Since bishop John Caroll founded Georgetown College in 1789, catholic universities and university-level colleges, numbering today as many as 230 institutiones, have had, through their training of generations of catholic leaders and their contributions to secular and sacred scholarship a profound influence on the life of the Church in the U.S. The author studies the various ways in which these institutions have related to the church, before controlled by the sponsoring religious institutes, developed greater autonomy from them.