Lincoln University in Jefferson City is the center of a U.S. District Court filing Wednesday, alleging the college has been historically underfunded (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).Current and former Lincoln University students are suing the State of Missouri for nearly $550 million to address what they allege are decades of inequitable funding that they say has hurt the college’s academic programs and facilities.
In a complaint filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, their attorneys claim the state has treated its two land-grant institutions — Lincoln University and the University of Missouri — unequally.
The lawsuit is part of a larger effort called the 1890 Project, which is seeking to draw national attention to funding disparities at historically Black land-grant universities. Its founder, Donald Calloway Jr., is a former Missouri House member who leads a law firm and strategic advisory firm.
Central to the lawsuit is a letter the United States Secretaries of Agriculture and Education sent in September 2023 to then-Gov. Mike Parson, outlining a funding disparity of $361.6 million between fiscal years 1987 and 2020.
Lincoln is one of 19 historically Black colleges and universities designated as a land-grant institution under the Second Morrill Act of 1890. At the time, states were required to either allow Black students to attend their existing land-grant universities established under the 1862 Morrill Act or operate a second college for Black students that would receive federal land-grant support.
A monument at the center of Lincoln University’s campus in Jefferson City commemorates soldiers of the 62nd United States Colored Infantry, who helped establish the institution in 1866 (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).
Missouri is one of 19 states to choose the latter, designating Lincoln in Jefferson City as its 1890 land-grant institution. In 2023, federal officials wrote to 16 of those states, saying they had underfunded historically Black land-grant universities by billions of dollars over decades.
The Lincoln lawsuit focuses in part on how Missouri provided the state money needed to match federal funding for the university’s agricultural programs.
Each year the U.S. Department of Agriculture gives grant money to land-grant institutions to support agricultural programs and research with the expectation that states will match the investment. Waivers allow 1890 land-grant universities to pull their full federal grant without the full 1:1 match if they can put forward at least 50%.
From fiscal years 2000 through 2007, the state did not earmark any funds for Lincoln’s land-grant programs, according to the court filing. And from 2008 to 2021, the state gave anywhere between 11% and 51% of the required match.
To avoid leaving federal money on the table, Lincoln administrators diverted some of its core funding to grow its agricultural programs and obtain the full USDA grants, totaling $43.5 million between 2000 and 2016.
“Missouri’s failure to appropriate the required state match did not merely leave a gap in Lincoln University’s funding,” attorneys wrote in the lawsuit. “It forced Lincoln to cannibalize its own core institutional operating budget to survive.”
Missouri lawmakers push for study of Lincoln University funding inequity
In 2023, state lawmakers requested a study of the funding inequity, but their proposal to create a special committee was never approved by legislative leaders.
At the time, Lincoln President John Moseley told The Independent that the college’s buildings were suffering as a result of the diverted funds. He estimated that it would cost $87 million to make the necessary repairs.
Students and alumni who brought the lawsuit say the consequences extend beyond aging buildings, affecting their health, finances and quality of life.
One of the plaintiffs, Makhi Joseph Berinyuy Jaff, took photos, videos and interviewed other students during his time at Lincoln in 2023 and 2024.
He described his experience in a presentation called “The Effect of Underfunding” that attorneys are presenting as evidence. In a handful of slides, Jaff shows photos of his “downtrodden” dormitory Perry Hall.
“Last year the pipes completely burst, leaving open feces to disperse. Perry smelled disgusting, and they still left this dormitory open. We had to live in the smell for several weeks,” he wrote alongside photos of a 1960s, communal-style bathroom.
Jaydan Monee Ware began attending Lincoln in 2025 and was placed in Tull Hall as her dormitory, “where the ventilation in her room was visibly dirty and where she experienced respiratory and allergic symptoms she had never before experienced,” the lawsuit says.
Other plaintiffs said problems with food in campus dining halls forced them to spend additional money eating elsewhere.
Ware has a cousin who attends the University of Missouri.
“I can see how much more funding they have than us,” she told her attorneys. If Lincoln received equal funding, she could “live somewhere where I don’t have to worry about eating, or mold in my vents.”
While Lincoln pushed off building repairs to be able to receive its USDA grants, the lawsuit says, the University of Missouri received its full match from the state.
Between 2011 and 2022, the University of Missouri received $191.7 million in federal grants with a state investment of $192.7 million, according to USDA data.
The lawsuit also takes aim at a performance-funding formula adopted in 2012 by the Missouri Coordinating Board for Higher Education that determines state aid for universities based on factors like degree attainment and financial efficiency. The board is currently looking for a replacement to its current funding strategy.
Attorneys allege that Lincoln’s land-grant funding from the state is conditioned on the performance metric while the University of Missouri’s is not.
“This two-tiered system requires a historically Black institution to qualify for funds that are statutorily owed to it, while the predominantly white institution receives equivalent support automatically,” they wrote.
The plaintiffs argue that the differing treatment amounts to unconstitutional race discrimination and violates the Equal Protection Clause.
The lawsuit asks the court to oversee a remedial fund, for which the state would owe nearly $550 million, and ensure equal funding going forward.
Defendants include the Coordinating Board for Higher Education, Higher Education Commissioner Bennett Boggs, Gov. Mike Kehoe and University of Missouri President Mun Choi.
Following the announcement of the lawsuit, the Missouri Legislative Black Caucus released a statement in support of fair funding for the university.
“Lincoln University has served Missourians for generations, and its future matters to communities across our state,” said state Rep. Michael Johnson, a Democrat from Kansas City and chair of the Missouri Legislative Black Caucus. “We support the students and alumni and we welcome thoughtful, good-faith work toward a resolution that strengthens the university and benefits Missouri.”
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