This dissertation explores the history of the Truman Commission, the United States' first national commission on higher education policy, and the origins of its case for federal aid to support universal college access. Historians and higher education scholars cite the Truman Commission's report, "Higher Education for American Democracy," as a "harbinger of" and "blueprint for" the growth of higher education after World War II. While acknowledging such accounts of the commission's influence on postwar higher education policy, this dissertation challenges popular narratives about the Truman Commission by exploring the deep roots of its recommendations and the complex, even contradictory, views of its members about the relationship between higher education, democracy, and the American state. Using a biographical (or prosopographical) approach that foregrounds the experiences of the commission's members between World War I and World War II, the dissertation examines the history of American higher education and the dynamics of public policy formation from multiple perspectives that stretch the bounds of institutional or policy history and paint an expansive and differentiated portrait of the "social role" of higher education in American society in the twentieth century. I argue that the commission must be remembered not only for making the seminal case for universal college access as a national priority, but also for revealing the complicated politics of federal higher education policy and for anticipating the perennial challenge of achieving equal opportunity in American education, especially "higher" education, over the last seventy years. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com.bibliotheek.ehb.be/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]