The initial proposal was so secret that the investigatory committee was titled the "Special Committee on an Important Problem" but by November 1933 the proposal had become public knowledge and created a strong backlash among Northwestern students, faculty, and alumni as well as members of the Evanston community. Opponents accused the University of Chicago of attempting to appropriate Northwestern's tax-free charter to avoid $300,000 in annual taxes, while an anonymous author promised a $25 million endowment on the condition that there be only one university in the Chicago area, while still other rumors purported that the merger was a plan for the city of Chicago to annex Evanston. However, a significant stumbling block concerned each university's respective medical schools which differed significantly in their respective approaches to teaching and research.