all such lands
shall be sold within the first five years after the same become salable by virtue of this section.
No more than one
-
half of the remainder within ten years after the same become salable as
aforesaid. The residue may be sold at any time after the expiration of said ten years. The
legislative assembly shall provide for the sale of all school lands subject to the provisions of
this article. In all sales of lands subject to the provisions of this article all minerals therein,
including but not limited to oil, gas, coal, cement materials, sodium sulphate, sand and gravel,
road material, building stone, chemical substances, metallic ores, uranium ores, or colloidal or
other clays, shall be reserved and excepted to the state of North Dakota, except that leases
may be executed for the extraction and sale of such materials in such manner and upon such
terms as the legislative assembly may provide.

Section 6

No original grant school or institutional land shall be sold for less than the fair
market value thereof, and in no case for less than ten dollars ($10.00) per acre, provided that
when lands have been sold on contract and the contract has been canceled, such lands may
be resold without reappraisement by the board of appraisal. The purchaser shall pay twenty
(20) percent of the purchase price at the time the contract is executed; thereafter annual
payments shall be made of not less than six (6) percent of the original purchase price. An
amount equal to not less than three (3) percent per annum of the unpaid principal shall be
credited to interest and the balance shall be applied as payment on principal as credit on
purchase price. The purchaser may pay all or any installment or installments not yet due to any
interest paying date. If the purchaser so desires, he may pay the entire balance due on his
contract with interest to date of payment at any time and he will then be entitled to proper
conveyance.
All sales shall be held at the county seat of the county in which the land to be sold is
situated, and shall be at public auction and to the highest bidder, and notice of such sale shall
be published once each week for a period of three weeks prior to the day of sale in a legal
newspaper published nearest the land and in the newspaper designated for the publication of
the official proceedings and legal notices within the county in which said land is situated.
No grant or patent for such lands shall issue until payment is made for the same; provided
that the land contracted to be sold by the state shall be subject to taxation from the date of the
contract. In case the taxes assessed against any of said lands for any year remain unpaid until
the first Monday in October of the following year, the contract of sale for such land shall, if the
board of university and school lands so determine, by it, be declared null and void. No contract
of sale heretofore made under the provisions of this section of the constitution as then
providing shall be affected by this amendment, except prepayment of principal may be made
as herein provided.
Any of said lands that may be required for townsite purposes, schoolhouse sites, church
sites, cemetery sites, sites for other educational or charitable institutions, public parks, airplane
landing fields, fairgrounds, public highways, railroad right of way, or other railroad uses and
purposes, reservoirs for the storage of water for irrigation, irrigation canals, and ditches,
drainage ditches, or for any of the purposes for which private lands may be taken under the
right of eminent domain under the constitution and laws of this state, may be sold under the
provisions of this article, and shall be paid for in full at the time of sale, or at any time thereafter
as herein provided. Any of said lands and any other lands controlled by the board of university
and school lands, including state coal mineral interests, may, with the approval of said board,
be exchanged for lands and coal mineral interests of the United States, the state of North
Dakota or any county or municipality thereof as the legislature may provide, and the lands so
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acquired shall be subject to the trust to which the lands exchanged therefor were subject, and
the state shall reserve all mineral and water power rights in land so transferred, except coal
mineral interests approved for exchange by the board of university and school lands under this
section.
When any of said lands have been heretofore or may be hereafter sold on contract, and
the purchaser or his heirs or assigns is unable to pay in full for the land purchased within
twenty years after the date of purchase and such contract is in default and subject to being
declared null and void as by law provided, the board of university and school lands may, after
declaring such contract null and void, resell the land described in such contract to such
purchaser, his heirs or assigns, for the amount of the unpaid principal, together with interest
thereon reckoned to the date of such resale at the rate of not less than three (3%) percent, but
in no case shall the resale price be more than the original sale price; such contract of resale
shall be upon the terms herein provided, provided this section shall be deemed self
-
executing
insofar as the provisions for resale herein made are concerned.

Section 7

All lands received by the state for any specific educational or charitable
institution shall be appraised and sold in the same manner and under the same limitations and
subject to all the conditions as to price and sale as provided in this constitution for the
appraisal and sale of lands for the benefit of common schools. However, a distinct and
separate account shall be kept by the proper officers of each of said funds and the limitations
as to the time in which school land may be sold shall apply only to lands granted for the
support of common schools.

Section 8

The legislative assembly shall have authority to provide by law for the leasing
of lands granted to the state for educational and charitable purposes; but no such law shall
authorize the leasing of said lands for a longer period than five years. Said lands shall only be
leased for pasturage and meadow purposes and at a public auction after notice as heretofore
provided in case of sale; provided, that all of said school lands now under cultivation may be
leased, at the discretion and under the control of the board of university and school lands, for
other than pasturage and meadow purposes until sold. All rents shall be paid in advance.
Provided, further, that coal lands may also be leased for agricultural cultivation upon such
terms and conditions and for such a period, not exceeding five years, as the legislature may
provide.

Section 9

No law shall ever be passed by the legislative assembly granting to any
person, corporation or association any privileges by reason of the occupation, cultivation or
improvement of any public lands by said person, corporation or association subsequent to the
survey thereof by the general government. No claim for the occupation, cultivation or
improvement of any public lands shall ever be recognized, nor shall such occupation,
cultivation or improvement of any public lands ever be used to diminish either directly or
indirectly, the purchase price of said lands.

Section 10

The legislative assembly may provide by law for the sale or disposal of all
public lands that have been, or may hereafter be granted by the United States to the state for
purposes other than set forth in article IX, section 1. The legislative assembly in providing for
the appraisal, sale, rental, and disposal of the same shall not be subject to the provisions and
limitations of article IX, sections 1 through 11.

Section 11

The legislative assembly shall pass suitable laws for the safekeeping, transfer
and disbursement of the state school funds; and shall require all officers charged with the
same or the safekeeping thereof to give ample bonds for all moneys and funds received by
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them, and if any of said officers shall convert to his own use in any manner or form, or shall
loan with or without interest or shall deposit in his own name, or otherwise than in the name of
the state of North Dakota, or shall deposit in any banks or with any person or persons, or
exchange for other funds or property any portion of the school funds aforesaid or purposely
allow any portion of the same to remain in his own hands uninvested, except in the manner
prescribed by law, every such act shall constitute an embezzlement of so much of the
aforesaid school funds as shall be thus taken or loaned, or deposited, or exchanged, or
withheld and shall be a felony; and any failure to pay over, produce or account for, the state
school funds or any part of the same entrusted to any such officer, as by law required or
demanded, shall be held and be taken to be prima facie evidence of such embezzlement.

Section 12

The following public institutions of the state are permanently located at the
places hereinafter named, each to have the lands specifically granted to it by the United States
in the Act of Congress approved February 22, 1889, to be disposed of and used in such
manner as the legislative assembly may prescribe subject to the limitations provided in the
article on school and public lands contained in this constitution.
1.
The seat of government at the city of Bismarck in the county of Burleigh.
2.
The state university and the school of mines at the city of Grand Forks, in the county
of Grand Forks.
3.
The North Dakota state university of agriculture and applied science at the city of
Fargo, in the county of Cass.
4.
A state normal school at the city of Valley City, in the county of Barnes, and the
legislative assembly, in apportioning the grant of eighty thousand acres of land for
normal schools made in the Act of Congress referred to shall grant to the said normal
school at Valley City, as aforementioned, fifty thousand (50,000) acres, and said
lands are hereby appropriated to said institution for that purpose.
5.
The school for the deaf and hard of hearing at the city of Devils Lake, in the county of
Ramsey.
6.
A state training school at the city of Mandan, in the county of Morton.
7.
A state normal school at the city of Mayville, in the county of Traill, and the legislative
assembly in apportioning the grant of lands made by Congress in the Act aforesaid
for state normal schools shall assign thirty thousand (30,000) acres to the institution
hereby located at Mayville, and said lands are hereby appropriated for said purpose.
8.
A state hospital for the care of individuals with mental illness at the city of
Jamestown, in the county of Stutsman. And the legislative assembly shall appropriate
twenty thousand acres of the grant of lands made by the Act of Congress aforesaid
for other educational and charitable institutions to the benefit and for the endowment
of said institution, and there shall be located at or near the city of Grafton, in the
county of Walsh, a facility for individuals with developmental disabilities, on the
grounds purchased by the secretary of the interior for a penitentiary building.

Section 13

The following public institutions are located as provided, each to have so
much of the remaining grant of one hundred seventy thousand acres of land made by the
United States for "other educational and charitable institutions" as is allotted by law:
1.
A soldiers' home, when located, or such other charitable institution as the legislative
assembly may determine, at the city of Lisbon in the county of Ransom, with a grant
of forty thousand acres of land.
2.
The school for the blind at the city of Grand Forks in the county of Grand Forks or at
such other location as may be determined by the legislative assembly to be in the
best interests of the students of such institution and the state of North Dakota.
3.
A school of forestry, or such other institution as the legislative assembly may
determine, at such place in one of the counties of McHenry, Ward, Bottineau, or
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Rolette, as the electors of said counties may determine by an election for that
purpose, to be held as provided by the legislative assembly.
4.
A school of science or such other educational or charitable institution as the
legislative assembly may prescribe, at the city of Wahpeton in the county of Richland,
with a grant of forty thousand acres.
5.
A state college at the city of Minot in the county of Ward.
6.
A state college at the city of Dickinson in the county of Stark.
7.
A state hospital for the care of individuals with mental illness at such place within this
state as shall be selected by the legislative assembly.
No other institution of a character similar to any one of those located by article IX, section 12,
or this section shall be established or maintained without an amendment of this constitution.
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